earth-from-spaceThe evolution of the universe and the evolution of life provision the religious naturalist with a wondrous grand narrative.

The 13.8-billion-year saga includes the generation of our star and our planet ~4.6 billion years ago and our species ~150,000 years ago. All of modern life shares a common chemistry and a common ancestry, and inhabits countless interdependent ecosystems.

Offered below are links to books, videos, and websites that present accessible accounts of our current science-based understandings of the natural world.

If you have suggestions of additional materials, please contact us at: RNAcomments@gmail.com.

Books

Cosmology and Physics

Big Bang: The Origin of the Universecosmos-nasa-m81-in-ursa-major

QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter

The Particle at the End of the Universe: How the Hunt for the Higgs Boson Leads Us to the Edge of a New World

A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing

The Hidden Reality: Parallel Universes and the Deep Laws of the Cosmos

From Eternity to Here: The Quest for the Ultimate Theory of Time

Death by Black Hole: And Other Cosmic Quandaries

The Fabric of the Cosmos: Space, Time, and the Texture of Reality

The Grand Design

The Accidental Universe

At Home in the Universe: The Search for Laws of Complexity

The Serengeti Rules: The Quest to Discover How Life Works and Why It Matters

Earth history

The Story of Earth: The First 4.5 Billion Years, from Stardust to Living Planetcontinents

Reading the Rocks: The Autobiography of the Earth

Annals of the Former World

Evolution

Life Ascending: The Ten Great Inventions of Evolution

Why Evolution Is Trueevolution-fish

Teaching Big History

The Ancestor’s Tale

Incomplete Nature: How Mind Emerged from Matter

Journey of the Universe

A Short History of Nearly Everything

The Social Conquest of Earth

The Evolution of Everything

The Vital Question

The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning, and the Universe Itself

The Serengeti Rules: The Quest to Discover How Life Works and Why It Matters

        Improbable Destinies: Fate, Chance, and the Future of Evolution

        Origin Story: A Big History of Everything

Multicellular development

Endless Forms Most Beautiful: The New Science of Evo Devo

Your Inner Fish

The Regulatory Genome: Gene Regulatory Networks In Development And Evolution

Brilliant Green: The Surprising History of Plant Intelligence

Books for Young Readers

The Turtle and the Universe

Our Family Tree: An Evolution Story

Before the Beginning: A Child’s First Book of the Great Story

Born with a Bang: The Universe Tells Our Cosmic Story: Book 1

From Lava to Life: The Universe Tells Our Earth Story: Book 2

Mammals Who Morph: The Universe Tells Our Evolution Story: Book 3

The Universe Verse

Everybody Needs a Rock

The Other Way to Listen

I’m In Charge of Celebrations

The Way To Start a Day

I’m Lucy: A Day in the Life of a Young Bonobo

Origins, Being Human, and Other Stories for Children

The Magic of Reality: How We Know What’s Really True

The Great Story

Grandmother Fish: A Child’s first book of Evolution

Duck, Death, and The Tulip

         The Stuff of Stars

Videography

Journey of the UniverseDNA Strands

Journey of the Universe (Mary Evelyn Tucker, Chautauqua)

Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey

Connecting Kids to the Cosmos (TEDx, Bob Blain)

Emergence (NOVA video)

Life’s Greatest Miracle (NOVA video)

Earth on Edge

Arrow of Time

Websites

Big History Project

13.7 Cosmos and Culture (blog)

Environment 360

Deep Time Journey Network

HubbleSite

Astronomy Picture of the Day

NOVA Nature

Exploring Life’s Origins (Boston Museum of Science)

Nature’s Depths

Frans de Waal (public page; animal intelligence)

Towards The Moon Blog