Alan MacFarlane

This refreshing guide has been written by Alan Macfarlane, a Fellow of King's College for over forty years and currently a Life Fellow and Emeritus Professor of Anthropology. It is written in collaboration with Patricia McGuire, the King's College Archivist, illustrated by Bridget Strevens Marzo who studied at King's, and assisted by the Fellow Librarian Peter Jones.

We live in a confused and confusing world. This is partlycaused by the massive growth of inter-civilisational contactsdriven by economic, cultural and communication changes. Itis urgent that we understand each other if we are to surviveand thrive, yet most of us know very little about the worldoutside our own civilisation.This book describes the central features of four greatcivilisations, their history and culture: China, Japan, Europeand the Anglosphere. Through a comparison of their deeper cultural logic and through investigating their dreams and nightmares, their religious, economic, political and social similarities and differences, we may come to a deeper appreciation of their worlds and our own.Drawing on fifty years of travel through these different civilisations and teaching about them at the University of Cambridge, Alan Macfarlane explores how we can remain different and yet live in some sort of harmony through mutual appreciation and understanding.

Here I explain three ways in which we learn about our world - through participation, conversation and by absorbing creative works. I look at how this experience is worked upon, reshaped and communicated through our imagination and writing. Finally I look at how our interpretations are influenced by the wider cultural context. Alan Macfarlane, F.B.A., is an Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at Cambridge University and a Life Fellow of King's College. His website is alanmacfarlane.com

We live in a confused and confusing world. Populationgrowth, rapidly changing technologies, large migrations ofpeoples and ideas are changing everything faster. This is abrief historical overview of eight of the major problems weface and some radical ways of thinking about them. Theseinclude robots and work, computers and the internet, theincrease in life and health, the challenge to democracy, multiculturalism, educational changes, war and peace.Alan Macfarlane, F.B.A., is an Emeritus Professor ofAnthropology at Cambridge University and a Life Fellowof King's College. His website is alanmacfarlane.co

We live in a shrinking world where civilisations are colliding and people from all over the world are encountering former strangers as neighbours. So we need to understand each other's history and culture. To help with this deeper appreciation of the huge variety of humankind, here is a simple description of the basic features of five of the greatest current world civilisations - the Sino-sphere, Japano-sphere, Islamo-sphere, Euro-sphere and Anglo-sphere. Alan Macfarlane, F.B.A., is an Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at Cambridge University and a Life Fellow of King's College. His website is alanmacfarlane.com

The development of modern computers and Artificial Intelligence since the middle of the twentieth century is the greatest technological revolution since the invention of writing. This book explains how and why it happened, and what are the likely consequences of an exponential growth in the power of computers and robots - and how we can come to terms with this. Alan Macfarlane, F.B.A., is an Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at Cambridge University and a Life Fellow of King's College. His website is alanmacfarlane.com

I have spent the last sixty years trying to understand the world. I have studied for two doctorates at Oxford and London and travelled through Nepal, Japan and China. Here I will describe what I have found about asking questions, guessing, testing, assembling evidence, creative writing and the conditions of creativity. Alan Macfarlane, F.B.A., is an Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at Cambridge University and a Life Fellow of King's College. His website is alanmacfarlane.com

British education is designed to teach about society andpower, play and performance, the head and the heart, thespirit and character. It is a preparation for a certain kind of'modernity.' This book explains how education can make usmodern and the way in which such an education is differentfrom that of Europe and China.Alan Macfarlane, F.B.A., is an Emeritus Professor ofAnthropology at Cambridge University and a Life Fellowof King's College. His website is alanmacfarlane.com

The theme of this book is the transformation of a child through infancy, boarding schools and university, from the home to the wider society. By combining photographs and scans of documents, Alan Macfarlane presents an account of his 'education' from his birth in Assam, India, in 1941 through to the end of his undergraduate degree at Oxford University in 1963. This is part of a wider study of comparative education between China and the West. Alan Macfarlane, F.B.A., is an Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at Cambridge University and a Life Fellow of King's College. His website is alanmacfarlane.com

Adam Smith was one of the three founders of modernclassical economics, along with Malthus and Ricardo. Yethe was much more than an economist. He was a truepolymath with a vast width of knowledge and a close friendof the philosopher David Hume. To understand him wehave to look not just at his famous Wealth of Nations (1776)but also his Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759), Lectureson Jurisprudence (1982) and his Essays on PhilosophicalSubjects (1982). Bringing his life and work together we seea man who decisively shaped our modern world and laidout the blue-print for modern affluence.Alan Macfarlane, F.B.A., is an Emeritus Professor ofAnthropology at Cambridge University and a Life Fellowof King's College. His website is alanmacfarlane.com.

Alexis de Tocqueville was one of the greatest political scientists of all time. His Democracy in America (1835,1840) and Ancien Regime (1856) are classics. Yet his work is not always easy to understand since it needs to be seen as a work which combines his essays, letters, travels and other materials. Through an examination of all of these, we can see that Tocqueville, more than any other thinker, understood the deep roots of individualism, equality andfraternity and in doing so the origins of the modern world.His three-way comparison of France, England, and Americais unique and deeply illuminating.Alan Macfarlane, F.B.A., is an Emeritus Professor ofAnthropology at Cambridge University and a Life Fellowof King's College. His website is alanmacfarlane.com

Thomas Malthus was one of the three founders of moderneconomics, alongside Adam Smith and David Ricardo. Hewas also the founder of modern demography (populationstudies). In his Essay on the Principle of Population (1798), turned into a greatly expanded and in many ways differentbook in the second edition of 1803, Malthus laid out hisfamous laws of population, later amended to tendencies.The influence of this book has been immense, not merelyon theoretical discussions in economics and the socialsciences, but also in the practical legislation of the earlynineteenth century and the policies of those who ruled theBritish Empire. His theories also provided the key to theidea of natural selection for both Alfred Russell Wallaceand Charles Darwin.Alan Macfarlane, F.B.A., is an Emeritus Professor ofAnthropology at Cambridge University and a Life Fellowof King's College. His website is alanmacfarlane.com

Yukichi Fukuzawa is arguably the greatest Japanese socialthinker of the last three centuries. In numerous books, inparticular An Outline of a Theory of Civilization (1973) andAutobiography (1972) he outlined his many ideas, not leaston the raised status of women.By setting up bookshops, universities, schools, modernaccounting, and modern manufacturing he became oneof the principal architects of modern Japan, where hisimage is still on the highest-denomination Japanesebanknote. Through his travels to the West and readingof western philosophy, he discovered the secret essenceof civilization and modernity and explained this to hiscountrymen and women.Alan Macfarlane, F.B.A., is an Emeritus Professor ofAnthropology at Cambridge University and a Life Fellowof King's College. His website is alanmacfarlane.com.

Montesquieu is widely regarded as one of the founders ofmany of the social sciences. His broad erudition and deepconcentration led to his great work The Spirit of the Laws, published in 1748. Before that, he had written other notableworks including the Persian Letters, published in 1721. Byconsidering his life and his work in relation to each other, and all his works alongside each other, we can see insidethe mind of one of the greatest of modern thinkers. He wasthe first great global thinker who could base his work on sources from around the world. Alan Macfarlane, F.B.A., is an Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at Cambridge University and a Life Fellow of King's College. His website is alanmacfarlane.co

Account of life at a northern boarding school

From the preface: 'This is a book which synthesizes a lifetime of reflection on the origins of the modern world. Through forty years of travel in Europe, Australia, India, Nepal, Japan and China I have observed the similarities and differences of cultures. I have read as widely as possible in both contemporary and classical works in history, anthropology and philosophy.' Prof Macfarlane is also the author of The Culture of Capitalism, The Savage Wars of Peace, The Riddle of the Modern World and The Making of the Modern World, among many others. This is the third book published by Odd Volumes, the imprint of The Fortnightly Review.