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Are you looking for more recommendations to read books this 2024?
Then you're in the right place!
As a Psychologist with a background in Neuroscience, Comparative Psychology, and a big passion for science, I have tons of books to recommend to you, but that could be a matter of other posts (otherwise it will be a never-ending article haha).
Here I will focus on my favorite book of 2023. One that completely changed my life.
If you're interested in other books, I already wrote an article recommending 5 Neuroscience Books for beginners to read in 2024. You can find it here:
Let's go into it!
My Favorite Lecture of 2023
As you may know already (and if not you can check my articles), I love animals. I love to write about their intelligence, behavior, cognition, and consciousness.
However, I never found the topic that I wanted to read about: how animals perceive and experience the world.
But as I was googling for more and more books about animals, I finally found it! And it is one that was released in 2023.
And the book is …
An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us
This book is just FANTASTIC. I completely fell in love with it, and I devoured it in just a few days.
I never felt like this with a book, and I don't see too many recommendations about it. So I have the necessity to tell the world how incredible is this piece of art.
Ed Yong amazingly put a memorable work into the science behind how animals perceive and experience the world.
The philosophy of the book relies on the concept of Umwelt, which refers to the perceptive world of an animal, a sensory bubble.
I also wrote an article about Umwelt if you're interested:
Ed then starts by writing about our principal way to perceive and experience the world: vision.
I loved so much how he focused on other species and described how vision is in those other animals.
In the following chapters, he focused on:
- Pain: can animals experience pain?
- Heat and Cold
- Contact
- Vibrations
- Sound
- Echoes
- Electric Fields
- Magnetic Fields
- Everything Together
- Umwelt and Sensory Contamination
What Do I Think About the Book?
As a psychologist with a background in Neuroscience and Comparative Psychology, I think this book was a game changer in the dissemination of animal behavior and cognition.
The book is full of references and consultation with experts. It covers species from dogs to bats, octopuses, and several insects to cetaceans, fish, and more.
As Ed pointed out, the philosophy of the book remarks that studying other animals is not a matter of superiority, but diversity.
He did an excellent job pointing out the beautiful diversity we have in this world shared with our fellow animals.
I also loved how he dedicated a full chapter about the sensory contaminations that we humans are doing to other species.
We bring light into darkness, making life hard for nocturnal species. We bring sounds in silence, affecting other species. This sensory contamination is also leading to the threat of species extinction.
Is an urgent topic that needs to be addressed, so I very much appreciate that he wrote about it.
As I said in the title, this book was my favorite lecture in 2023, and I rate this book with:
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Conclusion
If you love animals, or you're a science enthusiast, or you're just a curious person who loves to read and learn new things, then you will completely fall in love with this book.
I never felt that with a book before, and I don't see too many people recommending it, so I feel the necessity to tell you that this book is unique and fantastic.
If you decide to read this book, I really hope that you enjoy it just as much as I did
Thanks for reading, and have an awesome day! Take care of animals!
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Cheers!
📚 Reference
Yong, E. (2022). An immense world: How animal senses reveal the hidden realms around us. Knopf Canada.