Showing results by author "The Great Courses" in All Categories

In this audiobook, Roth takes you inside the trending world of financial independence and early retirement, giving you the tools both to achieve financial independence and to improve the quality of your everyday life. You'll explore the ins and outs of the "FIRE movement", a collection of ideas and habits that allow people to manage their money so they can quit working while they're young. You'll consider the shockingly simple math behind financial freedom.

Look beyond the abstract dates and figures, kings and queens, and battles and wars that make up so many historical accounts. Over the course of 48 richly detailed lectures, Professor Garland covers the breadth and depth of human history from the perspective of the so-called ordinary people, from its earliest beginnings through the Middle Ages.

Education can be enriching and transformative. It can also be downright excruciating—even demoralizing. When it comes to learning, why are some of us lovers and some of us haters? Welcome to the world of educational psychology, which uses science to explore what causes people to engage and learn, and what we can do to make learning opportunities more enjoyable and impactful. Spoiler alert: Teachers can only do so much. Students, too, must take control of their learning. Unfortunately, many of us never, ahem, learned the skills to do just that.

Grasp the important ideas that have served as the backbone of philosophy across the ages with this extraordinary 60-lecture series. This is your opportunity to explore the enormous range of philosophical perspectives and ponder the most important and enduring of human questions-without spending your life poring over dense philosophical texts.

Yoga originated in the Indus Valley more than 5,000 years ago. It wasn’t until the 20th century, however, that it found its way to the West, gradually growing from a fringe interest among countercultural youth to a mainstream fitness phenomenon that’s still going strong. We’ve all heard the countless benefits of yoga touted by lifestyle magazines and wellness influencers, but what does science have to say about the effects of this ancient mind-body practice? That is what you will explore in 10 Scientific Benefits of Yoga.

In the six lectures of How to Bring Your Creative Ideas to Life, Dr. Sharon Kim will dig into how creativity emerges and evolves, how individuals generate and refine ideas, and what it takes to bring yours to life. As you explore the science and art of creativity, you’ll not only engage with research and behavioral studies, but you’ll also hear real-world stories and gain practical tips you can use to spark creativity in your own life and work.

In 10 lectures for self-development, professional communications coach and speaker Carol Ann Lloyd teaches the best ways to communicate and listen, including how to focus on understanding, how to overcome barriers and distractions, and how to clarify intentions. When listeners step back to hear what makes conversations successful, they will learn that each component of a conversation is a piece of a larger puzzle, which only fits together when thoughtfully considered and executed.

What is life? What is my place in it? What choices do these questions obligate me to make? More than a half-century after it burst upon the intellectual scene - with roots that extend to the mid-19th century - Existentialism's quest to answer these most fundamental questions of individual responsibility, morality, and personal freedom, life has continued to exert a profound attraction.

Language defines us as a species, placing humans head and shoulders above even the most proficient animal communicators. But it also beguiles us with its endless mysteries, allowing us to ponder why different languages emerged, why there isn't simply a single language, how languages change over time and whether that's good or bad, and how languages die out and become extinct.

Most of us have a limited understanding of the powerful role economics has played in shaping human civilization. This makes economic history - the study of how civilizations structured their environments to provide food, shelter, and material goods - a vital lens through which to think about how we arrived at our present, globalized moment. Designed to fill a long-empty gap in how we think about modern history, these 48 lectures are a comprehensive journey through more than 600 years of economic history.

Taught by award-winning Professor Patrick Grim of the State University of New York at Stony Brook, The Philosopher’s Toolkit: How to Be the Most Rational Person in Any Room arms you against the perils of bad thinking and supplies you with an arsenal of strategies to help you be more creative, logical, inventive, realistic, and rational in all aspects of your daily life.

Over 5,000 years, India has been home to a rich tapestry of peoples and cultures. Two of the world's great religions - Hinduism and Buddhism - have their origins in South Asia, and the lands east of the Indus River have long been a central hub for trade, migration, and cultural exchange. Today the subcontinent contains 20 percent of the world's population and is a thriving center for global business, making this region one of most significant economic powerhouses in the world.

Thinking of starting a consulting business? Knowing how to craft an effective business plan is the first step. What’s next? Finding clients and knowing how much to charge. Plus, the consultancy must be properly marketed. And don’t forget other aspects of consulting, from answering an RFP to knowing when to walk away from a problem client. This business course from The Teaching Company and lecturer Dr. Allison Friederichs delivers all this and more.

Your nervous system is you. All the thoughts, perceptions, moods, passions, and dreams that make you an active, sentient being are the work of this amazing network of cells. For many centuries, people knew this was true. But no one was sure how it happened. Now, thanks to the exciting new field of neuroscience, we can chart the workings of the brain and the rest of the nervous system in remarkable detail to explain how neurons, synapses, neurotransmitters, and other biological processes produce all the experiences of everyday life, in every stage of life.

From the days of Freud and Skinner to the modern science of fMRIs and genetics, Introduction to Psychology is a grand introduction to one of the most captivating fields of inquiry - where the subject is you, and everyone around you. Taught by Professor Catherine A. Sanderson of Amherst College, these 36 insightful lessons not only give you a panoramic grounding in the history, methods, and fundamental findings of psychology, but they also introduce you to the most up-to-date 21st-century research and discoveries.

We rely on effective research in many areas of life, and at times our lives even depend on it. But what is it that makes research effective? Any good research rests upon, above all else, method. In these 24 dynamic lectures, you’ll discover the remarkable procedures and techniques that make research such a powerful tool. This brilliantly conceived course gives you a deep, detailed, and practical guide to proper research methods - methods that are broadly applicable to all kinds of research.

Every day of your life is spent surrounded by mysteries that involve what appear to be rather ordinary human behaviors. What makes you happy? Where did your personality come from? Why do you have trouble controlling certain behaviors? Why do you behave differently as an adult than you did as an adolescent?Since the start of recorded history, and probably even before, people have been interested in answering questions about why we behave the way we do.

The 10 enlightening (and often humorous) lectures of Medieval Myths and Mysteries will show you how far from the “dark” times of legend these centuries were. Uncover the facts about the Knights Templar. Reveal the truth behind the tales of legendary creatures like the Questing Beast and the unicorn. Trace the events of the Black Death and the ways it altered the world in its wake, and much more. With Professor Armstrong, you will dig deep into the ways that later generations reshaped the narrative of the medieval years and perpetuated the myths.

Recent years have seen the introduction of concepts from the new and exciting field of complexity science that have captivated the attention of economists, sociologists, engineers, businesspeople, and many others. These include tipping points, the wisdom of crowds, six degrees of separation (or Kevin Bacon), and emergence. Complexity science can shed light on why businesses or economies succeed and fail, how epidemics spread and can be stopped, and what causes ecological systems to rebalance themselves after a disaster.

No skill is more important in today's world than being able to think about, understand, and act on information in an effective and responsible way. What's more, at no point in human history have we had access to so much information, with such relative ease, as we do in the 21st century. But because misinformation out there has increased as well, critical thinking is more important than ever. These 24 rewarding lectures equip you with the knowledge and techniques you need to become a savvier, sharper critical thinker in your professional and personal life.