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I Contain Multitudes
- The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life
- Narrated by: Charlie Anson
- Length: 9 hrs and 52 mins
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Summary
Your body is teeming with tens of trillions of microbes. It's an entire world, a colony full of life. In other words, you contain multitudes. These microscopic companions sculpt our organs, protect us from diseases, guide our behaviour and bombard us with their genes. They also hold the key to understanding all life on earth.
In I Contain Multitudes, Ed Yong opens our eyes and invites us to marvel at ourselves and other animals in a new light, less as individuals and more as thriving ecosystems. We learn the invisible and wondrous science behind the corals that construct mighty reefs and the squid that create their own light shows. We see how bacteria can alter our response to cancer-fighting drugs, tune our immune system, influence our evolution and even modify our genetic make-up. And we meet the scientists who are manipulating these microscopic partners to our advantage.
In a million tiny ways, I Contain Multitudes will radically change how you think about the natural world - and how you see yourself.
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What listeners say about I Contain Multitudes
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- Millymagpie
- 14-09-16
Very enjoyable read
Any additional comments?
One of the most informative books on the microbiome, dispels some myths, challenges the new multi billion dollar probiotic / fermented food movement. This book gives a very balanced factual look at how we destroy our microbiome with the overuse of antibacterial products, western diet / lifestyle and drugs especially antibiotics. Unlike many other books I have read on the topic this book clearly states that there is no magic solutlion such as stool transplants and change in diet / lifestyle, while these may work the main point I got from reading this is that we are all different and what will work for one person will not work for another! So will I give up my kombucha and probiotics - hummm probabily not however I will not put as much faith in such supposed miracle foods and supplements.
My main takeaways:
We are all different, very different so one solution does not fit all.
Trying to recolonise your microbiome doesn't always work as fermented foods and probiotics seem to produce a temporary alteration in bacteria which can return to your original state shortly after - so don't waist your money!
Stop using antibacterial products, stop cleaning so much (excellent I say), open your windows & eat fiber!
Excellent read, interesting informative and yes this book had an impact on how I live
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35 people found this helpful
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- Lakeskip
- 03-11-16
Really Fascinating Stuff.
Who knew we had so much going on in us! There's no way I would have got all the way through this in printed form. (Not because of the content but due to my attention span for the technical stuff being too short) but so glad I bought it as thoroughly enjoyed it, so very interesting and the narrators voice is just right. It's one of the books I'll listen to again.
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14 people found this helpful
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- Cian Hickey
- 01-11-16
Excellent, interesting science book for anyone.
Lots of amazing information on a largely hidden world. The author makes the topic of microbes very interesting and engaging. Faultless narration.
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10 people found this helpful
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- Tony
- 19-10-16
Excellent. A window into our fascinating world.
This is on a par with The Selfish Gene, Guns, Germs and Steel and the Vital Question as a book which adds a whole new perspective on what we are.
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8 people found this helpful
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- Wras
- 17-11-17
They are legion and we but one environment
Everything is interlaced, all life is an exchange a compromise with other life, the macro and microscopy are one, developing and destroying in one fluid motion, changing, competing, inventing in chemical signals, in every encounter helping and infecting, colonising being colonized. this book like the life it describes has colonized my thoughts my view of the world; I have lost my singularity in a vast symbiosis that is me, and the singularity of all living things has become a universe within universes. Shaking hands has become an act of exchange, my dog is no longer one animal but a microbial ambassador made of millions of hosts.
A fantastic reality explained and exposed to brilliant ideas and possibilities; Science answering thousands of questions and creating millions more, life's mysteries augmented by including the invisible engineers and chemist within all of us animals.
A great read that needs to be repeated.
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4 people found this helpful
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- polly
- 10-10-17
Amazingly interesting
This is a book for non specialist scientists containing many academic references and paths of research work. Essentially anyone should be able to understand it, but I found it helpful to have a copy of the hardback from the library to hand so I could reread passages I had not fully understood. I also downloaded diagrams from the net to further enable my understanding.
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3 people found this helpful
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- EmmaM
- 19-04-23
Good and bad
This book is brilliantly researched and utterly fascinating. The influence of the biome, how it is put together and what it does is extraordinary. Understanding that these microbes are not merely passengers but active participants which shape every part of our lives is a mind bending perspective, particularly in the realm of behaviour, mental health and developmental differences such as autism.
Sadly however, the production on this audiobook is so awful that if the content weren’t so compelling, I would have abandoned it.
British audiobook production companies need to up their game. Research how the Americans do it. Employ some proof listeners. Employ producers who give a fig about the end product, honour the content and respect the performer’s work. Stop inserting short retakes cobbled together like some ghastly queue greeting on a hospital switchboard. If a word needs to be replaced, then a whole section should be re-recorded. I don’t want to be distracted by constant changes of vocal tone, narrator energy and acoustic atmosphere. Ultimately, I believe that recognisably new sessions need to be restricted to the beginning of each chapter. Muffle the slimy mouth and tongue noises (mercifully not an issue on this recording), which have rendered all Bill Bryson’s self-narrated books unlistenable. Stop with the cod-American accents on non-fiction (again not an issue here), and require the performer to practise pronouncing difficult terms so that they don’t hesitate during the narration. Have them then practise using such terms within the context so that the sentence sounds fluent and makes sense. Find a pronunciation unit and use it. Whichever pronunciation you choose, use it consistently.
In conclusion, I find that although the content of the book is 10/10, the production is so cheap, amateurish and substandard that it needs to be entirely re-recorded to do the book any justice.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Amazon Customer
- 24-12-21
a bit fluffy
There is a lot of very good science backed information in this book, but it is somewhat spoiled by the author's insistance on describing the character, appearance and surroundings of the people he has gathered his information off.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 04-01-18
Fascinating
Extremely well written and read. A fascinating listen. Recommend to everyone! Even if you have just a passing interest in science.
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2 people found this helpful
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- KT
- 26-11-17
Microbes are amazing...
Brilliant, informative, well researched with some cutting edge material included, so we can look forward towards new knowledge and applications - respect to the multitudes!
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1 person found this helpful