Shortform Books

Geothermal Energy in the US: Pros, Cons, & Future Prospects

Why aren’t we using more geothermal energy in the US? What are the benefits of switching to geothermal energy? America is the world’s leading producer of geothermal energy—but that currently generates less than 1% of the nation’s power. The US hopes to see geothermal generate 8.5% of electricity by 2050, but the cost and accessibility to tap the resource pose significant challenges. Below we’ll explore what geothermal energy is, its benefits and downsides, and prospects for its expansion.

How to Understand Your Emotions & Stop Suppressing Them

Why is it bad to suppress your emotions? How do you understand your emotions effectively? Steve Magness’s book Do Hard Things attributes self-improvement and healthy toughness to the ability to understand your emotions. This is because when you ignore your emotions, you’re not allowing yourself to live life as fully as possible. Check out how to understand your emotions so you can make good decisions and be mentally strong.

Mere Christianity Discussion Questions: Apply C. S. Lewis’s Ideas

Would you like to internalize the concepts in the classic book Mere Christianity? How can you make them come alive in your life and ministry? In Mere Christianity, C. S. Lewis sets out to explain and defend Christian beliefs to a skeptical modern audience. Through his essays, Lewis—whom many Christians regard as an important lay theologian—argues for the existence of God, the divinity of Christ, and the benefits of a virtuous life. Continue reading for several Mere Christianity discussion questions that will help you apply the book’s ideas to your own life.

There Are Too Many Apps—Here’s Why We Should Only Need One

How many apps do you have on your phone? Are there too many apps to keep up with? One of the main issues with technology today is that there’s too much of it. You have to use so many products and apps to perform tasks, when it would be much easier to just have a single app for everything. If you agree that there are too many apps for everything, keep reading for the solution.

How to Take Action on Your Goals: The 3 Steps to Success

4 Practices That Hinder Brave Leadership

Do you struggle to follow through with your goals? How can you stop falling off track and keep showing up for your goals? To make your goals a reality, you’ve got to take consistent actions toward them. Provided your goals are realistic and your actions are constructive and systematic, achieving them is only a matter of time. Here’s how to take action on your goals, according to self-help author Napoleon Hill.

Where Does Glucose Come From? Not From Our Bodies

Where does glucose come from? How does the body convert glucose to energy? According to Jessie Inchauspé, the author of Glucose Revolution, we need glucose to survive, but we can’t synthesize it ourselves. This means that we must get it from another source: plants. All the glucose in food we eat came from a plant at some point. Here’s how plants produce glucose.

Steven E. Koonin’s Unsettled: Book Overview & Takeaways

How much has the Earth warmed? Is extreme weather getting worse? Are climate scientists in agreement? In Unsettled, a book about climate change, former energy industry scientist Steven E. Koonin doesn’t deny that the planet is warming and that humans are partly to blame. But, he challenges the evidence and prediction models, coming to some conclusions that not everyone shares. Read more for an overview of Koonin’s book.

Reading Facial Expressions: 3 Things to Pay Attention To

How reliable are facial expressions? What are some things you should look out for when reading facial expressions? When it comes to reading someone’s feelings and intentions, facial expressions can offer helpful cues. However, they aren’t as reliable as body language. This is because we’ve trained our faces to feign emotions, so you need to be able to decipher very subtle cues. Here’s a look at the key facial cues you should look out for when trying to read faces.

How to Build Your Career: The Journey From New Hire to CEO

What are the secrets to being successful in your career? What’s the best way to start? How can you finish strong? Entrepreneur Tony Fadell answers these questions and more in Build. The book is part career encyclopedia and part memoir, detailing Fadell’s extraordinary journey inventing the iPhone and then starting his own wildly successful companies. He shares the career lessons he learned along the way. Read more to learn how to build your career, from the bottom to the top.

The Culture Wars in America: Strauss and Howe’s Third Turning

When did the Culture Wars in America start? What were the wars about? What values came to the fore? William Strauss and Neil Howe wrote The Fourth Turning in 1997, in the midst of America’s most recent Third Turning—the third phase in a four-phase cycle of history. The authors describe the Third Turning in general as an Unraveling. They call the Third Turning which began in 1984 “the Culture Wars.” Read more to learn about the Culture Wars in America and how they fit into the larger historical picture.