The Human Surge

Johann Malfatti is a composer and sound designer based in Berlin. He composes music for film & theatre as well as art projects. Over the years he has contributed to numerous music releases ranging from electronic music, noise to chamber pop on labels such as Deco, Klangkrieg, Fat Cat Records, Planet Mu, WMF Records, Subrosa and Polydor. Most notably, he is part of Ensemble (Fat Cat Records) that has collaborated with Björk, The Twighlight Sad and Cat Power. In his solo work he composes for solo piano, drawing inspiration from computer-based processes like granular synthesis and time stretching algorithms. Surge (Glacial Movements) marks his first solo release and is an ambient album of sonic landscapes dealing with the perception of time. Surge was written in the winter of 02016 in the Austrian alps.

The Disturbance Fields are the physical manifestations that mother nature's fury can take against the human race due to our mistreatment of the oceans, rainforests and overdevelopment of urban landmasses. This has resulted in dramatic climatic changes in the temperatures of the earth and the sea and is the cause of far stronger and more violent storms and destructive natural events.

Natural products have a long history of use as folk medicines in several systems of traditional medicine. Extensive evidence from modern pharmacological studies has confirmed traditional applications, and unveiled the vast potential of naturally occurring compounds, particularly plant-derived phytochemicals, in the management of chronic human diseases. The past decade has witnessed a surge of findings from randomized controlled trials testifying the safety and efficacy of natural products as adjuncts or alternatives to standard-of-care medications for several illnesses. Biomolecular studies have unveiled hundreds of cellular and molecular targets for phytochemicals including key transcription factors, receptors, enzymes, hormones, neurotransmitters, cytokines, lipids, and non-coding RNAs.

This book describes the potential and challenges of cosmopolitanism from a philosophical and historical point of view. Through the prism of cosmopolitanism, this book considers how the recent surge in migration is affecting our current reality, while also taking stock of the contemporary potential of cosmopolitan ideas.