Whether you’re buying a home, saving for retirement, running a business, or just plain speculating, it’s important to understand financial markets. These are the engines of commerce in today’s world, powering economic activity and steering the flow of capital. Taught by Professor Connel Fullenkamp of Duke University, Understanding the World of Financial Markets is aimed at the ordinary investor and surveys the impressive range of financial markets—from stocks and bonds to futures, options, real estate, private equity, and virtual assets.

“Who are you?” Chances are you’d answer this question by describing the highlights of your personality and life experiences. But if you’d been asked this same question yesterday, you might have responded with a slightly different description. Does that mean you are a particular person today but were a different person yesterday? And what about tomorrow? Welcome to the slippery, shape-shifting nature of memory. As Professor Gabrielle Principe reveals, “you” are the conglomeration of the often-unreliable information your brain decides to feed you at any given moment.

What is it about Stoicism that Marcus found so important then, and that millions find relevant today? In the 12 fascinating lectures of Books That Matter: Meditations, professor Massimo Pigliucci explores the questions Marcus believed were crucial to address in a life of value, the answers he proposed, and the many ways in which you can use Stoic philosophy. While Meditations was originally written for an audience of just one, what Marcus wanted to examine certainly still applies to us today. What exactly should we be mindful of in this life?

What explains the brain-body connection? How is it that something intangible like stress can really kill? How about the fact that we can and often do worry ourselves sick? And how can we take advantage of the mind’s connection to the body to reduce pain, boost physical performance, and even treat disease? Answer these questions and more in The Power of Mind over Body, a 12-lecture course that will change the way you think about physical health and the brain.

Religion is foundational to what it means to be human. Our quest for meaning is as ancient as our very existence, stretching back to a time when Neanderthal burials and Paleolithic figurines suggest our ancestors recognized a power that transcended visible reality. From ancient civilizations to the 21st century, belief in a higher power seems to be a universal human instinct. These 12 thought-provoking lectures introduce you to the world of comparative religion, giving you insights into a variety of religious expressions and human cultures.

Epigenetics is the science of living DNA, charting the chemical pathways that spur DNA into action by turning genes on and off. While the Human Genome Project of the early 2000s was hailed as the key to understanding human heredity and disease, that historic effort was just the beginning. It has taken epigenetics to fill in the picture, explaining how the fixed code of our genome is implemented in countless living processes.

Many Americans remember a family road trip to visit one of our 63 national parks. Why did Americans start preserving these sites of natural and historic interest? How were these parks selected, and what steps did conservationists, activists, philanthropists, politicians, and others take to protect millions of acres against the booming developments of an expanding nation? An award-winning writer, researcher, and American Studies scholar, Dr. Megan Kate Nelson tackles these questions as she takes you on a marvelous journey through some of the most beautiful places on Earth.

From the 17th to 18th centuries, bold thinkers cast off the authority of ancient traditions and embraced reason as the primary tool for understanding the world. These rationalists, or early modern philosophers, included René Descartes, Baruch Spinoza, and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz—visionaries whose answers to profound questions remain relevant today. Early Modern Philosophy: Descartes and the Rationalists covers the key philosophers of this period in 12 fascinating half-hour lectures, presented by award-winning teacher James D. Reid, Professor of Philosophy at Metropolitan State University.

Propaganda and Persuasion gives you a one-of-a-kind opportunity to explore the powerful, fascinating, and at times dangerous world of influence. Taught by Professor Dannagal G. Young of the University of Delaware, these 12 eye-opening lectures arm you with the tools of effective communication and the insight to understand—and perhaps resist—persuasion in all its forms.

In the 12 fascinating and action-oriented lectures of Treating Anxiety, Dr. Ellen Hendriksen describes the causes and symptoms of numerous anxiety disorders—from generalized anxiety disorder to social anxiety to panic. In her calming manner, and always backed by rigorous scientific studies, she will give you numerous tools and exercises you can employ immediately to help treat your own anxiety. After all, few of us are in danger of being eaten by a bear these days and, as Dr. Henricksen points out, we don’t want to spend our lives hiding in the metaphorical cave.

Chemistry and Our Universe: How It All Works is your in-depth introduction to this vital field, taught through 60 engaging half-hour lectures that are suitable for any background or none at all. Covering a year’s worth of introductory general chemistry at the college level, plus intriguing topics that are rarely discussed in the classroom, this amazingly comprehensive course requires nothing more advanced than high-school math. Your guide is Professor Ron B. Davis, Jr., a research chemist and award-winning teacher at Georgetown University.

Eating is an indispensable human activity. As a result, whether we realize it or not, the drive to obtain food has been a major catalyst across all of history, from prehistoric times to the present. Epicure Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin said it best: "Gastronomy governs the whole life of man."

In Understanding Cognitive Biases, you will learn how to recognize biases for what they are, counteract them when necessary, and even use them to your advantage in some instances. In 24 fascinating lectures, Dr. Alexander B. Swan uses examples from psychology experiments, history, politics, movies, TV, comics, social media, and more to illustrate dozens of cognitive biases that affect us all.

Sex. The word makes some people giggle or blush, while others may draw back in discomfort. So, why do we find it so difficult to talk openly about sex? Much of our reticence in discussing and acknowledging the realities of sex comes, at least in part, from a unique time and place: medieval Europe. In the 12 episodes of Sex in the Middle Ages, Professor Jennifer McNabb and a panel of experts in medieval history and literature will take you back to the period between the fall of Rome and the rise of the Renaissance to explore the ideals and realities of sex and sexuality.

Shedding light on what creative people do, and how they do it, neuroscientists are mapping the regions of the brain that come into play during creative work, showing that creativity is a skill and something that all of us can cultivate. In these 24 compelling lectures, Professor Viskontas takes you on a deep dive into the human creative faculty. Through the many areas of knowledge within the course, Creativity and Your Brain offers empowering and inspiring guidelines for developing your own creativity.

What explains the brain-body connection? How is it that something intangible like stress can really kill? How about the fact that we can and often do worry ourselves sick? And how can we take advantage of the mind’s connection to the body to reduce pain, boost physical performance, and even treat disease? Answer these questions and more in The Power of Mind over Body, a 12-lecture course that will change the way you think about physical health and the brain.

Right this minute, your body is carrying roughly 38 trillion microbial cells along with it—and in the vast majority of cases, you couldn’t live without them. On top of that, you harbor around 380 trillion viruses, most of which are either beneficial or benign. The Hidden Power of Microbes draws back the curtain on this vast microworld in 24 half-hour lectures delivered by acclaimed science communicator Dr. Melissa Booth, research scientist, professor, and Founder and Principal of The Science Communicator, devoted to training scientists to tell accurate, compelling stories about their fields.

One of the most complicated and advanced computers on Earth can't be purchased in any store. This astonishing device, responsible for storing and retrieving vast quantities of information that can be accessed at a moment's notice, is the human brain. How does such a dynamic and powerful machine make memories, learn a language, and remember how to drive a car? What habits can we adopt in order to learn more effectively throughout our lives? The answers to these questions are merely the tip of the iceberg in The Learning Brain.

Whether you’re buying a home, saving for retirement, running a business, or just plain speculating, it’s important to understand financial markets. These are the engines of commerce in today’s world, powering economic activity and steering the flow of capital. Taught by Professor Connel Fullenkamp of Duke University, Understanding the World of Financial Markets is aimed at the ordinary investor and surveys the impressive range of financial markets—from stocks and bonds to futures, options, real estate, private equity, and virtual assets.

In Understanding Cognitive Biases, you will learn how to recognize biases for what they are, counteract them when necessary, and even use them to your advantage in some instances. In 24 fascinating lectures, Dr. Alexander B. Swan uses examples from psychology experiments, history, politics, movies, TV, comics, social media, and more to illustrate dozens of cognitive biases that affect us all.

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.

Thought experiments are “what if” scenarios that invite us to look carefully at how we think and view the world. They’ve been used throughout history by philosophers and other thinkers to explore our intuitions and ways of reasoning, to find solutions to problems, and to expand our knowledge of ourselves and the world. In these 24 eye-opening lectures, Professor Breyer takes you deeply into the historical tradition of thought experiments, shining a light on both the purpose and the outcomes of these compelling mental voyages.

The promise of America is that the country is based on an idea, one where everyone is created equal and equally free to chart their own course. From 13 newly independent states ratifying a national constitution to the heated debates in the halls of Congress today, American politics is about negotiation over what our country is—and where we are going.

Considering everything the brain does, how can it possibly be the source of our personalities, dreams, thoughts, sensations, utterances, and movements? Understanding the Brain, a 36-lecture course by award-winning Professor Jeanette Norden of Vanderbilt University, takes you inside this astonishingly complex organ and shows you how it works. With its combination of neurology, biology, and psychology, this course helps you understand how we perceive the world through our senses, how we move, how we learn and remember, and how emotions affect our thoughts and actions.

What is our species' greatest invention? Medicine, computers, space travel? Not even close. The innovation that underlies each of our past achievements and those we still aspire to is language. Language is the ultimate invention of Homo sapiens - one that has allowed us to change the physical and social world around us in every conceivable way, and an invention that has fundamentally changed us, as well.

Shedding light on what creative people do, and how they do it, neuroscientists are mapping the regions of the brain that come into play during creative work, showing that creativity is a skill and something that all of us can cultivate. In these 24 compelling lectures, Professor Viskontas takes you on a deep dive into the human creative faculty. Through the many areas of knowledge within the course, Creativity and Your Brain offers empowering and inspiring guidelines for developing your own creativity.

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.

How is it that our brain creates all the subjective experiences of our lives every single day - the experiences we call reality? That is the mind-body problem. In Mind-Body Philosophy, Professor Patrick Grim of the State University of New York at Stony Brook leads an intellectually exhilarating tour through millennia of philosophy and science addressing one of life's greatest conundrums. But you won't just be a spectator as Dr. Grim engages and encourages each of us to come to our own conclusions.

Eating is an indispensable human activity. As a result, whether we realize it or not, the drive to obtain food has been a major catalyst across all of history, from prehistoric times to the present. Epicure Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin said it best: "Gastronomy governs the whole life of man."

Understanding our humanity - the essence of who we are - is one of the deepest mysteries and biggest challenges in modern science. Why do we have bad moods? Why are we capable of having such strange dreams? How can metaphors in our language hold such sway on our actions? As we learn more about the mechanisms of human behavior through evolutionary biology, neuroscience, anthropology, and other related fields, we're discovering just how intriguing the human species is.