Fred Spier

anthropologist, University of Amsterdam

Fred Spier is Senior Lecturer in Big History. As of 1994, he has organized the annual big history course at the University of Amsterdam, while since 2003 he has also taught the annual big history university lecture series at the Eindhoven University of Technology. First trained as a biochemist with research experience in plant genetic engineering and the synthesis of oligonucleotides, Spier subsequently became a cultural anthropologist and social historian. In this quality he performed a ten year study on religion, politics and ecology in Peru, which led to the publication of two books. Developing an overarching explanatory paradigm for Big History. In his article "How Big History Works: Energy flows and the rise and demise of complexity" (published in 2005 by the journal *Social Evolution & History*), the outline of an historical theory of everything is proposed, which should help to explain history at all levels as well as guide further research. An elaborated version of this argument will be presented in his upcoming book tentatively titled *Big History and the Future*.