edited by Max Brockman ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 9, 2011
A collection of essays by young scientists, describing the implications of their work for a general audience.
Literary agent Brockman (What’s Next: Dispatches on the Future of Science, 2009) notes in an introduction that the various authors are at the stage in their academic careers when writing a popular book on their work would do nothing for their prospects for tenure or promotion. Thus this collection of essays, the majority of which focus on biological or social science. In “The Coming Age of Ocean Exploration,” Kevin P. Hand discusses the probability of finding life on several satellites of Jupiter and Saturn, which are believed to have oceans larger than Earth’s. At the other end of the scale of magnitude, William McEwan, working with synthetic DNA, explores the potential for creating molecular tools to combat viral infections. In several instances, two essayists take on similar topics: Daniel Haun and Joan Y. Chiao look at different aspects of human diversity, and Jennifer Jacquet and Naomi Eisenberger examine the biological roots of shame and rejection. Anthony Aguirre, in “Next Step: Infinity,” threads out the cosmological and philosophical implications to be drawn from the interplay of mathematics and physics, ending up with the probability that, in an infinite universe, there are infinite copies of Earth, with an infinite number of copies of every one of us. Other writers also explore the interplay of scientific research and philosophical issues. Joshua Knobe takes on the venerable mind-body problem and arrives at the conclusion that our tendency to ascribe complex mental processes to another is inversely related to our perception of their animal nature. Fiery Cushman, in “Should the Law Depend on Luck?” asks why our legal system differentiates between essentially identical actions by assigning different punishments to the drunken driver who hits a tree and the one who hits a child. While not all the essays are equally well written, the book offers a good overview of what’s happening in today’s laboratories. If Scientific American is your idea of a good read, this should be right up your alley.
Pub Date: Aug. 9, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-307-74191-2
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Vintage
Review Posted Online: June 6, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2011
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by Lulu Miller illustrated by Kate Samworth ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 14, 2020
A quirky wonder of a book.
A Peabody Award–winning NPR science reporter chronicles the life of a turn-of-the-century scientist and how her quest led to significant revelations about the meaning of order, chaos, and her own existence.
Miller began doing research on David Starr Jordan (1851-1931) to understand how he had managed to carry on after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake destroyed his work. A taxonomist who is credited with discovering “a full fifth of fish known to man in his day,” Jordan had amassed an unparalleled collection of ichthyological specimens. Gathering up all the fish he could save, Jordan sewed the nameplates that had been on the destroyed jars directly onto the fish. His perseverance intrigued the author, who also discusses the struggles she underwent after her affair with a woman ended a heterosexual relationship. Born into an upstate New York farm family, Jordan attended Cornell and then became an itinerant scholar and field researcher until he landed at Indiana University, where his first ichthyological collection was destroyed by lightning. In between this catastrophe and others involving family members’ deaths, he reconstructed his collection. Later, he was appointed as the founding president of Stanford, where he evolved into a Machiavellian figure who trampled on colleagues and sang the praises of eugenics. Miller concludes that Jordan displayed the characteristics of someone who relied on “positive illusions” to rebound from disaster and that his stand on eugenics came from a belief in “a divine hierarchy from bacteria to humans that point[ed]…toward better.” Considering recent research that negates biological hierarchies, the author then suggests that Jordan’s beloved taxonomic category—fish—does not exist. Part biography, part science report, and part meditation on how the chaos that caused Miller’s existential misery could also bring self-acceptance and a loving wife, this unique book is an ingenious celebration of diversity and the mysterious order that underlies all existence.
A quirky wonder of a book.Pub Date: April 14, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5011-6027-1
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 1, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
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by Carlo Rovelli ; translated by Simon Carnell & Erica Segre ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 2016
An intriguing meditation on the nature of the universe and our attempts to understand it that should appeal to both...
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Italian theoretical physicist Rovelli (General Relativity: The Most Beautiful of Theories, 2015, etc.) shares his thoughts on the broader scientific and philosophical implications of the great revolution that has taken place over the past century.
These seven lessons, which first appeared as articles in the Sunday supplement of the Italian newspaper Sole 24 Ore, are addressed to readers with little knowledge of physics. In less than 100 pages, the author, who teaches physics in both France and the United States, cogently covers the great accomplishments of the past and the open questions still baffling physicists today. In the first lesson, he focuses on Einstein's theory of general relativity. He describes Einstein's recognition that gravity "is not diffused through space [but] is that space itself" as "a stroke of pure genius." In the second lesson, Rovelli deals with the puzzling features of quantum physics that challenge our picture of reality. In the remaining sections, the author introduces the constant fluctuations of atoms, the granular nature of space, and more. "It is hardly surprising that there are more things in heaven and earth, dear reader, than have been dreamed of in our philosophy—or in our physics,” he writes. Rovelli also discusses the issues raised in loop quantum gravity, a theory that he co-developed. These issues lead to his extraordinary claim that the passage of time is not fundamental but rather derived from the granular nature of space. The author suggests that there have been two separate pathways throughout human history: mythology and the accumulation of knowledge through observation. He believes that scientists today share the same curiosity about nature exhibited by early man.
An intriguing meditation on the nature of the universe and our attempts to understand it that should appeal to both scientists and general readers.Pub Date: March 1, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-399-18441-3
Page Count: 96
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: Dec. 7, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2015
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