A winning combination of good writers, good science and serious broader concerns.
Edge.org founder and publisher Brockman (Culture: Leading Scientists Explore Civilizations, Art, Networks, Reputation, and the Online Revolution, 2011, etc.) asks a group of eminent scientists and writers their views on the question, “What Scientific Concept Would Improve Everybody's Cognitive Toolkit?”
The thematic question was actually proposed to the editor by Harvard professor Steven Pinker, who urges the need for people to recognize the value of win-win bargaining based on cooperation rather than competition—positive rather than zero sum games. New Scientist editor Roger Highfield writes humorously that “one way to win the struggle for existence is to pursue the snuggle for existence: to cooperate.” In a similar vein, astronomer Marcelo Gleiser suggests that since humans may be unique in the universe, “[we] might as well start enjoying one another's company.” Psychologist Daniel Goleman examines the seeming indifference of most people about the risk of “planetary meltdown.” In the same vein, science writer Alun Anderson suggests changing the name of our species to Homo dilatus because of our inability to face up to the consequences of global warming. Physicist Lawrence Krauss looks at the importance of scale in determining how precise an answer must be, and Lisa Randall argues the need for understanding both the “robustness and the limitations” of scientific results. Neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky warns against too much reliance on anecdotal evidence, and several contributors touch on the theme of how to evaluate risk and the tendency of people to over-focus on the immediate in estimating dangers. Other notable contributors—there are more than 150—include Stewart Brand, Richard Dawkins, Jonah Lehrer, Nicholas Carr, David Eagleman, Alison Gopnik, Jaron Lanier, V.S. Ramachandran, Brian Eno, Amanda Gefter and Clay Shirky.
A winning combination of good writers, good science and serious broader concerns.Pub Date: Feb. 14, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-06-210939-2
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Perennial/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A physicist's attempt to reconnect science and theology on the controversial subject of extraterrestrial intelligence. Davies (Natural Philosophy/Univ. of Adelaide, Australia; The Mind of God, 1992, etc.) has written numerous works on religion and the nature of the universe. This time around he explores theories of physics that suggest that life elsewhere is possible. At the center of the argument is Davies's theory of organized complexity, which claims that the universe has an underlying order and that consciousness is one of its fundamental features. The author sometimes wanders into the arcane details of radio frequencies and the odds of finding a DNA molecule elsewhere in the universe. Davies is at his best when simply stating his own ideas. In the final pages he passionately argues that ``the most important upshot of the discovery of extraterrestrial life would be to restore to human beings some of the dignity of which science has robbed them [and to] give us cause to believe that we, in our humble way, are part of a larger, majestic process of cosmic self-knowledge.''
Pub Date: Aug. 2, 1995
ISBN: 0-465-00418-0
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Basic Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 1995
Decline. Dieback. Pandemic. Call it what you will, things are rotten in the American forest—namely, the trees—cautions this enthralling, terrifying study of our sylvan predicament. ``In the dim light of the summer forest, I felt a sense of uneasiness,'' notes Little (Hope for the Land, 1992). It gets much worse. From the East Coast to the West Coast (and Europe and everywhere), trees are dying wholesale. The author strongly suggests that behind each wooded ill lies the hand of humankind: Acid rain levels red spruce in the Northeast; fire suppression along Colorado's Front Range encourages the spruce budworm to do its nasty work; the introduction, through human accident, of the gypsy moth leads to the pleasures of DDT as an antidote; clear- cutting has catastrophic, rippling consequences, with two standing trees dying for every one cut due to blowdown and disease; internal combustion engines permanently remove sugar maples from the woods (not to mention maple syrup from the breakfast table). Little interviews plant pathologists and entomologists in each case, plumbing for the causes behind the effects. Comparing their findings with politicized, compromised, state-sponsored reports, he encounters one instance after another of sidestepping, obfuscation, and downright misrepresentation of facts on the part of the government. Little knows well what must be done: Reduce fossil fuel use, stop clear-cutting, end the release of CFCs, control population. But such massive mind-set changes don't come overnight, and he fears the forest may be beyond such remedial actions. To say that the fate of the woods looks gloomy to Little is to put it mildly. He doesn't mind being branded an alarmist, for it is an alarm that he wishes to spread. Biting and eloquent. A book that should make the current surge of environmental glad-tiders sit back and reconsider. (Author tour)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1995
ISBN: 0-670-84135-8
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 1995
BOOK REVIEW
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