Late night thoughts have a foreboding, and thus it is with Thomas: in his third compilation of magazine and newspaper pieces, he saves the title essay for last. It is a foreboding about the bomb and the foolishness of governments. "I am old enough by this time to be used to the notion of dying," he says. Now, hearing the cellos at the end of the Mahler pick up fragments from the first movement, "as though prepared to begin everything all over again," he remarks that he used to hear this as a wonderful few seconds of encouragement. Instead, with a pamphlet on MX-basing in front of him, the cellos "sound in my mind like the opening of all the hatches and the instant before ignition." Several of these essays—including the first, "The Unforgettable Fire"—are eloquent dark statements by a somber Thomas who sees little hope except perhaps from enough people reading the documents and writings on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In other essays, of a more familiar sort, Thomas eyes nature with his special vision. A favorite, "On Smell," will appeal to all who have savored autumn leaf bonfires, now succeeded by "great black plastic bags, set out at the curb like wrapped corpses." The range of delights may be gleaned from the titles: "On Alchemy"—about the emergence of the "soft," or behavioral sciences; "Altruism"—some amusing turns on sociobiology. Other pieces of a scientific sort include one on dementia; a personal chronicle of the installation of a pacemaker; and, inevitably, one on language. And there is Thomas' list of the new seven wonders of the world (solicited by the New York Times)—where he has again found a miraculous symbiosis between two distinct species, as well as some very grand wonders indeed. Any Thomas is worth reading. These essays, with their theme and coda on nuclear holocaust, add a note of gravity that is new.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1983
ISBN: 0140243283
Page Count: 168
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1983
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
BOOK REVIEW
An intriguing meditation on the nature of the universe and our attempts to understand it that should appeal to both...
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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