Dawkins takes to heart his title of Charles Simonyi Professor of Public Understanding of Science at Oxford in this thoughtful exegesis on the nature of science and why its detractors are all wrong. More with pity than anger, he takes Keats to task for faulting “cold philosophy” for unweaving the rainbow in the long poem “Lamia.” On the contrary, Dawkins observes, Newton’s use of a prism to split white light into the spectrum not only led to our understanding of how rainbows form in raindrops, but enabled astronomers to read the make-up of stars. Dawkins devotes a few chapters to debunking astrology, magic, and clairvoyance, arguing that, as rational adults, we need to be critical about ideas. This notion serves him handily in chapters on coincidence: He explains the exacting calculations of probabilities to show that coincidences aren—t so unusual. Yet people have a penchant for finding patterns where there are none, which leads Dawkins also to address superstitions, the class of errors known as false positives and false negatives, and a wealth of cultural practices from rain dances to human sacrifice. He takes to task what he calls bad poetic science, in which he includes the theories of his rival Stephen Jay Gould in relation to what Gould sees as the three perennial questions in paleontology: Does time have a directional arrow? Do internal or external forces drive evolution? And does evolution occur gradually or in jumps? The spleen’s so heavy here that one can anticipate a debate, if not a duel. Final chapters provide him with a platform for reweaving the rainbow, enlarging on his earlier themes and metaphors in relation to memes, genes, and evolution. The speculative writing here is less rooted in complex gene analysis than in philosophy of the Dennett school. A sharp mind is much in evidence, delighting in exposing fraud, providing instruction, baiting a colleague, and indulging in his own high-wire acts of evolutionary dreaming.
Pub Date: Dec. 1, 1998
ISBN: 0-395-88382-2
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1998
More short takes (40 of them) from polymath biophysicist Morowitz (Entropy and the Magic Flute, 1993), ensconced now on the faculty at George Mason University in Virginia. The order of the essays is derived from Buddhist groupings called skandas, so that, for instance, Morowitz's ``People and Places'' section ``resonates'' with the skanda of feeling, ``Language'' with the skanda of form. Readers who already know Morowitz's pithy way with words will read the new essays as though they were letters from an old friend whose mind leaps from one thing to another as inspiration hits. Generally, his approach is to celebrate rather than denigrate. And so we stumble upon unsung heroes like the Ukrainian Ivan Puluj, who appears to have been a co-discoverer of X-rays. We learn about the real achievements of Dr. Joseph Ignace Guillotin, the 18th-century French physician and humanitarian who favored mechanical decapitation for all executions as more democratic (and merciful) than the two-class system of the noose for the hoi polloi and the ax for nobility. Some essays are purely personal and meant to charm. In ``The Proctological Truth,'' the author shares his reveries while visiting the History of Medicine Library at Yale, his nose buried in The Romance of Proctology (``I have certainly acquired a knowledge of the history of proctology that goes way beyond what cultural literacy would require of me''). While traveling in Hawaii, he explores the lore of ficus trees. And he confesses that ``for two years I was faculty adviser to the Esperanto Club of George Mason University.'' ``People and Places'' has Morowitz uncharacteristically facing off against that other celebrated scientist/essayist, Stephen Jay Gould, whom he takes to task for accusing the Jesuit Teilhard de Chardin of being a conspirator in the Piltdown hoax. There is something here for nearly anyone who appreciates graceful, seasoned, casual wisdom.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1997
ISBN: 1-887178-49-X
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Counterpoint
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1997
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A prolific popularizer of science, Davies (Physics/Univ. of Adelaide, Australia; The Matter Myth, 1992, etc.) gives a broad survey of concepts of time, a subject he has become intimately acquainted with in his research. In a long ramble interspersed with biographical digressions, personal reflections, and questions from a hypothetical ``skeptic'' baffled by the quantum world, Davies discourses on concepts of time embodied in ancient cultural and religious beliefs; the Newtonian clockwork universe, in which time flows according to unbending mathematical laws; Einstein's theory that time is relative and flexible; and nonintuitive ideas from quantum mechanics. In this light, he interprets the history of human intellectual development. There have been revolutionary changes, he notes, but the story is far from over. Davies is energized by the notion that nature is permissive—that just about anything can happen if it is not forbidden by a physical law. This leads into speculations about exotic phenomena as possible consequences of relativity and quantum mechanics: black holes, strings, time warps, wormholes, time travel, alternative consciousness, and time reversal. This list of current hot topics in theoretical and experimental physics gives a realistic picture of contemporary science. A pleasant surprise is how many examples of these investigations are given from the scientific community working ``down under,'' in Australia and New Zealand. Equally enjoyable are the personal stories, including Davies's recollections of his discussions with Stephen Hawking and others. In an amusing passage, the ``chattering classes'' of British literati are savaged for their ill-considered criticism of Hawking's A Brief History of Time. But the copious epigraphs, while sometimes salient, are often irrelevant or bewildering. For readers new to the subject, Davies offers many ``believe- it-or-not'' tidbits for cocktail-party conversation; the better- informed can glean insights, cultural commentary, and late-breaking reportage on the cosmologically bizarre. (Line drawings)
Pub Date: March 1, 1995
ISBN: 0-671-79964-9
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1995
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