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books tagged “science”
books tagged “science”
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About Time: Einstein's Unfinished Revolutionby P. C. W. DaviesISBN 0684818221 (0-684-81822-1)
Softcover, Touchstone Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'About Time: Einstein's Unfinished Revolution'Book summary:Examining the consequences of Einstein's relativity theory, an original work explores the mystery of time and considers black holes, time warps, time travel, the existence of God, nature of the universe, and humankind's place in the cosmos. 35,000 first printing. Tour. [via]
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The Age of Spiritual Machines : When Computers Exceed Human Intelligenceby Ray KurzweilISBN 0670882178 (0-670-88217-8)
Hardcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Age of Spiritual Machines : When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence'Book summary:How much do we humans enjoy our current status as the most intelligent beings on earth? Enough to try to stop our own inventions from surpassing us in smarts? If so, we'd better pull the plug right now, because if Ray Kurzweil is right we've only got until about 2020 before computers outpace the human brain in computational power. Kurzweil, artificial intelligence expert and author of The Age of Intelligent Machines, shows that technological evolution moves at an exponential pace. Further, he asserts, in a sort of swirling postulate, time speeds up as order increases, and vice versa. He calls this the "Law of Time and Chaos," and it means that although entropy is slowing the stream of time down for the universe overall, and thus vastly increasing the amount of time between major events, in the eddy of technological evolution the exact opposite is happening, and events will soon be coming faster and more furiously. This means that we'd better figure out how to deal with conscious machines as soon as possible--they'll soon not only be able to beat us at chess, but also likely demand civil rights, and might at last realize the very human dream of immortality.
The Age of Spiritual Machines is compelling and accessible, and not necessarily best read from front to back--it's less heavily historical if you jump around (Kurzweil encourages this). Much of the content of the book lays the groundwork to justify Kurzweil's timeline, providing an engaging primer on the philosophical and technological ideas behind the study of consciousness. Instead of being a gee-whiz futurist manifesto, Spiritual Machines reads like a history of the future, without too much science fiction dystopianism. Instead, Kurzweil shows us the logical outgrowths of current trends, with all their attendant possibilities. This is the book we'll turn to when our computers first say "hello." --Therese Littleton [via]
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Almost like a Whale: The Origin of Species Updatedby Steve JonesISBN 0385409850 (0-385-40985-0)
Hardcover, Doubleday
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Almost like a Whale: The Origin of Species Updated'Book summary:Containing anecdotes, facts and humour, this work uses 20th-century science to update the theories presented in Darwin's "The Origin of Species". [via]
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Annals Former Worldby John McPhieISBN 0374105197 (0-374-10519-7)
Hardcover, Farrar Straus & Giroux
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Annals of the Former Worldby John McPheeISBN 0374518734 (0-374-51873-4)
Softcover, Farrar Straus & Giroux
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Annals of the Former World'Book summary:In 1978 New Yorker magazine staff writer John McPhee set out making notes for an ambitious project: a geological history of North America, centered, for the sake of convenience, on the 40th parallel, a history that encompasses billions of years. In 1981 he published the first of the four books that would come from his research: Basin and Range, a study of the mountainous lands between the Rockies and the Sierra Nevadas. Two years later came In Suspect Terrain, a grand overview of the Appalachian mountain system. In 1986 McPhee released Rising from the Plains, a history of the Rocky Mountains set largely in Wyoming. And in 1993 came Assembling California, a survey of the area geologists find to be a laboratory of volcanic and tectonic processes, a place where geology can be watched in the making. Annals of the Former World gathers these four volumes, which McPhee always conceived of as a whole, to make that epic of the Earth's formation; to it he adds a fifth book, Crossing the Craton, which introduces the continent's ancient core, underlying what is now Illinois, Iowa, and Nebraska.
McPhee's great virtue as a journalist covering the sciences--and any other of the countless subjects he has taken on, for that matter--is his ability to distill and explain complex matters: here, for example, the processes of mineral deposition or of plate tectonics. He does so by allowing geologists to speak for themselves and an entertaining lot they are, those sometimes odd men and women who puzzle out the landscape for clues to its most ancient past. Annals of the Former World is a magisterial work of popular science for which geologists--and devotees of good writing--will be grateful. --Gregory McNamee [via]
At Home in the Universe: The Search for Laws of Self-Organization and Complexityby Stuart KauffmanISBN 0195111303 (0-19-511130-3)
Softcover, Oxford Univ Pr
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› Find signed collectible books: 'At Home in the Universe: The Search for Laws of Self-Organization and Complexity'Book summary:The best treatment I have yet encountered about how order emerges naturally -- and possibly even necessarily -- out of chaos. Profoundly important, and considerably more informed than better-known pop-science treatments of chaos theory. Very highly recommended. [via]
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Black Holes and Time Warps: Einstein's Outrageous Legacyby Kip S. ThorneISBN 0393312763 (0-393-31276-3)
Softcover, W W Norton & Co Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Black Holes and Time Warps: Einstein's Outrageous Legacy'Book summary:In a masterfully written, brilliantly informed work, the Feynman Professor of Theoretical Physics at Caltech leads readers through an elegant, always human tapestry of interlocking themes, answering the great question: What principles control our universe and why do physicists think they know what they know? Introduction by Stephen Hawking. Illustrations. [via]
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Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinkingby Malcolm GladwellISBN 0316010669 (0-316-01066-9)
Softcover, Little Brown & Co
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Blink: The Power Of Thinking Without Thinking'Book summary:Blink is about the first two seconds of looking--the decisive glance that knows in an instant. Gladwell, the best-selling author of The Tipping Point, campaigns for snap judgments and mind reading with a gift for translating research into splendid storytelling. Building his case with scenes from a marriage, heart attack triage, speed dating, choking on the golf course, selling cars, and military maneuvers, he persuades readers to think small and focus on the meaning of "thin slices" of behavior. The key is to rely on our "adaptive unconscious"--a 24/7 mental valet--that provides us with instant and sophisticated information to warn of danger, read a stranger, or react to a new idea.
Gladwell includes caveats about leaping to conclusions: marketers can manipulate our first impressions, high arousal moments make us "mind blind," focusing on the wrong cue leaves us vulnerable to "the Warren Harding Effect" (i.e., voting for a handsome but hapless president). In a provocative chapter that exposes the "dark side of blink," he illuminates the failure of rapid cognition in the tragic stakeout and murder of Amadou Diallo in the Bronx. He underlines studies about autism, facial reading and cardio uptick to urge training that enhances high-stakes decision-making. In this brilliant, cage-rattling book, one can only wish for a thicker slice of Gladwell's ideas about what Blink Camp might look like. --Barbara Mackoff [via]
More editions of Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking:
- Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking: ISBN 0316011789 (0-316-01178-9)
Hardcover, Little Brown & Company - Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking: ISBN 0316172324 (0-316-17232-4)
Hardcover, Little Brown & Company - Blink: The Power Of Thinking Without Thinking: ISBN 0316010669 (0-316-01066-9)
Softcover, Little Brown & Co
- Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking: ISBN 0316011789 (0-316-01178-9)
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Cartoon Guide to Physicsby Larry Gonick, Art HuffmanISBN 0062731009 (0-06-273100-9)
Softcover, Perennial
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Cartoon Guide to Physics'Book summary:It's been said that before physics students can fly with Feynman they need to walk with Halliday and Resnick. Those of us who are still toddling along, however, need Larry Gonick. Gonick's characteristically quirky drawings are teamed with physicist Art Huffman's prose to produce lessons like this: picture Sir Isaac Newton driving a Mack truck labeled "Big Inertia." Ike is talking into a CB radio, saying: "Breaker one nine: force overcomes inertia and produces acceleration. Do you read?" As the jacket copy says, "If you think a negative charge is something that shows up on your credit-card bill--if you imagine that Ohm's law dictates how long to meditate--if you believe that Newtonian mechanics will fix your car," here's the book for you. --Mary Ellen Curtin [via]
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The Character of Physical Lawby Richard P FeynmanISBN 0262560038 (0-262-56003-8)
Softcover, Mit Pr
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Character of Physical Law'Book summary:In these Messenger Lectures, originally delivered at Cornell University and recorded for television by the BBC, Richard Feynman offers an overview of selected physical laws and gathers their common features into one broad principle of invariance. He maintains at the outset that the importance of a physical law is not "how clever we are to have found it out, but... how clever nature is to pay attention to it," and tends his discussions toward a final exposition of the elegance and simplicity of all scientific laws. Rather than an essay on the most significant achievements in modern science, The Character of Physical Law is a statement of what is most remarkable in nature. Feynman's enlightened approach, his wit, and his enthusiasm make this a memorable exposition of the scientist's craft.The Law of Gravitation is the author's principal example. Relating the details of its discovery and stressing its mathematical character, he uses it to demonstrate the essential interaction of mathematics and physics. He views mathematics as the key to any system of scientific laws, suggesting that if it were possible to fill out the structure of scientific theory completely, the result would be an integrated set of mathematical axioms. The principles of conservation, symmetry, and time-irreversibility are then considered in relation to developments in classical and modern physics, and in his final lecture Feynman develops his own analysis of the process and future of scientific discovery.Like any set of oral reflections, The Character of Physical Law has special value as a demonstration of the mind in action. The reader is particularly lucky in Richard Feynman. One of the most eminent and imaginative modern physicists, he was Professor of Theoretical Physics at the California Institute of Technology until his death in 1988. He is best known for his work on the quantum theory of the electromagnetic field, as well as for his later research in the field of low-temperature physics. In 1954 he received the Albert Einstein Award for his "outstanding contribution to knowledge in mathematical and physical sciences"; in 1965 he was appointed to Foreign Membership in the Royal Society and was awarded the Nobel Prize.
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Cometby Carl Sagan, Ann DruyanISBN 0345412222 (0-345-41222-2)
Softcover, Ballantine Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Comet'Book summary:This book is an exploration of these strange visitors to our skies. [via]
Cometby Ann Druyan, Carl SagaISBN 0671619179 (0-671-61917-9)
Softcover, Pocket Books
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Connectionsby James BurkeISBN 0316116726 (0-316-11672-6)
Softcover, Little Brown & Co
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Connections'Book summary:You can make all the plans you will, plot to make a fortune in the commodities market, speculate on developing trends: all will likely come to naught, for "however carefully you plan for the future, someone else's actions will inevitably modify the way your plans turn out." So writes the English scholar and documentary producer James Burke in his sparkling book Connections, a favorite of historically minded readers ever since its first publication in 1978. Taking a hint from Jacob Bronowski's Ascent of Man, Burke charts the course of technological innovation from ancient times to the present, but always with a subversive eye for things happening in spite of, and not because of, their inventors' intentions. Burke gives careful attention to the role of accident in human history. In his opening pages, for instance, he writes of the invention of uniform coinage, an invention that hinged on some unknown Anatolian prospector's discovering that a fleck of gold rubbed against a piece of schist--a "touchstone"--would leave a mark indicating its quality. Just so, we owe the invention of modern printing to Johann Gutenberg's training as a goldsmith, for his knowledge of the properties of metals enabled him to develop a press whose letterforms would not easily wear down. With Gutenberg's invention, Burke notes, came a massive revolution in the European economy, for, as he writes, "the easier it is to communicate, the faster change happens." Burke's book is a splendid and educational entertainment for our fast-changing time. --Gregory McNamee [via]
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Darwin's Ghost: The Origin of Species Updatedby Steve JonesISBN 0345422775 (0-345-42277-5)
Softcover, Ballantine Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Darwin's Ghost: The Origin of Species Updated'Book summary:Biologists have a dirty little secret: while practically everyone knows of The Origin of Species (and owes much to it), almost nobody has read it. British geneticist Steve Jones wants to make the arguments contained in that great text accessible to modern audiences, and succeeds with the delightful Darwin's Ghost. Approximating the structure of Darwin's opus, Jones uses the original chapter headings and summaries as a scaffolding to build an up-to-date demonstration of the power of a few simple ideas. Heredity, variation, and natural selection are all you need to infer evolution over time, and now that Jones can fill in the gaps in Darwin's pre-Mendelian understanding of genetics, the case becomes airtight.
More than a polemic, though, Darwin's Ghost is nearly as pleasurable a read as its ancestor is--one suspects that part of Jones's mission is to inspire today's readers to turn back to the grand but humble Origin of Species. While he may not be able to quite match Darwin's vast erudition or hawk's eye for detail, he still makes the theory of evolution shudder and breathe on the page. Dog breeding, mass extinctions, and weird fossils of tiny elephants all march to his drumbeat and--just when you least expect it--return to the main point that all living things share a common ancestor. Whether you're one of the elite who's had the pleasure of Darwin's literary company or you'd like a taste of what you're missing, Darwin's Ghost will bring the spirit of the great man back into your world of ideas. --Rob Lightner [via]
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The Dinosaur Heresiesby Robert T. BakkerISBN 0806522607 (0-8065-2260-7)
Softcover, Kensington Publishing Corporation
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Dinosaur Heresies : New Theories Unlocking the Mystery of the Dinosaurs'Book summary:The inside story of a scientific heresy that is scandalizing traditional paleontology, told by the unorthodox leader of the dinosaurian heretics and featuring over 200 original black-and-white drawings that show how dinosaurs lived. [via]
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- The Dinosaur Heresies: ISBN 0821728598 (0-8217-2859-8)
Softcover, Kensington Pub Corp - The Dinosaur Heresies: ISBN 0821756087 (0-8217-5608-7)
Softcover, Kensington Pub Corp - The Dinosaur Heresies: ISBN 0688042872 (0-688-04287-2)
Hardcover, Harpercollins - The Dinosaur Heresies : New Theories Unlocking the Mystery of the Dinosaurs: ISBN 0806522607 (0-8065-2260-7)
Softcover, Kensington Publishing Corporation
- The Dinosaur Heresies: ISBN 0821728598 (0-8217-2859-8)
Engines of Creationby K. Eric DrexlerISBN 1872180469 (1-872180-46-9)
Hardcover, Fourth Estate
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Engines of Creation'Book summary:This brilliant work heralds the new age of nanotechnology, which will give us thorough and inexpensive control of the structure of matter. Drexler examines the enormous implications of these developments for medicine, the economy, and the environment, and makes astounding yet well-founded projections for the future. [via]
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The Fabric of Reality: The Science of Parallel Universes-And Its Implicationsby David DeutschISBN 014027541X (0-14-027541-X)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Fabric of Reality: The Science of Parallel Universes-And Its Implications'Book summary:"Our best theories are not only truer than common sense, they make more sense than common sense," writes physicist David Deutsch. In The Fabric of Reality, Deutsch traces what he considers the four main strands of scientific explanation: quantum theory, evolution, computation, and the theory of knowledge. "The four of them taken together form a coherent explanatory structure that is so far-reaching, and has come to encompass so much of our understanding of the world, that in my view it may already properly be called the first Theory of Everything." Deutsch covers some difficult material with unusual clarity. Each chapter ends with a summary and definitions of important terms, which makes the work an invaluable sourcebook. [via]
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The Golden Ratio: The Story of Phi, the World's Most Astonishing Numberby Mario LivioISBN 0767908163 (0-7679-0816-3)
Softcover, Bantam Dell Pub Group
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Golden Ratio: The Story of Phi, the World's Most Astonishing Number'Book summary:Throughout history, thinkers from mathematicians to theologians have pondered the mysterious relationship between numbers and the nature of reality. In this fascinating book, Mario Livio tells the tale of a number at the heart of that mystery: phi, or 1.6180339887...This curious mathematical relationship, widely known as "The Golden Ratio," was discovered by Euclid more than two thousand years ago because of its crucial role in the construction of the pentagram, to which magical properties had been attributed. Since then it has shown a propensity to appear in the most astonishing variety of places, from mollusk shells, sunflower florets, and rose petals to the shape of the galaxy. Psychological studies have investigated whether the Golden Ratio is the most aesthetically pleasing proportion extant, and it has been asserted that the creators of the Pyramids and the Parthenon employed it. It is believed to feature in works of art from Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa to Salvador Dali's The Sacrament of the Last Supper, and poets and composers have used it in their works. It has even been found to be connected to the behavior of the stock market!
The Golden Ratio is a captivating journey through art and architecture, botany and biology, physics and mathematics. It tells the human story of numerous phi-fixated individuals, including the followers of Pythagoras who believed that this proportion revealed the hand of God; astronomer Johannes Kepler, who saw phi as the greatest treasure of geometry; such Renaissance thinkers as mathematician Leonardo Fibonacci of Pisa; and such masters of the modern world as Goethe, Cezanne, Bartok, and physicist Roger Penrose. Wherever his quest for the meaning of phi takes him, Mario Livio reveals the world as a place where order, beauty, and eternal mystery will always coexist. [via]More editions of The Golden Ratio: The Story of Phi, the World's Most Astonishing Number:
The Handy Science Answer Book: Revised & Expandedby James E. Bobick, Naomi E. BalabanISBN 1578591406 (1-57859-140-6)
Softcover, Visible Ink Pr
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The Handy Science Answer Bookby Science and Technology Department of Carnegie Library of PittsburghISBN 0787610135 (0-7876-1013-5)
Softcover, Visible Ink Pr
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Handy Science Answer Book'Book summary:Why do golf balls have dimples? What makes people snore? How does a fax work? The answers to these and 1,250 other commonly asked, but hard to explain questions can be found in this volume. Revised and expanded, the second edition of this bestselling book tackles dozens of sci-tech subject areas, including the human body, space, the environment, weights and measures, chemistry and physics, and much more. [via]
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The Handy Science Answer Bookby Science and Technology Department of the Carnegie LibraryISBN 0810394510 (0-8103-9451-0)
Softcover, Mint Pub
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The Handy Science Answer Book: Centennial Editionby Science & Technology Department Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, Naomi E. BalabanISBN 0780807278 (0-7808-0727-8)
Hardcover, Omnigraphics Inc
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The Hedgehog, the Fox, and the Magister's Pox: Mending the Gap Between Science and the Humanitiesby Stephen Jay GhouldISBN 1400051533 (1-4000-5153-3)
Softcover, Three Rivers Pr
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Hedgehog, the Fox, and the Magister's Pox: Mending the Gap Between Science and the Humanities'Book summary:Though this final book is not the most accessible of Stephen Jay Gould's meditations on science and culture, it is a complex and revealing look at one of the late paleontologist's great passions: the unity of human endeavor. The titular hedgehog and fox refer to the classic dichotomy of persistence opposed to agility of thought, which Gould uses as a backbone in comparing, contrasting, and balancing science and the humanities. Unlike many scientists, he does not consider humanities (nor religion) to be inferior to his discipline. Drawing liberally from Renaissance and Scientific Revolution sources, Gould shows that the perceived differences in the two cultures are mostly false. Readers of E.O. Wilson's Consilience will find many similarities here, though Gould emphatically rejects Wilson's conclusion that reductionism is an appropriate way to unite the two cultures and offers examples of when such an approach might fail.
If we discover that a majority of human cultures have favored infanticide under certain conditions, and that such a practice arose for good Darwinian reasons, shall we then claim that we have resolved the question of the rightness of such a practice with a "yea"?
This volume is presented by its editor almost unchanged from the manuscript Gould had finished shortly before his death. The result is a book with such unedited detail that its dense blend of history and philosophy is at times overwhelmingly difficult. Nevertheless, Gould's deeply held conviction that human understanding comes from all our cultural efforts shines through. --Therese Littleton [via]
More editions of The Hedgehog, the Fox, and the Magister's Pox: Mending the Gap Between Science and the Humanities:
- The Hedgehog, the Fox, and the Magister's Pox: Mending the Gap Between Science and the Humanities: ISBN 022406309X (0-224-06309-X)
Hardcover, Jonathan Cape - The Hedgehog, the Fox, and the Magister's Pox : Mending the Gap Between Science and the Humanities: ISBN 0609601407 (0-609-60140-7)
Hardcover, Crown Publishing Group - The Hedgehog, the Fox, and the Magister's Pox: Mending the Gap Between Science and the Humanities: ISBN 1400051533 (1-4000-5153-3)
Softcover, Three Rivers Pr
- The Hedgehog, the Fox, and the Magister's Pox: Mending the Gap Between Science and the Humanities: ISBN 022406309X (0-224-06309-X)
Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toesby Stephen Jay GouldISBN 0393311031 (0-393-31103-1)
Softcover, W W Norton & Co Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes'Book summary:Gould introduces the reader to some of the many and wonderful manifestations of evolutionary biology. [via]
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The Last Three Minutes: Conjectures About the Ultimate Fate of the Universeby P. C. W. DaviesISBN 0465038514 (0-465-03851-4)
Softcover, Perseus Books Group
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Last Three Minutes: Conjectures About the Ultimate Fate of the Universe'Book summary:A speculative description of the end of time applies scientific theory to imagination, predicting the overtaking of black holes, the end of sunlight, the beginning of stardoom, and the crushing effects of gravity. [via]
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Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Wormsby Stephen Jay GouldISBN 0609804758 (0-609-80475-8)
Softcover, Random House Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms'Book summary:One of this century's most thoughtful and prolific naturalists, Harvard professor Stephen Jay Gould looks at the human twists on science in his eighth series of essays taken from Natural History magazine. As only he can, Gould finds questions where others have never looked, and answers where others have been blinded--by their professional rivalries, by their unacknowledged privilege in society, by the dominant world-view at their particular juncture in history. "All great science," he says in the title essay, "indeed all fruitful thinking, must occur in a social and intellectual context--and contexts are just as likely to promote insight as to constrain thought." Gould's gift is being able to identify context, and see patterns in diverse fields or people or moments in history in a way that Darwin saw patterns in living species.
This book is less about clams, worms, and Leonardo than about some evolutionary dead ends in human intellectual history. It's not an easy read. Those who are already Gould fans will find more tantalizing tidbits--no, thick stew--from this fruitful author. Those first-timers drawn by an intriguing title will scratch, frown, fall asleep, swear, and generally want to give up. But don't! Gould is one of those authors that takes some getting used to. With a little patience, his extravagant prose will edify rather than trip you, and his digressions will delight rather than distract. --Lauran Cole Warner [via]
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Linked: How Everything Is Connected to Everything Else and What It Means for Business, Science, and Everyday Lifeby Albert-Laszlo BarabasiISBN 0452284392 (0-452-28439-2)
Softcover, Plume
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Linked: How Everything Is Connected to Everything Else and What It Means for Business, Science, and Everyday Life'Book summary:How is the human brain like the AIDS epidemic? Ask physicist Albert-László Barabási and he'll explain them both in terms of networks of individual nodes connected via complex but understandable relationships. Linked: The New Science of Networks is his bright, accessible guide to the fundamentals underlying neurology, epidemiology, Internet traffic, and many other fields united by complexity.
Barabási's gift for concrete, nonmathematical explanations and penchant for eccentric humor would make the book thoroughly enjoyable even if the content weren't engaging. But the results of Barabási's research into the behavior of networks are deeply compelling. Not all networks are created equal, he says, and he shows how even fairly robust systems like the Internet could be crippled by taking out a few super-connected nodes, or hubs. His mathematical descriptions of this behavior are helping doctors, programmers, and security professionals design systems better suited to their needs. Linked presents the next step in complexity theory--from understanding chaos to practical applications. --Rob Lightner [via]
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The Lying Stones of Marrakech: Penultimate Reflections in Natural Historyby Stephen Jay GouldISBN 0609807552 (0-609-80755-2)
Softcover, Three Rivers Pr
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Lying Stones of Marrakech: Penultimate Reflections in Natural History'Book summary:Celebrated paleontologist and science writer Stephen Jay Gould has honed and matured his voice over almost 30 years of writing for Natural History. His tenure at that magazine closes with the end of the century, so The Lying Stones of Marrakech is his next-to-last collection of essays from this era. As ever, his works are clever, thoughtful, and inspiring; however, the longtime reader will detect a deeper reflection and a longer view taken by Gould in latter days, perhaps inevitable outcomes of experience and growth. The title essay refers to false fossils carved by Moroccans intent on making a few bucks off of hapless tourists, discusses the case of Beringer's 18th-century fossil hoax, and ends with a plea for a stricter separation between commercial and scientific interests--showing the breadth and scope of his paleontological interests and thinking.
Of course, he also has much to say beyond the confines of his profession: Joe DiMaggio and Dolly the sheep each get respectful treatment from the Gould pen, and he discusses the competing Christian groups sharing the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Though his attitudes may have mellowed over time--he's far from the crotchety oldster some feared he'd become--his passion for knowledge and scientific freedom is still radiant. Whether you're an old-school fan of Gould's writings or a newcomer to his delightfully brainy essays, you'll find The Lying Stones of Marrakech a joy to behold. --Rob Lightner [via]
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The Mind's Iby Hofstadter, Douglas R. & Dennett, Daniel C., Daniel C. DennettISBN 0553345842 (0-553-34584-2)
Softcover, Bantam Dell Pub Group
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Mind's I'Book summary:Ever wondered who you are? Who you really are? This collection of writings and reflections by some of today's most notable thinkers is designed to enliven this most central, and most baffling, question in the philosophy of mind. In some ways, the questions posed and bantered about in this book are at the heart of all philosophical reasoning. They are the ultimate questions about the self. The Mind's I contains an astonishing variety of approaches to answering the question, "Who am I?" Between the covers of this book one encounters the literary erudition of Argentinean writer Jorge Luis Borges alongside the analytic rigor of John Searle. There are sophisticated metaphorical pieces (such as "The Princess Ineffabelle" by Polish philosopher and writer Stanislaw Lem), intriguing dialogues (like Raymond Smullyan's "Is God a Taoist?"), and serious but engaging philosophical essays from a host of thinkers (see Thomas Nagel's "What Is It Like to Be a Bat?").
Editors Hofstadter and Dennett--leading lights in the study of cognitive science, artificial intelligence, and the philosophy of mind--follow each selection with a short reflection designed to elaborate on their main themes. The Mind's I admirably broadens their fields to a more general audience. The book's essays are grouped into six categories, each successively raising the philosophical stakes by introducing new levels of complexity. Ultimately, one confronts some of the thorniest questions in modern philosophy here, such as the nature of free will, our place in the metaphysical world, and the possibility of genuine artificial intelligence. The book closes with a playful and perplexing piece by Robert Nozick, an adequate summation to The Mind's I. He writes, "Perhaps God has not decided yet whether he has created, in this world, a fictional world or a real one.... Which decision do you hope for?" --Eric de Place [via]
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The Mind's I: Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soulby Daniel C. Dennett, Douglas R. HofstadterISBN 0465030912 (0-465-03091-2)
Softcover, Perseus Books Group
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Mind's I: Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soul'Book summary:Ever wondered who you are? Who you really are? This collection of writings and reflections by some of today's most notable thinkers is designed to enliven this most central, and most baffling, question in the philosophy of mind. In some ways, the questions posed and bantered about in this book are at the heart of all philosophical reasoning. They are the ultimate questions about the self. The Mind's I contains an astonishing variety of approaches to answering the question, "Who am I?" Between the covers of this book one encounters the literary erudition of Argentinean writer Jorge Luis Borges alongside the analytic rigor of John Searle. There are sophisticated metaphorical pieces (such as "The Princess Ineffabelle" by Polish philosopher and writer Stanislaw Lem), intriguing dialogues (like Raymond Smullyan's "Is God a Taoist?"), and serious but engaging philosophical essays from a host of thinkers (see Thomas Nagel's "What Is It Like to Be a Bat?").
Editors Hofstadter and Dennett--leading lights in the study of cognitive science, artificial intelligence, and the philosophy of mind--follow each selection with a short reflection designed to elaborate on their main themes. The Mind's I admirably broadens their fields to a more general audience. The book's essays are grouped into six categories, each successively raising the philosophical stakes by introducing new levels of complexity. Ultimately, one confronts some of the thorniest questions in modern philosophy here, such as the nature of free will, our place in the metaphysical world, and the possibility of genuine artificial intelligence. The book closes with a playful and perplexing piece by Robert Nozick, an adequate summation to The Mind's I. He writes, "Perhaps God has not decided yet whether he has created, in this world, a fictional world or a real one.... Which decision do you hope for?" --Eric de Place [via]
More editions of The Mind's I: Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soul:
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The Mind's I: Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soulby Douglas R. HofstadterISBN 046504624X (0-465-04624-X)
Hardcover, Perseus Books Group
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Mind's I: Fantasies and Reflections on Self and Soul'Book summary:Ever wondered who you are? Who you really are? This collection of writings and reflections by some of today's most notable thinkers is designed to enliven this most central, and most baffling, question in the philosophy of mind. In some ways, the questions posed and bantered about in this book are at the heart of all philosophical reasoning. They are the ultimate questions about the self. The Mind's I contains an astonishing variety of approaches to answering the question, "Who am I?" Between the covers of this book one encounters the literary erudition of Argentinean writer Jorge Luis Borges alongside the analytic rigor of John Searle. There are sophisticated metaphorical pieces (such as "The Princess Ineffabelle" by Polish philosopher and writer Stanislaw Lem), intriguing dialogues (like Raymond Smullyan's "Is God a Taoist?"), and serious but engaging philosophical essays from a host of thinkers (see Thomas Nagel's "What Is It Like to Be a Bat?").
Editors Hofstadter and Dennett--leading lights in the study of cognitive science, artificial intelligence, and the philosophy of mind--follow each selection with a short reflection designed to elaborate on their main themes. The Mind's I admirably broadens their fields to a more general audience. The book's essays are grouped into six categories, each successively raising the philosophical stakes by introducing new levels of complexity. Ultimately, one confronts some of the thorniest questions in modern philosophy here, such as the nature of free will, our place in the metaphysical world, and the possibility of genuine artificial intelligence. The book closes with a playful and perplexing piece by Robert Nozick, an adequate summation to The Mind's I. He writes, "Perhaps God has not decided yet whether he has created, in this world, a fictional world or a real one.... Which decision do you hope for?" --Eric de Place [via]
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One Two Three...Infinity: Facts and Speculations of Scienceby George GamowISBN 0486256642 (0-486-25664-2)
Softcover, Dover Pubns
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One, Two, Three Infinityby George GamowISBN 0553132784 (0-553-13278-4)
Softcover, Bantam Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'One, Two, Three Infinity'Book summary:340 pp Original Viking edition published Sept. 1947 Revised Viking edition publ. May 1961 Viking Explorer Series Ed. publ. 1961 Natural History Book Club ed. publ. 1948 12th printing Aug. 1079 [via]
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Paradigms Lostby John L. CastiISBN 0380711656 (0-380-71165-6)
Softcover, HarperCollins Publishers
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Paradigms Lost: Images of Man in the Mirror of Scienceby John L. CastiISBN 0688081312 (0-688-08131-2)
Hardcover, Harpercollins
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Parallel Worlds: A Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, And the Future of the Cosmosby Michio KakuISBN 1400033721 (1-4000-3372-1)
Softcover, Alfred a Knopf Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Parallel Worlds: A Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, And the Future of the Cosmos'Book summary:Is our universe dying?
[via]
Could there be other universes?
In Parallel Worlds, world-renowned physicist and bestselling author Michio Kakuan author who has a knack for bringing the most ethereal ideas down to earth (Wall Street Journal)takes readers on a fascinating tour of cosmology, M-theory, and its implications for the fate of the universe.
In his first book of physics since Hyperspace, Michio Kaku begins by describing the extraordinary advances that have transformed cosmology over the last century, and particularly over the last decade, forcing scientists around the world to rethink our understanding of the birth of the universe, and its ultimate fate. In Dr. Kakus eyes, we are living in a golden age of physics, as new discoveries from the WMAP and COBE satellites and the Hubble space telescope have given us unprecedented pictures of our universe in its infancy.
As astronomers wade through the avalanche of data from the WMAP satellite, a new cosmological picture is emerging. So far, the leading theory about the birth of the universe is the inflationary universe theory, a major refinement on the big bang theory. In this theory, our universe may be but one in a multiverse, floating like a bubble in an infinite sea of bubble universes, with new universes being created all the time. A parallel universe may well hover a mere millimeter from our own.
The very idea of parallel universes and the string theory that can explain their existence was once viewed with suspicion by scientists, seen as the province of mystics, charlatans, and cranks. But today, physicists overwhelmingly support string-theory, and its latest iteration, M-theory, as it is this one theory that, if proven correct, would reconcile the four forces of the universe simply and elegantly, and answer the question What happened before the big bang?
Already, Kaku explains, the worlds foremost physicists and astronomers are searching for ways to test the theory of the multiverse using highly sophisticated wave detectors, gravity lenses, satellites, and telescopes. The implications of M-theory are fascinating and endless. If parallel worlds do exist, Kaku speculates, in time, perhaps a trillion years or more from now, as appears likely, when our universe grows cold and dark in what scientists describe as a big freeze, advanced civilizations may well find a way to escape our universe in a kind of inter-dimensional lifeboat.
An unforgettable journey into black holes and time machines, alternate universes, and multidimensional space, Parallel Worlds gives us a compelling portrait of the revolution sweeping the world of cosmology.More editions of Parallel Worlds: A Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, And the Future of the Cosmos:
- Parallel Worlds: A Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos: ISBN 0385509863 (0-385-50986-3)
Hardcover, Doubleday Publishing - Parallel Worlds: A Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, And the Future of the Cosmos: ISBN 1400033721 (1-4000-3372-1)
Softcover, Alfred a Knopf Inc
- Parallel Worlds: A Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos: ISBN 0385509863 (0-385-50986-3)
The Pinball Effect: How Rennaissance Water Gardens Made the Carburator Possibleby James Burke, Geoffrey KloskeISBN 0316116106 (0-316-11610-6)
Softcover, Back Bay Books
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The Quark and the Jaguar : Adventures in the Simple and the Complexby Murray Gell-MannISBN 0716725819 (0-7167-2581-9)
Hardcover, Freeman & Company, W. H.
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Quark and the Jaguar : Adventures in the Simple and the Complex'Book summary:A Nobel Prize-winning physicist discusses the science of simplicity and complexity, describing the intricate interrelationships that exist in nature between the simple (a quark in an atom) and the complex (the jaguar prowling its jungle environment). 25,000 first printing. [via]
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The Quark and the Jaguar: The Quark and the Jaguarby Murray Gell-MannISBN 0805072535 (0-8050-7253-5)
Softcover, Henry Holt & Co
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Quark and the Jaguar: The Quark and the Jaguar'Book summary:From one of the architects of the new science of simplicity and complexity comes an explanation of the connections between nature at its most basic level and natural selection, archaeology, linguistics, child development, computers, and other complex adaptive systems. Nobel laureate Murray Gell-Mann offers a uniquely personal and unifying vision of the relationship between the fundamental laws of physics and the complexity and diversity of the natural world.[via]More editions of The Quark and the Jaguar: The Quark and the Jaguar:
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Quicksilverby Neal StephensonISBN 0060593083 (0-06-059308-3)
Softcover, Harpercollins
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Quicksilver'Book summary:In Quicksilver, the first volume of the "Baroque Cycle," Neal Stephenson launches his most ambitious work to date. The novel, divided into three books, opens in 1713 with the ageless Enoch Root seeking Daniel Waterhouse on the campus of what passes for MIT in eighteenth-century Massachusetts. Daniel, Enoch's message conveys, is key to resolving an explosive scientific battle of preeminence between Isaac Newton and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz over the development of calculus. As Daniel returns to London aboard the Minerva, readers are catapulted back half a century to recall his years at Cambridge with young Isaac. Daniel is a perfect historical witness. Privy to Robert Hooke's early drawings of microscope images and with associates among the English nobility, religious radicals, and the Royal Society, he also befriends Samuel Pepys, risks a cup of coffee, and enjoys a lecture on Belgian waffles and cleavage-all before the year 1700.
In the second book, Stephenson introduces Jack Shaftoe and Eliza. "Half-Cocked" Jack (also know as the "King of the Vagabonds") recovers the English Eliza from a Turkish harem. Fleeing the siege of Vienna, the two journey across Europe driven by Eliza's lust for fame, fortune, and nobility. Gradually, their circle intertwines with that of Daniel in the third book of the novel.
The book courses with Stephenson's scholarship but is rarely bogged down in its historical detail. Stephenson is especially impressive in his ability to represent dialogue over the evolving worldview of seventeenth-century scientists and enliven the most abstruse explanation of theory. Though replete with science, the novel is as much about the complex struggles for political ascendancy and the workings of financial markets. Further, the novel's literary ambitions match its physical size. Stephenson narrates through epistolary chapters, fragments of plays and poems, journal entries, maps, drawings, genealogic tables, and copious contemporary epigrams. But, caught in this richness, the prose is occasionally neglected and wants editing. Further, anticipating a cycle, the book does not provide a satisfying conclusion to its 900 pages. These are minor quibbles, though. Stephenson has matched ambition to execution, and his faithful, durable readers will be both entertained and richly rewarded with a practicum in Baroque science, cypher, culture, and politics. --Patrick O'Kelley [via]
More editions of Quicksilver:
- Quicksilver: ISBN 0060833165 (0-06-083316-5)
Softcover, Harpercollins - Quicksilver: ISBN 0060599332 (0-06-059933-2)
Hardcover, Harpercollins - Quicksilver: ISBN 0380977427 (0-380-97742-7)
Hardcover, Harpercollins - Quicksilver: ISBN 0434008931 (0-434-00893-1)
Softcover, Heinemann - Quicksilver: ISBN 0434008176 (0-434-00817-6)
Hardcover, Heinemann - Quicksilver: ISBN 0060593083 (0-06-059308-3)
Softcover, Harpercollins
- Quicksilver: ISBN 0060833165 (0-06-083316-5)
Rocks of Agesby Stephen Jay GouldISBN 034545040X (0-345-45040-X)
Softcover, Ballantine Books
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Rocks of Ages : Science and Religion in the Fullness of Lifeby Stephen Jay GouldISBN 0345430093 (0-345-43009-3)
Hardcover, Random House Publishing Group
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Rocks of Ages : Science and Religion in the Fullness of Life'Book summary:Revered and eminently readable essayist Stephen Jay Gould has once again rendered the complex simple, this time mending the seeming split between the two "Rocks of Ages," science and religion. He quickly, and rightfully, admits that his thesis is not new, but one broadly accepted by many scientists and theologians. Gould begins by suggesting that Darwin has been misconstrued--that while some religious thinkers have used divinity to prove the impossibility of evolution, Darwin would have never done the reverse.
Gould eloquently lays out not "a merely diplomatic solution" to rectify the physical and metaphysical, but "a principled position on moral and intellectual grounds," central to which is the elegant concept of "non-overlapping magisteria." (Gould defines magisteria as a "four-bit" word meaning domain of authority in teaching.) Essentially, science and religion can't be unified, but neither should they be in conflict; each has its own discrete magisteria, the natural world belonging exclusively to science and the moral to religion.
Gould's argument is both lucid and convincing as he cites past religious and scientific greats (including a particularly touching section on Darwin himself). Regardless of your persuasions, religious or scientific, Gould holds up his end of the conversation with characteristic respect and intelligence. --Paul Hughes [via]
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Science of Harry Potter: How Magic Really Worksby Roger HighfieldISBN 0142003557 (0-14-200355-7)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Science of Harry Potter: How Magic Really Works'Book summary:Can Fluffy the three-headed dog be explained by advances in molecular biology? Could the discovery of cosmic "gravity-shielding effects" unlock the secret to the Nimbus 2000 broomstick's ability to fly? Is the griffin really none other than the dinosaur Protoceratops? Roger Highfield, author of the critically acclaimed The Physics of Christmas, explores the fascinating links between magic and science to reveal that much of what strikes us as supremely strange in the Potter books can actually be explained by the conjurings of the scientific mind. This is the perfect guide for parents who want to teach their children science through their favorite adventures as well as for the millions of adult fans of the series intrigued by its marvels and mysteries.[via]More editions of Science of Harry Potter: How Magic Really Works:
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Six Not-So-Easy Pieces: Einstein's Relativity, Symmetry and Space-Timeby Richard P FeynmanISBN 0201328410 (0-201-32841-0)
Softcover, Perseus Books Group
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Six Not-So-Easy Pieces: Einstein's Relativity, Symmetry and Space-Time'Book summary:No twentieth-century American scientist is better known to a wider spectrum of people than Richard P. Feynman (19181988)physicist, teacher, author, and cultural icon. His autobiographies and biographies have been read and enjoyed by millions of readers around the world, while his wit and eccentricities have made him the subject of TV specials and even a theatrical film. The spectacular reception of the book and audio versions of Feynmans Six Easy Pieces (published in 1995) resulted in a worldwide clamor for More Feynman! More Feynman! The outcome is these six additional lectures, drawn from the celebrated three-volume Lectures on Physics. Though slightly more challenging than the first six, these lectures are more focused, delving into the most revolutionary discovery in twentieth-century physics: Einsteins Theory of Relativity. No single breakthrough in twentieth-century physics (with the possible exception of quantum mechanics) changed our view of the world more than that of Einsteins discovery of relativity. The notions that the flow of time is not a constant, that the mass of an object depends on its velocity, and that the speed of light is a constant no matter what the motion of the observer, at first seemed shocking to scientists and laymen alike. But, as Feynman shows so clearly and so entertainingly in the lectures chosen for this volume, these crazy notions are no mere dry principles of physics, but are things of beauty and elegance. No onenot even Einstein himselfexplained these difficult, anti-intuitive concepts more clearly, or with more verve and gusto, than Richard Feynman.[via]More editions of Six Not-So-Easy Pieces: Einstein's Relativity, Symmetry and Space-Time:
- Six Not-So-Easy Pieces: Einstein's Relativity, Symmetry An Space-Time: ISBN 0465023932 (0-465-02393-2)
Softcover, Perseus Books Group - Six Not-So-Easy Pieces: Einstein's Relativity, Symmetry and Space-Time: ISBN 0201328429 (0-201-32842-9)
Softcover, Perseus Books Group - Six Not-So-Easy Pieces: Einstein's Relativity, Symmetry and Space-Time: ISBN 0201150255 (0-201-15025-5)
Hardcover, Perseus Books Group - Six Not-So-Easy Pieces: Einstein's Relativity, Symmetry and Space-Time: ISBN 0201150263 (0-201-15026-3)
Hardcover, Perseus Books Group - Six Not-So-Easy Pieces: Einstein's Relativity, Symmetry and Space-Time: ISBN 0201328410 (0-201-32841-0)
Softcover, Perseus Books Group
- Six Not-So-Easy Pieces: Einstein's Relativity, Symmetry An Space-Time: ISBN 0465023932 (0-465-02393-2)
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The Society of Mindby Marvin MinskyISBN 0671657135 (0-671-65713-5)
Softcover, Touchstone Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Society of Mind'Book summary:For some artificial intelligence researchers, Minsky's book is too far removed from hard science to be useful. For others, the high-level approach of The Society of Mind makes it a gold mine of ideas waiting to be implemented. The author, one of the undisputed fathers of the discipline of AI, sets out to provide an abstract model of how the human mind really works. His thesis is that our minds consist of a huge aggregation of tiny mini-minds or agents that have evolved to perform highly specific tasks. Most of these agents lack the attributes we think of as intelligence and are severely limited in their ability to intercommunicate. Yet rational thought, feeling, and purposeful action result from the interaction of these basic components. Minsky's theory does not suggest a specific implementation for building intelligent machines. Still, this book may prove to be one of the most influential for the future of AI. [via]
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Uncle Tungsten: Memories Of A Chemical Boyhoodby Oliver W. SacksISBN 0375704043 (0-375-70404-3)
Softcover, Random House Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Uncle Tungsten: Memories Of A Chemical Boyhood'Book summary:From his earliest days, Oliver Sacks, the distinguished neurologist who is also one of the most remarkable storytellers of our time, was irresistibly drawn to understanding the natural world. Born into a large family of doctors, metallurgists, chemists, physicists, and teachers, his curiosity was encouraged and abetted by aunts, uncles, parents, and older brothers. But soon after his sixth birthday, the Second World War broke out and he was evacuated from London, as were hundreds of thousands of children, to escape the bombing. Exiled to a school that rivaled Dickens's grimmest, fed on a steady diet of turnips and beetroots, tormented by a sadistic headmaster, and allowed home only once in four years, he felt desolate and abandoned.
When he returned to London in 1943 at the age of ten, he was a changed, withdrawn boy, one who desperately needed order to make sense of his life. He was sustained by his secret passions: for numbers, for metals, and for finding patterns in the world around him. Under the tutelage of his "chemical" uncle, Uncle Tungsten, Sacks began to experiment with "the stinks and bangs" that almost define a first entry into chemistry: tossing sodium off a bridge to see it take fire in the water below; producing billowing clouds of noxious-smelling chemicals in his home lab. As his interests spread to investigations of batteries and bulbs, vacuum tubes and photography, he discovered his first great scientific heroes, men and women whose genius lay in understanding the hidden order of things and disclosing the forces that sustain and support the tangible world. There was Humphry Davy, the boyish chemist who delighted in sending flaming globules of metal shooting across his lab; Marie Curie, whose heroic efforts in isolating radium would ultimately lead to the unlocking of the secrets of the atom; and Dmitri Mendeleev, inventor of the periodic table, whose pursuit of the classification of elements unfolds like a detective story.
Uncle Tungsten vividly evokes a time when virtual reality had not yet displaced a hands-on knowledge of the world. It draws us into a journey of discovery that reveals, through the enchantment and wonder of a childhood passion, the birth of an extraordinary and original mind. [via]More editions of Uncle Tungsten: Memories Of A Chemical Boyhood:
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Understanding Physicsby Isaac AsimovISBN 0880292512 (0-88029-251-2)
Hardcover, Barnes & Noble, Incorporated
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Understanding Physics'Book summary:Dr Isaac Asimov, famed science fiction writer and science popularizer, presents an introduction to the complexities of modern physics. [via]
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Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Centuryby Michio KakuISBN 0385484992 (0-385-48499-2)
Softcover, Random House Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century'Book summary:Take it easy: that's Michio Kaku's motto. Given the extraordinary advances science has thrown up in time for the millennium, the only way you could possibly fit them into a single volume is by a correspondingly massive simplification.
Subtitled How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century and Beyond, Visions assumes that, by and large, scientists get to do whatever they like, that all technologies are consumer technologies, and that consumers welcome anything and everything science throws at them. Kaku gets away with this frankly dodgy strategy by dint of sheer hard work. He has based his predictions on interviews with more than 150 renowned working scientists; he integrates these interviews with a huge body of original journalistic material; and, above all, he roots that mass of information on an entirely reasonable model of what the purpose of science will be in the third millennium. Up until now, science has expended its efforts on decoding most of the fundamental natural processes--"the dance," as Kaku puts it, of elementary particles deep inside stars and the rhythms of DNA molecules coiling and uncoiling within our bodies. Science's task now, Kaku believes, is to cross-pollinate advances thrown up by the study of matter, biology, and mind--modern science's three main theaters of endeavor. "We are now making the transition from amateur chess players to grand masters," he writes, "from observers to choreographers of nature." Then again, he also believes that "the Internet ... will eventually become a 'Magic Mirror' that appears in fairy tales, able to speak with the wisdom of the human race." Kaku, in short, deserves a good slapping--but he also deserves to be read. --Simon Ings, Amazon.co.uk [via]
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Visions : How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century and Beyondby Michio KakuISBN 0385484984 (0-385-48498-4)
Hardcover, Doubleday Publishing
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Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize the Twenty-First Centuryby Michio KakuISBN 0198500866 (0-19-850086-6)
Hardcover, Oxford Univ Pr
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize the Twenty-First Century'Book summary:As the twentieth century draws to a close, the fundamental elements of matter and life - the particles of the atom and the decoding of the nucleus of the cell - have been discovered, and one of the great chapters of scientific discovery has drawn to a close.
In many ways, however, this is but a preface to an even more far-reaching scientific revolution that will take place in the next century, as we make the transition from unravelling the secrets of nature to becoming the masters of nature.
In VISIONS, physicist Michio Kaku looks to this future and guides the reader through the science of the next century. What makes his vision of this future so compelling is that it is based on the pioneering efforts by theoreticians and the groundbreaking research that is going on in the labs right now. Science, for all its breathtaking change, evolves slowly. Dr. Kaku asserts that, using today's knowledge, we can confidently predict the direction of science through the next century.
In the first section of the book, he explores the evolution and development of computers and artificial intelligence. He offers a window on how computer science will evolve after the year 2020, when the principle that has governed the industry's technological process since the 1950's, Moore's Law, reaches its limits. Next, he discusses biogenetics, the second great scientific revolution, and reveals how the completion of the decoding of the genetic structure of DNA will allow us to conquer the devastating genetic diseases that have plagued the human race throughout our history and allow us to alter and reshape our genetic inheritance. The final section of the book takes us yet further into the future, as we see how quantum physicists are perfecting new ways of harnessing the matter and energy of the Universe.
A spellbinding narrative that brings together the cutting-edge research of today's foremost scientists to explore the science of tomorrow, VISIONS is an exhilarating adventure into the future of our planet and ourselves. [via]More editions of Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize the Twenty-First Century:
Warped Passages: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Universe's Hidden Dimensionsby Lisa RandallISBN 0060531096 (0-06-053109-6)
Softcover, Perennial
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What Evolution Isby Ernst MayrISBN 0465044263 (0-465-04426-3)
Softcover, Perseus Books Group
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› Find signed collectible books: 'What Evolution Is'Book summary:Gathering insights from his seven-decade career, the renowned biologist Ernst Mayr argues that evolution is now to be considered not a theory but a fact--and that "there is not a single Why? question in biology that can be answered adequately without a consideration of evolution."
Mayr, emeritus professor of zoology at Harvard University, has long been one of the world's foremost researchers in genetic and evolutionary theory. In this overview of past and current scientific thought, he discusses key concepts and terms, among them the origin of species, the (somewhat metaphorical) "struggle for existence," and agents of micro- and macroevolution. Somewhat against the grain, he argues against reduction and for the study of evolution at the phenotypic, not genetic, level. In his concluding pages, Mayr offers a careful overview of human evolution, adding his view that humankind is indeed unique--though "it has not yet completed the transition from quadrupedal to bipedal life in all of its structures."
Advanced students of the life sciences, as well as readers looking for a survey of current evolutionary theory, will find Mayr's book a useful companion. --Gregory McNamee [via]
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Woman: An Intimate Geographyby Natalie AngierISBN 0385498411 (0-385-49841-1)
Softcover, Bantam Dell Pub Group
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Woman: An Intimate Geography'Book summary:Despite scientific evidence to the contrary, as far as the health care profession is concerned the standard operating design of the human body is male. So when a book comes along as beautifully written and endlessly informative as Natalie Angier's Woman: An Intimate Geography, it's a cause for major celebration. Written with whimsy and eloquence, her investigation into female physiology draws its inspiration not only from scientific and medical sources but also from mythology, history, art, and literature, layering biological factoids with her own personal encounters and arcane anecdotes from the history of science. Who knew, for example, that the clitoris--with 8,000 nerve fibers--packs double the pleasure of the penis; that the gene controlling cellular sensitivity to male androgens, ironically enough, resides on the X-chromosome; or that stress hormones like cortisol and corticosterone are the true precursors of friendship?
The mysteries of evolution are not a new subject for Angier, a Pulitzer Prize-winning biology writer for the New York Times whose previous books include The Beauty of the Beastly and Natural Obsessions. The strengths of Woman begin with Angier's witty and evocative prose style, but its real contribution is the way it expands the definition of female "geography" beyond womb, breasts, and estrogen, down as far as the bimolecular substructure of DNA and up as high as the transcendent infrastructure of the human brain. --Patrizia DiLucchio [via]
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Spanish
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Blink Inteligencia Intuitiva?/blink.: Por Que Sabemos La Verdad En Dos Segundos/ the Power of Thinking Without Thinkingby Malcolm GladwellISBN 1598200879 (1-59820-087-9)
Softcover, Santillana USA Pub Co Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Blink Inteligencia Intuitiva?/blink.: Por Que Sabemos La Verdad En Dos Segundos/ the Power of Thinking Without Thinking'Book summary:In Blink, bestselling author Malcolm Gladwell revolutionizes the way we understand the world within. Blink is a book about how we think without thinking, about choices that seem to be made in an instant ¯in the blink of an eye¯ that actually aren't as simple as they seem. Why are some people brilliant decision makers, while others are consistently inept? How do our brains really work - in the office, in the classroom, in the kitchen, and in the bedroom? And why are the best decisions often those that are impossible to explain to others? [via]
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El Cometa/the Cometby Carl Sagan, Ann DruyanISBN 8432043680 (84-320-4368-0)
Softcover, Planeta Pub Corp
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La Maquina De Los Memesby Susan BlackmoreISBN 8449309670 (84-493-0967-0)
Softcover, Paidos Iberica Ediciones S A
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› Find signed collectible books: 'La Maquina De Los Memes'Book summary:Los humanos somos muy extraños. De la misma forma en que lo hicieron los animales, nuestros cuerpos han evolucionado por selección natural y, no obstante, son tremendamente distintos de los cuerpos de los otros seres. Utilizamos el lenguaje para comunicarnos, declaramos la guerra, creemos en la religión, enterramos a nuestros muertos y nos avergüenza la sexualidad. Consumimos televisión, conducimos automóviles y comemos helados. ¿Por qué somos tan sumamente distintos? De entre todos los animales, los humanos somos los únicos seres capaces de imitar a nuestros semejantes y, por lo tanto, de copiar ideas, costumbres, habilidades, conducta, inventos, canciones e historias: memes, en suma. El término «meme» fue acuñado en 1976 por Richard Dawkins, en las últimas páginas de su obra El gen egoísta. Los memes, como los genes, son replicantes empeñados en introducirse en tantos cerebros como puedan y en iniciar una competición que da forma a nuestras mentes y a nuestra cultura, del mismo modo en que la selección natural ha diseñado nuestros cuerpos. Los memes nos hacen: todos los seres humanos somos máquinas de fabricar memes. Este fascinante y extraordinario libro concluye con una de las cuestiones más trascendentales con las que debe enfrentarse el ser humano: la naturaleza del ser, el meollo de la conciencia que siente emociones, que tiene recuerdos y creencias y que toma decisiones. Y así, el fascinante discurso de Susan Blackmore sostiene que ese meollo de la conciencia, el yo interior, no es más que una entelequia, una ilusión creada por los memes en su esfuerzo por autorreplicarse. [via]
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