Reviews (19)

A must read!
I first read A Short History while on business in Australia. I couldn't put it down. The writing is outstanding and the information is communicated in language that anyone can understand. I have been re-reading A Short History with my kids, and they love it. This is a book for all ages.

The Layman's Scientific Reference Text
This review is for the Black Swan Paperback edition published in 2004, 574 pages of text plus comprehensive notes, bibliography and index.A SHORT HISTORY was on the USA Today top 150 best sellers list for 63 weeks between May 2003 and August 2005, reaching the peak position of number 31.
Amazingly witty and informative.
This is a very well written book. The writer writes in an old fashioned witty style alas seldom seen nowadays. I bought more examles of the book to send to my children and best fiends. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Essays    2. General    3. Popular works    4. Science    5. Science (General)    6. Science/Mathematics    7. Travel    8. Travel / General   

Reviews (5)

Truly magnificent...
As usual I found myself wondering around the science section of a local bookstore. I tried to convince myself that I should finish reading one of the seven books by my bed before spending anymore of my, rent, money. After browsing the covers of numerous books, I was just `looking', one caught my eye. A very visible font read: "Richard Dawkins". I picked it up assuming, wrongly so, that this was Dawkins biography. I usually have a habit of reading the preface of the book I have my eye on, this time I went straight to the register. I started reading the book in the car when I walked out of the bookstore. Two days after, of non-stop reading, I have just put it down.
Not just a cheering section
If Darwin's revelation of natural selection is "the best idea anyone, any where, ever had", then Richard Dawkins' identification of the "selfish gene" must run a close second.While Darwin's concept explained the workings of life, Dawkins' insight disclosed the mechanism of natural selection.The 1976 publication of "The Selfish Gene" not only stimulated a fresh wave of thinking among biologists, it also stirred public interest and imagination.If life was under the thrall of those strings of chemicals in our cells, how far did that influence reach?In this set of excellent essays on the issues, Dawkins ideas and their impact are presented and discussed.The fruit of his insights are bittersweet, and while most of these writings applaud his probity and communication skills, there is the tang of doubt about some of them.
Reflections on a major biological thinker of our time
The subtitle of this book, "how a scientist changed the way we think", is entirely justified: Richard Dawkins really did. Even people who thought they understood evolutionary theory quite well found that they had to rethink it all when The Selfish Gene appeared 30 years ago. Not all biologists agreed with his message, of course, Stephen J. Gould and Richard Lewontin being well known as opponents, but many of them did, and even when they did not agree with everything they still agreed with a great deal. Patrick Bateson provides one of the most interesting contributions to this book, in which he explains that he continues to disagree with Dawkins about some details, but he says, rightly, that "those who hope for bloody gladiatorial contests are disappointed when they discover that the circles of our interests and beliefs overlap much more extensively than they had believed".
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Subjects:  1. 1941-    2. Dawkins, Richard,    3. Essays    4. Influence    5. Life Sciences - Biology - General    6. Philosophy & Social Aspects    7. Science    8. Science/Mathematics    9. Scientists - General    10. Biography: general    11. History of science    12. Life Sciences | Evolutionary Biology    13. Science / Biology   

Reviews (2)

Excellent Journalism for Critical Thinkers From Any Field

This popular science book will blow your mind!
I was struck by something Brian Greene says in the intro to this
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Subjects:  1. American - General    2. Collections Of Monographs, Essays (Multi-Subject)    3. Essays    4. Science    5. Science (General)    6. Science/Mathematics    7. Science / Essays   

Reviews (2)

Buffet For the Science Gourmet

Good Reading About Science
This book contains 21 essays about a broad range of scientific topics.Many of the essays appeared in The New Yorker or The New York Times which gives you a hint of their flavor: well and professionally written for an intelligent but non-scientific audience.
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Subjects:  1. American - General    2. Essays    3. General    4. Popular works    5. Science    6. Science (General)    7. Science/Mathematics    8. Technical writing    9. United States    10. Science / General   

Reviews (16)

Competent compilation of the anti-Creation movment.
John Brockman has succeeded in assembling a good cross-section of anti-ID essays in one reasonably concise volume (less than 300 pages).The quality therein fluctuates from competent to outstanding, while the tone ranges from strictly professional to strangely defensive at times, all depending on the individual authors.Some wrote for purely to share knowledge, while a few (and only a few) bore an agenda on their backs, which weakened their credibility.
Amounts to a destruction of Intelligent Design
As Editor John Brockman writes in his introduction, this book, a collection of 16 essays by eminent scientists, "is a thoughtful response to the bizarre claims made by the ID movement's advocates, whose only interest in science appears to be to replace it with beliefs consistent with those of the Middle Ages." (p. x)
Scientists debunking pseudo-science...
If you're unclear why serious scientists get so frustrated with the intelligent-design movement, then this book is a must-read. It offers the opinions of respected professionals from a variety of fields, from biology to psychology, all of whom have one thing in common: they recognize that while science and evolutionary theory have not answered every question in the universe, intelligent design has not answered any. Another common theme throughout is the debunking of "teach the controversy", touted by intelligent designers as a back-door means of getting religious belief taught in the classroom. As these insightful authors explain, the only "controversy" is the misappropriation and distortion by intelligent-design proponents of evidence produced by serious researchers to satisfy the former group's untenable claims. There's nothing scientific about that... ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Christianity    2. Essays    3. Evolution (Biology)    4. Human Evolution    5. Intelligent design (Teleology)    6. Life Sciences - Evolution    7. Philosophy Of Science    8. Religion and science    9. Religious aspects    10. Science    11. Science/Mathematics    12. Science / Evolution   

Editorial Review

Scientists love to speculate about the direction research and technology will take us, and editor John Brockman has given a stellar panel free rein to imagine the future in Read more

Reviews (15)

Predictions, Past Present Future
Prophecy has been having a bad press lately. Despite the seeming millions of folks who either chat with a divinity, channel the dead, "solve" crimes, see ghosts or converse with aliens, not one predicted 911, the London bombings or the Indonesian tsunami. It's not just the fringe that strikes out."Experts" routinely choose wrong whether in politics, sports, finance, entertainmentor cultural trends. It's disillusioning, but the record of science is not much better in terms of "things to come". This is not to say that energy is not expended on that task. It is safe to say that the intervention of the computer, TV, car, discovery of DNA, cloning, medical advances, etc renders past predictions useless.That is one reason I liked this book so well.It is divided into 2 parts - the first philosophical, the second practical.
Captivating
Written in 2002, and containing twenty-five essays written by leading scientists, ethicists, technologists and industrialists, this book discussess what life might be like in fifty years.
Informative
I thought this was a good book for the most part. It did get a little long winded in places and the view of the future was a bit dark for me. The author made a few very profound statements that really impacted me, but I had to sort through a lot of repetative philosophy. It started to drag at the end. I enjoyed the first few chapters the most. I think it is worth reading if you are interested in the future of science and genetics. Just be prepared to sort through a lot of words to get to the good information. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Essays    2. Forecasting    3. Future Studies    4. History    5. Philosophy & Social Aspects    6. Science    7. Science And Civilization    8. Science And Public Policy    9. Science/Mathematics    10. Science / General   

Reviews (39)

A Great Book!
I loved "Lives of a Cell". It's not your ordinary biology textbook; the author's love for the world around him comes out in every page. He uses metaphor to describe the different parts and functions of the cell. For example, he compares the cell to a room, and then illustrates the different sizes of the components of the cell by comparing it to furniture.
I wasn't intrigued..
Though I understand other reviewers' opinions of this book, and I agree that some of the book's ideas were interesting, The Lives of a Cell just didn't appeal to me. I have always loved science, but not in the way this book displayed it. I got extremely bored with this book and found myself skimming chapters. Lewis Thomas seemed like he was trying to sound too intelligent while getting his opinion across, where a simple explanation would have been much more powerful. Some may like this book, but I think there are much better reads out there.

A Classic of Science Reading From 1974

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Subjects:  1. Addresses, essays, lectures    2. Biology    3. Essays    4. Life Sciences - Biology - General    5. Philosophy    6. Science    7. Science/Mathematics    8. Cellular biology    9. Science / Cytology   

Reviews (6)

"Great minds can sometimes guess the truth before they have...the evidence...for it"
+++++
Mundane question, provocative responses
The question posed by John Brockman was "What do you believe but cannot prove?" It might be classed as one of those Mediaeval "angels on the head of a pin" queries. However, this is the 21st Century and what we know of Nature now stands in stark contrast to what was known then. The responses show that serious questions remain to be resolved. Not all of them can be, as the issue concerned lies either in the past or is too remote for close study. Some, of course, lie in the realm of what we deem "consciousness". A vague term in its own right, made even more difficult when the various respondents offer their own definitions. That tactic, however, makes the answers more stimulating by creating fresh questions. By selecting novelist Ian McEwan to write the introduction, Brockman shows he doesn't consider the question limited to scientific speculation. McEwan demonstrates his knowledge of the scientific issues [would that more fiction writers matched that capacity!] and how "inspiration" has advanced our understanding of Nature.
Even scientists are allowed to speculate...
in fact, that's a part of their job description.
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Subjects:  1. Belief and doubt    2. Epistemology    3. Essays    4. Miscellanea    5. Philosophy & Social Aspects    6. Philosophy Of Science    7. Science    8. Science/Mathematics    9. Science / General   

Reviews (2)

Two books in one + CD...
I have purchased almost all Feynman books so far.
There's Room at the Bottom
Richard Feynman left his hand prints almost everywhere in physics, and here at Los Alamos, he is still a living legend: not just for his scientific brilliance, but for all the color of his personality.His signature characteristic, as you will read in this wonderful book, was simplicity.To wit:
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Subjects:  1. 20th century    2. Biography    3. Biography / Autobiography    4. Essay    5. Essays    6. Intellectual life    7. Physicists    8. Physics    9. Science    10. Science/Mathematics    11. Scientists - General    12. United States    13. History    14. Miscellaneous Items    15. Science / General   

Reviews (5)

A better title than book
The idea conveyed by the title is wonderful, and to some degree the notion is realized.Unfortunately, it doesn't really fly.While there still may be merit in study of Einstein's educational comments to children, this volume doesn't offer much insight.
Great book ABOUT Einstein, not by him.
This book has very little actually written by Einstein himself. It gives a brief biography and background of Einstein. The letters are from children and show the enormity of his fanbase in the 1940's and 50's.The biography is informative and there are plenty of interesting pictures.The letters are interesting, but toward the end, they seem repetitive.Still, it is a great book worth buying.Barnes and noble has a cheaper edition, which makes it well worth the 6 dollars!

Misleading Title
I had been looking forward to this book's release for some time.As yet another self-confessed Einstein fan, the idea of a collection of correspondences between the greatest scientific mind in the history of human endeavour, and curious children from around the world, was irresistable.So, when I finally got my hands on it, I wanted to enjoy it very much.However, in the end, I felt a bit cheated and misled.Read more

Subjects:  1. 1879-1955    2. Biography / Autobiography    3. Children    4. Correspondence    5. Einstein, Albert,    6. Essays    7. Letters    8. Literary Collections    9. Literature: Classics    10. Physicists    11. Scientists - General    12. Biography: general    13. Literary studies: general    14. Literature: Texts    15. PHYSICS    16. Science: General Issues   

Reviews (33)

a vaporous language dance
Terrence McKenna said: "...Objects that are Faberge Eggs, things made of pearl, and metal, and glass, and gel, and you, when you're shown one of these things, a single one of them, you look at it an you know, without a shadow of a doubt, in the moment of looking at this thing, that if it were right here, right now, this world would go mad..."
This book is a drug! Wow!
The amazing diversity of subjects covered opens new patterns of thought in your own mind. Pickover's book was incredible in the way it could illicit new thoughts and perceptions. If you are a curious mind you will love this book. It is filled with ideas and information gleaned from the farthest reaches. You will feel like you have traveled to distant lands and you have Pickover as your expert guide on the journey.

Rick's Review
Very interesting, expecially for us Hippies from the 60s.
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Subjects:  1. Essays    2. Mathematical Physics    3. Science    4. Science/Mathematics    5. Science / Mathematical Physics   

Editorial Review

Richard Dawkins has an opinion on everything biological, it seems, and in Read more

Reviews (50)

A Devils Chaplain
Richard Dawkins is one of the most influential and controversial essayists of today. A renowned evolutionary biologist, he currently holds the Charles Simonyi Chair at Oxford University. In his book A Devils Champlain he brings together 25 years and some of his best and most polemic essays (some previously unpublished) with subjects dealing with everything from love to evolution.
A good intro for those new to Dawkins's ideas
This is a great book outlining Dawkins's various ideas on science, religion and philosophy. Those of you who find his other books hard to follow will benefit from this collection of essays and his views on religion are more pronounced.
Dawkins diversified
This book shows Dawkins' brilliant intellect on many topics. Admitidly, there are some points in the book that drag on a bit if you are not particularly interested in the topic at hand, but for the most part the short essays and writings in this book are highly valuable and revealing. Most especially to me was the letter to his daughter about good and bad reasons to believe. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Essays    2. Evolution (Biology)    3. Organic Evolution    4. Philosophy    5. Philosophy & Social Aspects    6. Philosophy Of Biology    7. Religion and science    8. Science    9. Science/Mathematics    10. Science / Essays