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A New Kind of Science
by Stephen Wolfram


Physics and computer science genius Stephen Wolfram, whose Mathematica computer language launched a multimillion-dollar company, now sets his sights on a more daunting goal: understanding the universe. Wolfram lets the world see his work in A New Kind of Science, a gorgeous, 1,280-page tome more than a decade in the making. With patience, insight, and self-confidence to spare, Wolfram outlines a fundamental new way of modeling complex systems. On the frontier of complexity science since he was a boy, Wolfram is a champion of cellular automata--256 "programs" governed by simple nonmathematical rules. He points out that even the most complex equations fail to accurately model biological systems, but the simplest cellular automata can produce results straight out of nature--tree branches, stream eddies, and leopard spots, for instance. The graphics in A New Kind of Science show striking resemblance to the patterns we see in nature every day. Wolfram wrote the book in a distinct style meant to make it easy to read, even for nontechies; a basic familiarity with logic is helpful but not essential. Readers will find themselves swept away by the elegant simplicity of Wolfram's ideas and the accidental artistry of the cellular automaton models. Whether or not Wolfram's revolution ultimately gives us the keys to the universe, his new science is absolutely awe-inspiring. --Therese Littleton - Amazon.com
Hardcover: 1192 pages
Wolfram Media, Inc.; ISBN: 1579550088; (May 14, )

On the Shoulders of Giants
by Stephen Hawking (Editor)
Hardcover: 1200 pages
Running Pr; ISBN: 0762413484;

Tuxedo Park: A Wall Street Tycoon and the Secret Palace of Science That Changed the Course of World War II
by Jennet Conant
Listed under Inventors

The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World
by Michael Pollan
(Paperback -- May 28, )

A Beautiful Mind: The Life of Mathematical Genius and Nobel Laureate John Nash
by Sylvia Nasar
(Paperback -- November 27, )

Lives of a Biologist: Adventures in a Century of Extraordinary Science
by John Tyler Bonner
(Hardcover -- May )

The Universe in a Nutshell
by Stephen Hawking
Stephen Hawking, science's first real rock star, may be the least-read bestselling author in history--it's no secret that many people who own A Brief History of Time have never finished it. Hawking's The Universe in a Nutshell aims to remedy the situation, with a plethora of friendly illustrations... Read more
(Hardcover)

Linked: The New Science of Networks
by Albert-Laszlo Barabasi, Albert-László Barabási 
(Hardcover)


Dawkins vs. Gould : Survival of the Fittest
by Kim Sterelny, Jon Turney (Editor)
Kim Sterelny moves beyond caricature to expose the real differences between the conceptions of evolution of these two leading scientists. He shows that the conflict extends beyond evolution to their very beliefs in science itself; and, in Gould’s case, to domains in which science plays no role at all. Amazon.com
Listed under Evolution

The Illustrated Brief History of Time, Updated and Expanded Edition
by Stephen W. Hawking
(Hardcover)

Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood
by Oliver W. Sacks
Oliver Sacks's luminous memoir charts the growth of a mind. Born in 1933 into a family of formidably intelligent London Jews, he discovered the wonders of the physical sciences early from his parents and their flock of brilliant siblings, most notably "Uncle Tungsten" (real name, Dave), who... Read more
Knopf; Hardcover - 337 pages
(October 16, )

Animal: The Definitive Visual Guide to the World's Wildlife
by Don E. Wilson (Editor), David Burnie (Editor)
Over 2,000 species, from the tiny spider mite to the massive blue whale, are profiled in DK's astonishingly wonderful Animal, produced in cooperation with the Smithsonian Institution and more than 70 expert zoologists. To call this book "profusely illustrated" is to seriously underrepresent ... Read more
DK Publishing
Hardcover - 624 pages
1st edition (October 1, )

Celestial Treasury : From the Music of the Spheres to the Conquest of Space
by Marc Lachieze-Rey, et al
Cambridge Univ Pr (Trd)
Hardcover - 210 pages

An Intimate Look at the Night Sky
by Chet Raymo
Walker & Co
Hardcover - 242 pages

Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software
by Steven Johnson
An individual ant, like an individual neuron, is just about as dumb as can be. Connect enough of them together properly, though, and you get spontaneous intelligence. Web pundit Steven Johnson explains what we know about this phenomenon with a rare lucidity in Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants,... Read more
Scribner
Hardcover - 288 pages

Aquagenesis : The Origin and Evolution of Life in the Sea
by Richard Ellis
Viking Press
Hardcover - 304 pages
(September 27, )

The Seven Sins of Memory: How the Mind Forgets and Remembers
by Daniel L. Schacter
Illustrating decades of research with compelling and often bizarre examples of glitches and miscues, Daniel L. Schacter's The Seven Sins of Memory dusts off an old topic and finds material of both practical and theoretical interest. Chairman of Harvard's Department of Psychology, Schacter knows his... Read more
Houghton Mifflin Co
Hardcover - 270 pages

The Borderlands of Science : Where Sense Meets Nonsense
by Michael Shermer
Superstring theory is one of the latest inhabitants of what Shermer (Why People Believe Weird Things, etc.), editor of Skeptic magazine, calls the "borderlands" of science: that is, ideas that fall somewhere between established, likely explanations for reality (or some small part thereof) and... Read more
Oxford Univ Pr (Trade)
Hardcover - 320 pages

Ether Day: The Strange Tale of America's Greatest Medical Discovery and the Haunted Men Who Made It
by Julie M. Fenster
On Friday, 16 October 1846, at Massachusetts General Hospital a gas that had for a half century been a source of entertainment was first used as an anesthetic during an operation. New York columnist Fenster tells the story of the transformation, the people who brought it about, and its aftermath.... Read more
HarperCollins
Hardcover - 278 pages
1 Ed edition

The Invention of Clouds : How an Amateur Meteorologist Forged the Language of the Skies
by Richard Hamblyn
British science writer Richard Hamblyn skillfully blends biography with scientific and cultural history to capture for modern readers the remarkable achievement of Luke Howard (1772-1864), the quiet Quaker whose classification of cloud types we still employ today. "Cirrus," "cumulus," and "stratus"... Read more
Farrar Straus & Giroux
Hardcover - 256 pages
1 Ed edition

The Eternal Frontier: An Ecological History of North America and Its Peoples
by Tim Flannery
Reading The Eternal Frontier might be the closest you'll get to taking a class from Tim Flannery--and that alone makes it an opportunity just too good to pass up. This ambitious retelling of North America's dramatic ecological history grew out of a course that Flannery taught at Harvard surveying... Read more
Atlantic Monthly Pr
Hardcover - 368 pages
(May 10, )

Alfred Russel Wallace: A Life
by Peter Raby
Listed under Evolution

Dr Folkman's War: Angiogenesis and the Struggle to Defeat Cancer
by Robert Cooke, C. Everett Koop 
Early in 1998, New York Times science reporter and author Gina Kolata happened to be seated at a banquet next to the Nobel Prize-winning scientist James Watson. When Kolata asked Watson what was new in the world of science, he replied, "Judah Folkman and angiogenesis, that's what's new. Judah is... Read more
Random House
Hardcover - 366 pages
(February 15, )

The Hole in the Universe : How Scientists Peered over the Edge of Emptiness and Found Everything
by K. C. Cole
Most of science journalist K.C. Cole's journey into nothing is about physical nothing. "In the quantum realm, even nothing never sleeps. Nothing is always up to something. Even when there is absolutely nothing going on, and nothing there to do it." The nothingness of the vacuum is the background to... Read more
Harcourt Brace
Hardcover - 240 pages
(January 25, )

Mauve: How One Man Invented a Color That Changed the World
by Simon Garfield
In 1856, while trying to synthesize artificial quinine, 18-year-old chemistry student William Perkin instead produced a murky residue. Fifty years later, he described the event: he "was about to throw a certain residue away when I thought it might be interesting. The solution of it resulted in a... Read more
W.W. Norton & Company
Hardcover - 224 pages
(April )

Aquatics
by Henry Horenstein
Photographer Henry Horenstein has a unique vision of the natural world. His abstract views create intense, sometimes provocative, and yet always revealing portraits of animal life. In praise of Horenstein's work, the Boston Globe has written "His carp and jellyfish are weightless and oddly graceful,... Read more
Stewart Tabori & Chang
Hardcover - 84 pages
(November )

Kosmos
by Adam Bartos (Photographer), Svetlana Boym (Introduction)
The Space Race was an exhilirating moment in history, alternately frighten-ing, thrilling, awe-inspiring, and ultimately, sublime. Its most enigmatic element was the competition. The Soviets seemed less technologically sophisticated (at least from the American perspective) but in fact won many of... Read more
Princeton Architectural Press
Hardcover - 176 pages
(November )

Fly: The Unsung Hero of 20th-Century Science
by Martin Brookes
Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana, and biologists like fruit flies. Evolutionary geneticist and science journalist Martin Brookes explores the not-quite-microscopic world of Drosophila in Fly: The Unsung Hero of 20th-Century Science. Instantly familiar to any student of high school... Read more
Ecco Press, Hardcover - 215 pages

Rock of Ages, Sands of Time
by Warren Allmon, et al
University of Chicago Press (Trd)
Hardcover - 376 pages

The Mummy Congress : Science, Obsession, and the Everlasting Dead
by Heather Pringle
Mummies fascinate us. As we peer at their withered flesh, we are glimpsing a type of immortality. Heather Pringle tells the stories of some of these "frail elders"--and the scientists who study them--in The Mummy Congress. Pringle details the tension between the preservationists, who want to...
Listed under Archaeology

Chance in the House of Fate: A Natural History of Heredity
by Jennifer G. Ackerman
Houghton Mifflin Co
Hardcover - 272 pages
(June 2001

Dinner at the New Gene Cafe : How Genetic Engineering Is Changing What We Eat, How We Live, and the Global Politics of Food
by Bill Lambrecht
It may be true that we are what we eat. Now, with a flood of genetically modified foods overtaking the market, it is possible to eat what we are. But the prospect of genetic cannibalism is the least of the worries of food activists, and journalist Bill Lambrecht's Dinner at the New Gene Café... Read More
St. Martin's Press
Hardcover - 383 pages
1 Ed edition

Project Orion: The True Story of the Atomic Spaceship
by George Dyson
Listed under Space Flight
 
 
 

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