"A glorious book . . . A spirited defense of science . . . From the first page to the last, this book is a manifesto for clear thought."
*Los Angeles Times
"POWERFUL . . . A stirring defense of informed rationality. . . Rich in surprising information and beautiful writing."
*The Washington Post Book World
How can we make intelligent decisions about our increasingly technology-driven lives if we don't understand the difference between the myths of pseudoscience and the testable hypotheses of science? Pulitzer Prize-winning author and distinguished astronomer Carl Sagan argues that scientific thinking is critical not only to the pursuit of truth but to the very well-being of our democratic institutions.
Casting a wide net through history and culture, Sagan examines and authoritatively debunks such celebrated fallacies of the past as witchcraft, faith healing, demons, and UFOs. And yet, disturbingly, in today's so-called information age, pseudoscience is burgeoning with stories of alien abduction, channeling past lives, and communal hallucinations commanding growing attention and respect. As Sagan demonstrates with lucid eloquence, the siren song of unreason is not just a cultural wrong turn but a dangerous plunge into darkness that threatens our most basic freedoms.
"COMPELLING."
*USA Today
"A clear vision of what good science means and why it makes a difference. . . . A testimonial to the power of science and a warning of the dangers of unrestrained credulity."
*The Sciences
"PASSIONATE."
*San Francisco Examiner-Chronicle

Cosmic Jackpot is Paul Davies's eagerly awaited return to cosmology, the successor to his critically acclaimed bestseller The Mind of God. Here he tackles all the "big questions," including the biggest of them all: Why does the universe seem so well adapted for life? In his characteristically clear and elegant style, Davies shows how recent scientific discoveries point to a perplexing fact: many different aspects of the cosmos, from the properties of the humble carbon atom to the speed of light, seem tailor-made to produce life. A radical new theory says it's because our universe is just one of an infinite number of universes, each one slightly different. Our universe is bio-friendly by accident -- we just happened to win the cosmic jackpot. While this "multiverse" theory is compelling, it has bizarre implications, such as the existence of infinite copies of each of us and Matrix-like simulated universes. And it still leaves a lot unexplained. Davies believes there's a more satisfying solution to the problem of existence: the observations we make today could help shape the nature of reality in the remote past. If this is true, then life -- and, ultimately, consciousness -- aren't just incidental byproducts of nature, but central players in the evolution of the universe. Whether he's elucidating dark matter or dark energy, M-theory or the multiverse, Davies brings the leading edge of science into sharp focus, provoking us to think about the cosmos and our place within it in new and thrilling ways.

The traditional association between time and creation is at the heart of science, cosmology, and religion. When scientists began to explore the implications of Einstein's time for the universe as a whole, they discovered that time is elastic, and can be warped by rapid motion or gravitation, that time cannot be meaningfully divided into past, present, and future, nor does time flow in the popular sense. And they made one of the most important discoveries in the history of human thought: that time, and hence all of physical reality, must have had a definite origin in the past. There can be both a beginning and an end to time. But important though Einstein's theory of time turned out to be, it still did not solve "the riddle of time, " and the search for a deeper understanding of time and its relationship with the rest of the physical universe remains at the top of the scientific agenda. From black holes, where time stands still, to the bizarre world of quantum physics, where time vanishes completely, Professor Davies finds evidence that our current theories of time simply don't add up. Why, for instance, does the universe appear younger than some of the objects within it? And how does the concept of time emerge from the timeless chaos of the big bang? Is the passage of time merely an illusion? Can time run backwards? Is time travel possible?

Why can't we solve our problems anymore? Why do threats such as the Gulf oil spill, worldwide recession, terrorism, and global warming suddenly seem unstoppable? Are there limits to the kinds of problems humans can solve? Rebecca Costa confronts- and offers a solution to-these questions in her highly anticipated and game-changing book, "The Watchman's Rattle." Costa pulls headline for today's news to demonstrate how accelerating complexity quickly outpaces that rate at which the human brain can develop new capabilities. With compelling evidenced based on research in the rise and fall of Mayan, Khmer, and Roman empires, Costa shows how t ht tendency to find a quick solutions- leads to frightening long term consequence: Society's ability to solve its most challenging, intractable problems becomes gridlocked, progress slows, and collapse ensues. A provocative new voice in the tradition of thought leaders Thomas Friedman, Jared Diamond and Malcolm Gladwell, Costa reveals how we can reverse the downward spiral. Part history, part social science, part biology, " The Watchman's Rattle" is sure to provoke, engage and incite change.

A landmark book of popular science—a lucid, engaging account of how the human body evolved over millions of years and of how the increasing disparity between the jumble of adaptations in our Stone Age bodies and the modern world is fueling the paradox of greater longevity but more chronic disease.
In a book that illuminates, as never before, the evolutionary story of the human body, Daniel Lieberman deftly examines the major transformations that contributed key adaptations to the body: the advent of bipedalism; the shift to a non-fruit-based diet; the rise of hunting and gathering and our superlative endurance athletic abilities; the development of a very large brain; and the incipience of modern cultural abilities. He elucidates how cultural evolution differs from biological evolution, and how it further transformed our bodies during the Agricultural and Industrial Revolutions. Lieberman illuminates how these ongoing changes have brought many benefits, but also have created novel conditions to which our bodies are not entirely adapted, resulting in a growing incidence of obesity and new but avoidable diseases, including type-2 diabetes. He proposes that many of these chronic illnesses persist and in some cases are intensifying because of "dysevolution," a pernicious dynamic whereby only the symptoms rather than the causes of these maladies are treated. And finally—provocatively—he advocates the use of evolutionary information to help nudge, push, and sometimes oblige us to create a more salubrious environment.
(With charts and line drawings throughout.)

"Head Cases "takes us into the dark side of the brain in an astonishing sequence of stories, at once true and strange, from the world of brain damage. Michael Paul Mason is one of an elite group of experts who coordinate care in the complicated aftermath of tragic injuries that can last a lifetime. On the road with Mason, we encounter survivors of brain injuries as they struggle to map and make sense of the new worlds they inhabit.Underlying each of these survivors' stories is an exploration of the brain and its mysteries. When injured, the brain must figure out how to heal itself, reorganizing its physiology in order to do the job. Mason gives us a series of vivid glimpses into brain science, the last frontier of medicine, and we come away in awe of the miracles of the brain's workings and astonished at the fragility of the brain and the sense of self, life, and order that resides there. "Head Cases "" achieves] through sympathy and curiosity insight like that which pulses through genuine literature" ("The New York Sun"); it is at once illuminating and deeply affecting.

A Ph. D. Is Not Enough! is required reading for anyone thinking of applying to graduate school or entering the science job market. Focusing on critical survival skills, it offers sound advice on selecting a thesis or postdoctoral adviser; choosing among research jobs in academia, government laboratories, and industry; and defining a research program. This new edition features updates throughout and a new chapter reflecting todays rapidly changing world.

Highly effective thinking is an art that engineers and scientists can be taught to develop. By presenting actual experiences and analyzing them as they are described, the author conveys the developmental thought processes employed and shows a style of thinking that leads to successful results is something that can be learned. Along with spectacular successes, the author also conveys how failures contributed to shaping the thought processes.
Provides the reader with a style of thinking that will enhance a person's ability to function as a problem-solver of complex technical issues. Consists of a collection of stories about the author's participation in significant discoveries, relating how those discoveries came about and, most importantly, provides analysis about the thought processes and reasoning that took place as the author and his associates progressed through engineering problems.

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 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.

For over three decades, Ray Kurzweil has been one of the most respected and provocative advocates of the role of technology in our future. In his classic The Age of Spiritual Machines , he argued that computers would soon rival the full range of human intelligence at its best. Now he examines the next step in this inexorable evolutionary process: the union of human and machine, in which the knowledge and skills embedded in our brains will be combined with the vastly greater capacity, speed, and knowledge-sharing ability of our creations.

《自然哲学的数学原理》主要内容简介：我们把长期期待的新版牛顿的哲学奉献给您，善意的读者，它含有许多修订和增补。这一无与伦比的著作的主要内容，可从所附的目录中得知；增补和改动的内容在作者的序言中已给予指示。剩下要我们增加的是关于这一哲学的方法这方面的东西。
从事物理学研究的人大致可分为三类。其中的一些人给每一类事物赋予特别的且隐蔽的质，然后由此宣称每个物体的行为属于人所不知不识的方式。源自亚里士多德和逍遥学派的经院学派的整个教义基于此。的确他们断言每一种效果起源于物体的特别的性质；但他们没有教我们那些性质从何而来，因此他们什么也没有教。且因为他们全都关心事物的名称而不是事物本身，他们应被认为是发明了哲学谈论，而并未传习哲学。
所以，其他人希望通过抛弃这些无用的混杂的词汇，以辛勤的努力获得称誉。且因此他们以为所有的物质是同质的，在物体上被辨别出来的各种变形起源于构成它们的小部分的非常简单的和极容易理解的相互关系。如果他们不把小部分的原始的相互关系归之于自然所赋予的关系之外的关系，他们建立的从简单事物到更复杂的事物的进程是正确的。