Posts tagged with "Book"

Figuring
Maria Popova

Book History of science, Science lives

Unexpected connections emerge in a lyrical meditation on the lives and loves of pioneering women in science

18 February, 2019

The year was 1834, and William Whewell was impressed: Mary Somerville’s grasp of celestial mechanics placed her on the forefront of science. But what to call an interdisciplinary “man of science” who was a woman? The word Whewell ultimately coined was “scientist.” Figuring is a love letter to these scientists of the past, women whose… Read More
The Snow Leopard Project: And Other Adventures in Warzone Conservation
Alex Dehgan

Book Conservation

Afghanistan’s rich natural heritage shines in an insider’s account of the foundings of its first national parks

12 February, 2019

In war zones—where daily life holds existential threats, where people are strafed and hardened by conflict, where securing food and safety is an ever-present priority—why should people care about the elusive beauty of the snow leopard, the hoary majesty of the markhor goat, or the fantastically adorned Marco Polo sheep? Alex Dehgan tackles this question… Read More
Darwin Devolves: The New Science About DNA That Challenges Evolution
Michael J. Behe

Book Evolutionary Biology

A biochemist’s crusade to overturn evolution misrepresents theory and ignores evidence

7 February, 2019

In 1996, biochemist Michael Behe introduced the notion of “irreducible complexity,” arguing that some biomolecular structures could not have evolved because their functionality requires interacting parts, the removal of any one of which renders the entire apparatus defective. This claim excited creationists and remains a central plank of the “intelligent design” movement, despite being rig… Read More
Liquid Rules: The Delightful and Dangerous Substances That Flow Through Our Lives
Mark Miodownik

Book Fluid Dynamics, Materials Science

From ink to oceans, a materials scientist explores the properties of fluids encountered on a transatlantic flight

5 February, 2019

I read Mark Miodownik’s Liquid Rules on a flight between Germany and South Carolina—an appropriate setting because the book is organized around another transatlantic plane trip. Telling the story of liquids during air travel may seem counterintuitive, but as Miodownik carefully shows, one encounters many diverse and interesting liquids during flight. Liquid Rules is Miodownik’s… Read More
Nature’s Mutiny: How the Little Ice Age of the Long Seventeenth Century Transformed the West and Shaped the Present
Philipp Blom

Book Climate change

Citing 17th-century culture shifts, an author implicates climate in human destiny

30 January, 2019

We tend to talk about climate change in terms of its tangible effects—for example, about how too much CO2 in the atmosphere is fueling wildfires and accelerating sea rise. And although we note how it is beginning to cause migrations of people around the globe, we have yet to truly grapple with how it is… Read More
Good to Go: What the Athlete in All of Us Can Learn from the Strange Science of Recovery
Christie Aschwanden

Book Health and Medicine

Holistic workout recovery regimes often outperform touted tech, finds a writer who tried them all

28 January, 2019

Redolent of sweaty workout wear and foot stink, I’m bent over in a climbing gym, not climbing. A friend is showing me how to deadlift, and I’m afraid—afraid I’ll have horrible form and hurt my back, afraid I’ll lift well and suffer aches and stiffness, afraid I won’t get sore at all and thereby prove… Read More
Creatures of Cain: The Hunt for Human Nature in Cold War America
Erika Lorraine Milam

Book History of science

PODCAST: Q&A with Erika Milam, author of Creatures of Cain

24 January, 2019

The “killer ape” hypothesis of human behavior that arose in the aftermath of World War 2 argued that violence is not only natural but a critical component of our species’s success. This week on the Science podcast, historian Erika Milam reveals why the theory gained popularity and why it fell out of favor and discusses… Read More
Championing Science: Communicating Your Ideas to Decision Makers
Roger D. Aines and Amy L. Aines

Book Science Communication

Emotional intelligence and other “soft skills” are key to communicating with science stakeholders

23 January, 2019

Scientists the world over use a familiar formula when communicating their research findings to their peers. Typically, a focused introduction is followed by a description of the methods used and the results obtained. The report concludes with a discussion of what the results mean in a broader context. But as reductions in government funding for… Read More
Martin Lister and His Remarkable Daughters
Anna Marie Roos

Book History of science

Art and science interweave in a tale of two talented sisters and their polymath father

22 January, 2019

One can’t help but feel a twinge of concern for the patients of the 17th- century physician and naturalist Martin Lister. As Anna Marie Roos, a professor of the history of science and medicine at the University of Lincoln, makes abundantly clear in Martin Lister and His Remarkable Daughters, not only did he run a… Read More
Confessions of a Rogue Nuclear Regulator
Gregory B. Jaczko

Book Nuclear Energy, Nuclear Policy

Deference to industry trumps nuclear safety in the U.S., warns a controversial former regulator

15 January, 2019

Less than a year after the Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan, physicist Gregory B. Jaczko tried to break the “first commandment” of nuclear regulation: Thou shalt not deny a license to operate a reactor. As chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), he knew that the tradition was to encourage doomed applications to be… Read More