Book picks similar to
A Brief History of String Theory: From Dual Models to M-Theory by Dean Rickles
physics
science
0-tbr-like-sci
philosophy-of-science
The Road since Structure: Philosophical Essays, 1970-1993, with an Autobiographical Interview
Thomas S. Kuhn - 1993
The Road Since Structure, assembled with Kuhn's input before his death in 1996, follows the development of his thought through the later years of his life: collected here are several essays extending and rethinking the perspectives of Structure as well as an extensive, fascinating autobiographical interview in which Kuhn discusses the course of his life and philosophy.
The Encyclopedia Of Ancient Egypt
Helen Strudwick - 2006
Powerful pharaohs built great cities on the fertile banks of the Nile, and employed thousands of labourers to create lavish tombs and temples such as Thebes and the pyramids of the Giza plateau. The exceptional beauty and scale of ancient Egypt s antiquities still draws millions of visitors to Egypt s museums and monuments each year. The Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt is a celebration of these wonders, from Tutankhamun s tomb to Cleopatra s obelisks, from ancient papyrus scrolls covered with hieroglyphs to golden amulets in the form of ankhs and scarabs. The book also uncovers ancient Egyptian life from the role of women and the form of an Egyptian wedding banquet, to the weights, measures and currencies used in everyday trading and explores the modern archaelogy taking place on the ancient sites revealing the Egyptians artefacts and tools. With a combination of modern, specially commissioned colour illustrations and images of Egyptian antiquities and treasures alongside a detailed history of the civilisation to put it all into context, the world of the pharaohs is brought to life in vivid detail. For intrigued adults or fascinated children alike, The Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt provides a wealth of information about the riches of the ancient world."
Not Even Wrong: The Failure of String Theory and the Search for Unity in Physical Law
Peter Woit - 2006
In Peter Woit's view, superstring theory is just such an idea. In Not Even Wrong , he shows that what many physicists call superstring "theory" is not a theory at all. It makes no predictions, even wrong ones, and this very lack of falsifiability is what has allowed the subject to survive and flourish. Not Even Wrong explains why the mathematical conditions for progress in physics are entirely absent from superstring theory today and shows that judgments about scientific statements, which should be based on the logical consistency of argument and experimental evidence, are instead based on the eminence of those claiming to know the truth. In the face of many books from enthusiasts for string theory, this book presents the other side of the story.
Biggest Secrets
William Poundstone - 1993
Fields Cookies... What backward messages on records are really trying to tell you... Frank Sinatra's real age... Why you can't counterfeit a lottery ticket... Barbra Streisand's blue movie... The other Boy Scout rituals... Ingmar Bergman's soap commercials... The formula for Play-Doh... and more.
Hidden In Plain Sight 2: The Equation of the Universe
Andrew H. Thomas - 2013
Enjoy a thrilling intergalactic tour as Andrew Thomas redefines the force of gravity and introduces a brave new view of the universe!
The Beria Papers
Alan Williams - 1973
He was Stalin’s closest henchman. At one time he had a million armed men under his direct personal command. He was a sadist and a mass murderer. And he was also a vicious rapist with a compulsive appetite for young girls. This is possible: Beria may have kept a private diary in which he lovingly recorded his sexual activities, his murders, various scandals involving men now highly placed in the Soviet hierarchy — and the true facts of Stalin’s death. This is certain: The publication of Beria’s diary would cause the greatest political scandal the world has ever known — and set off a deadly manhunt for those responsible for its release … The private diaries of Beria — Stalin’s notorious chief of secret police — are a lurid, shattering indictment of Russian political methods and contain a new account of what really happened at Stalin’s death. They confirm Beria as one of the greatest human monsters of our time, both in his personal life and in his political manipulations of top Soviet politicians, some of whom are in power today. The Beria Papers are sold to an American publisher for three million dollars. On publication they are an immediate, sensational bestseller. They cause panic in Moscow and outrage everywhere — even in the upper echelons of the U.S. government, where there is fear that such revelations will create a dangerous precedent in smear campaigns against world leaders. So the world’s two most powerful secret services — the Soviet KGB and the American CIA — are ordered to track down the book’s origin. Their investigations range from New York to Washington, to London, Moscow, Munich, Budapest, Vienna and finally to a small island in the Indian Ocean where the activities of the two secret agencies come horrifically together. But can The Beria Papers possibly be a hoax? Praise for The Beria Papers: ‘Intriguing and gripping … compulsively exciting’ -
Sunday Express
‘Both exciting and really convincing … fascinating. Part adventure, part thriller, part a documentary of might-have-been history, The Beria Papers is the best thing of its kind for a long time.’ -
Sunday Times
‘The most interesting and original thriller since The Odessa File … a sharp and intelligent thriller that cries out for filming.’ -
Daily Mail
‘Intriguing and gripping … not merely compulsively exciting entertainment, it is also so well researched and the background appears so absolutely authentic that the whole fantastic story could just be true.’ -
Sunday Express
Alan Emlyn Williams(born 1935) is an ex-foreign correspondent, novelist and writer of thrillers. He was educated at Stowe, Grenoble and Heidelberg Universities, and at King's College, Cambridge where he graduated in 1957 with a B.A. in modern languages. His father was the actor and writer Emlyn Williams.
Spacefarers: How Humans Will Settle the Moon, Mars, and Beyond
Christopher Wanjek - 2020
From bone-whittling microgravity to eye-popping profits, the risks and rewards of space settlement have never been so close at hand.More than fifty years after the Apollo 11 moon landing, why is there so little human presence in space? Will we ever reach Mars? What will it take to become a multiplanet species, colonizing the solar system and traveling to other stars?Spacefarers meets these questions head on. While many books have speculated on the possibility of living beyond the Earth, few have delved into the practical challenges or plausible motives for leaving the safe confines of our home planet. Christopher Wanjek argues that there is little doubt we will be returning to the Moon and exploring Mars in the coming decades, given the potential scientific and commercial bonanza. Private industry is already taking a leading role and earning profits from human space activity. This can be, Wanjek suggests, a sustainable venture and a natural extension of earthbound science, business, and leisure. He envisions hotels in low-earth orbit and mining, tourism, and science on the Moon. He also proposes the slow, steady development of science bases on Mars, to be followed by settlements if Martian gravity will permit reproduction and healthy child development.An appetite for wonder will take us far, but if we really want to settle new worlds, we'll need the earnest plans of engineers, scientists, and entrepreneurs. Wanjek introduces us to those planners, who are striving right now to make life in space a reality.
Who Got Einstein's Office? Eccentricity and Genius at the Institute for Advanced Study
Ed Regis - 1987
Robert Oppenheimer rode out his political persecution in the Director's mansion. It is the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey; at one time or another, home to fourteen Nobel laureates, most of the great physicists and mathematicians of the modern era, and two of the most exciting developments in twentieth-century science—cellular automata and superstrings.Who Got Einstein's Office? tells for the first time the story of this secretive institution and of its fascinating personalities.
Killing America: A 100 Year Murder: Forty Historical Wounds That Bill O'Reilly Didn't Write About
M.S. King - 2015
You may not be able to put your finger on it, but you sense it instinctively.How can you not sense it? For the first time ever, both the majority of the younger and the older generations of America now believe that future generations will not be as prosperous as their parents’ generation was. And that’s only the economic pessimism. On the social and cultural fronts, how many of us can truly say that we are proud are what our society has degenerated to?Make no mistake; the America we once knew has indeed been murdered. How did we arrive at this point of perpetual debt, perpetual inflation, massive taxation, chronically high unemployment, disintegrating families, massive dependency on the state, perpetual war, and ever-worsening moral degeneracy, mass psychological depression, and cultural degradation?Who did it? Why did they do it? How did they do it? How was the ‘murder’ concealed from the American people?Through the use of 40 clear, concise and very easy-to-digest illustrated ‘blurbs’ (The 40 Wounds), Killing America: The 100 Year Murder will answer those questions for you. This is a mass-distribution booklet designed for ‘crash-course’ simplicity. Please share it with others.
What Is Real?: The Unfinished Quest for the Meaning of Quantum Physics
Adam Becker - 2018
But ask what it means, and the result will be a brawl. For a century, most physicists have followed Niels Bohr's Copenhagen interpretation and dismissed questions about the reality underlying quantum physics as meaningless. A mishmash of solipsism and poor reasoning, Copenhagen endured, as Bohr's students vigorously protected his legacy, and the physics community favored practical experiments over philosophical arguments. As a result, questioning the status quo long meant professional ruin. And yet, from the 1920s to today, physicists like John Bell, David Bohm, and Hugh Everett persisted in seeking the true meaning of quantum mechanics. What Is Real? is the gripping story of this battle of ideas and of the courageous scientists who dared to stand up for truth.
Journey to Mars: What Our Journey To the Red Planet Might Look Like ?
Peter Thiel - 2019
Putting people into places and situations unprecedented in history is stirred the imagination while the human experience was expanding and redefining. Yet, space exploration compels humans to confront a hostile environment of cosmic radiations, radical changes in the gravity and magnetic fields, as well as social isolation. Therefore, any space traveller is submitted to relevant health-related threats. In the twenty-first century, human space flight is poised to continue, but it will enjoy the ongoing developments in science and technology. It will become more networked, more global, and more oriented toward primary goals. A novel international human space flight policy could help achieve these objectives by clarifying the rationale, the ethics of acceptable risk, the role of remote presence, and the need for balance between funding and ambition to justify the risk of human lives. In order to address such a challenge, a preliminary careful survey of the available scientific data is mandatory to set forth adequate countermeasures. Envisaged solutions should provide a sound and technically feasible approach for counteracting microgravity and cosmic rays effects, which represent the main health risk for space crews. This objective must necessarily be sustained by national/international space agencies, which would coordinate their common efforts into a defined international spaceflight program.
Our Marvelous Native Tongue
Robert Claiborne - 1983
Robert Claiborne then continues with the Anglo-Saxon invaders of England whose language developed into Old English, which in turn slowly developed into Middle English after the Norman Invasion. He also gives an overview of the various dialects of English and slang.
The Farther Corner: A Sentimental Return to North-East Football
Harry Pearson - 2020
Now, a generation later, Harry Pearson returns to the region to discover how much things have changed - and how much they have remained the same. In the mid-1990s, Kevin Keegan brought sporting romance and expectation of trophies to Newcastle, Sunderland moved the the Stadium of Light backed by a wealthy consortium, Middlesbrough signed one of the best Brazilians of the era and won their first major trophy - even little Darlington had a former safe-cracker turned kitchen magnate in charge, promising the world. The region even provided England's two key players in Euro 96 in Alan Shearer and Paul Gascoigne - the far corner seemed destined to become the centre of England's footballing world. But it never happened. Using travels to and from matches in the 2018-19 season, The Farther Corner will explore the changes in north-east football and society over the past twenty-five years. Visiting new places and some familiar ones, catching the stories, the sentiment and the sound of the supporters, locating where football now sits in the life of a region that was once proud to be what John Arlott suggested was ‘The Hotbed of Soccer’, it will be about love and loss and the happiness to be found eating KitKats and joking about Bobby Mimms on cold February days in coal-scented northern air. The region may have been left behind in the Champions League stakes, but few would doubt the power of its beating heart.
Do You QuantumThink?: New Thinking That Will Rock Your World
Dianne Collins - 2011
We're all looking for new ways of thinking that can bring about real solutions to modern problems, from the pursuit of inner serenity to solving world conflicts. In Do You QuantumThink? author Dianne Collins shares her ingenious discovery that reveals a critical missing link to make sense of our changing times. Her discovery provides us with the understanding and methodology to rise above problems of today by laying the foundation for an entirely new way to think.Part science, part philosophy, part spirituality, Do You QuantumThink? draws on a wide spectrum of sources, from cutting edge innovations in the sciences to the insights of the world's greatest spiritual leaders. This book will make you laugh, free you from limiting ideas, and introduce you to the most advanced principles and practical methods for living. Do You QuantumThink? will rock your world in the best of ways as you experience one revelation after another.
Plague: A Story of Science, Rivalry, and the Scourge That Won't Go Away
Edward Marriott - 2003
Edward Marriott’s dramatic, gripping new book gives you yet another thing to worry about.” —New York Plague. The very word carries an unholy resonance. No other disease can claim its apocalyptic power: it can lie dormant for centuries, only to resurface with nation-killing force. Here, with the high drama of an adventure tale, Edward Marriott unravels the story of this lethal disease: the historic battle to identify its source, the devastating effects of pandemics, and the prospects for new outbreaks. Marriott begins the trail in Hong Kong in the summer of 1894, when a plague diagnosis brought to the island two top scientists—Alexandre Yersin, a maverick Frenchman, and his Japanese rival, Shibasaburo Kitasato. Marriott interweaves the narrative of their fierce competition with vivid scenes of the scourge’s persistence: California in 1900; Surat, India, in 1994; and New York City sometime in the future.A masterly account of medical and human history, Plague is at once an instructive warning and a chilling read.