Superstrings And The Search For The Theory Of Everything
F. David Peat - 1988
David Peat explains the development and meaning of this Superstring Theory in a thoroughly readable, dramatic manner accessible to lay readers with no knowledge of mathematics. The consequences of the Superstring Theory are nothing less than astonishing.
Practical Electronics for Inventors
Paul Scherz - 1998
Instead, it tells you-and shows you-what basic and advanced electronics parts and components do, and how they work. Chock-full of illustrations, Practical Electronics for Inventors offers over 750 hand-drawn images that provide clear, detailed instructions that can help turn theoretical ideas into real-life inventions and gadgets.
The Systems View of Life: A Unifying Vision
Fritjof Capra - 2014
New emphasis has been given to complexity, networks, and patterns of organisation, leading to a novel kind of 'systemic' thinking. This volume integrates the ideas, models, and theories underlying the systems view of life into a single coherent framework. Taking a broad sweep through history and across scientific disciplines, the authors examine the appearance of key concepts such as autopoiesis, dissipative structures, social networks, and a systemic understanding of evolution. The implications of the systems view of life for health care, management, and our global ecological and economic crises are also discussed. Written primarily for undergraduates, it is also essential reading for graduate students and researchers interested in understanding the new systemic conception of life and its implications for a broad range of professions - from economics and politics to medicine, psychology and law.
Probability Theory: The Logic of Science
E.T. Jaynes - 1999
It discusses new results, along with applications of probability theory to a variety of problems. The book contains many exercises and is suitable for use as a textbook on graduate-level courses involving data analysis. Aimed at readers already familiar with applied mathematics at an advanced undergraduate level or higher, it is of interest to scientists concerned with inference from incomplete information.
The Visual Display of Quantitative Information
Edward R. Tufte - 1983
Theory and practice in the design of data graphics, 250 illustrations of the best (and a few of the worst) statistical graphics, with detailed analysis of how to display data for precise, effective, quick analysis. Design of the high-resolution displays, small multiples. Editing and improving graphics. The data-ink ratio. Time-series, relational graphics, data maps, multivariate designs. Detection of graphical deception: design variation vs. data variation. Sources of deception. Aesthetics and data graphical displays. This is the second edition of The Visual Display of Quantitative Information. Recently published, this new edition provides excellent color reproductions of the many graphics of William Playfair, adds color to other images, and includes all the changes and corrections accumulated during 17 printings of the first edition.
Machine Learning: An Algorithmic Perspective
Stephen Marsland - 2009
The field is ready for a text that not only demonstrates how to use the algorithms that make up machine learning methods, but also provides the background needed to understand how and why these algorithms work. Machine Learning: An Algorithmic Perspective is that text.Theory Backed up by Practical ExamplesThe book covers neural networks, graphical models, reinforcement learning, evolutionary algorithms, dimensionality reduction methods, and the important area of optimization. It treads the fine line between adequate academic rigor and overwhelming students with equations and mathematical concepts. The author addresses the topics in a practical way while providing complete information and references where other expositions can be found. He includes examples based on widely available datasets and practical and theoretical problems to test understanding and application of the material. The book describes algorithms with code examples backed up by a website that provides working implementations in Python. The author uses data from a variety of applications to demonstrate the methods and includes practical problems for students to solve.Highlights a Range of Disciplines and ApplicationsDrawing from computer science, statistics, mathematics, and engineering, the multidisciplinary nature of machine learning is underscored by its applicability to areas ranging from finance to biology and medicine to physics and chemistry. Written in an easily accessible style, this book bridges the gaps between disciplines, providing the ideal blend of theory and practical, applicable knowledge."
Calculus for Dummies
Mark Ryan - 2003
Others who have no intention of ever studying the subject have this notion that calculus is impossibly difficult unless you happen to be a direct descendant of Einstein. Well, the good news is that you can master calculus. It's not nearly as tough as its mystique would lead you to think. Much of calculus is really just very advanced algebra, geometry, and trig. It builds upon and is a logical extension of those subjects. If you can do algebra, geometry, and trig, you can do calculus.Calculus For Dummies is intended for three groups of readers:Students taking their first calculus course - If you're enrolled in a calculus course and you find your textbook less than crystal clear, this is the book for you. It covers the most important topics in the first year of calculus: differentiation, integration, and infinite series.Students who need to brush up on their calculus to prepare for other studies - If you've had elementary calculus, but it's been a couple of years and you want to review the concepts to prepare for, say, some graduate program, Calculus For Dummies will give you a thorough, no-nonsense refresher course.Adults of all ages who'd like a good introduction to the subject - Non-student readers will find the book's exposition clear and accessible. Calculus For Dummies takes calculus out of the ivory tower and brings it down to earth. This is a user-friendly math book. Whenever possible, the author explains the calculus concepts by showing you connections between the calculus ideas and easier ideas from algebra and geometry. Then, you'll see how the calculus concepts work in concrete examples. All explanations are in plain English, not math-speak. Calculus For Dummies covers the following topics and more:Real-world examples of calculus The two big ideas of calculus: differentiation and integration Why calculus works Pre-algebra and algebra review Common functions and their graphs Limits and continuity Integration and approximating area Sequences and series Don't buy the misconception. Sure calculus is difficult - but it's manageable, doable. You made it through algebra, geometry, and trigonometry. Well, calculus just picks up where they leave off - it's simply the next step in a logical progression.
Calculus Made Easy
Silvanus Phillips Thompson - 1910
With a new introduction, three new chapters, modernized language and methods throughout, and an appendix of challenging and enjoyable practice problems, Calculus Made Easy has been thoroughly updated for the modern reader.
Data Science for Business: What you need to know about data mining and data-analytic thinking
Foster Provost - 2013
This guide also helps you understand the many data-mining techniques in use today.Based on an MBA course Provost has taught at New York University over the past ten years, Data Science for Business provides examples of real-world business problems to illustrate these principles. You’ll not only learn how to improve communication between business stakeholders and data scientists, but also how participate intelligently in your company’s data science projects. You’ll also discover how to think data-analytically, and fully appreciate how data science methods can support business decision-making.Understand how data science fits in your organization—and how you can use it for competitive advantageTreat data as a business asset that requires careful investment if you’re to gain real valueApproach business problems data-analytically, using the data-mining process to gather good data in the most appropriate wayLearn general concepts for actually extracting knowledge from dataApply data science principles when interviewing data science job candidates
Div, Grad, Curl, and All That: An Informal Text on Vector Calculus
Harry M. Schey - 1973
Since the publication of the First Edition over thirty years ago, Div, Grad, Curl, and All That has been widely renowned for its clear and concise coverage of vector calculus, helping science and engineering students gain a thorough understanding of gradient, curl, and Laplacian operators without required knowledge of advanced mathematics.
The Quantum Story: A History in 40 Moments
Jim Baggott - 2011
From the minds of the world's leading physicists there flowed a river of ideas that would transport mankind to the pinnacle of wonderment and to the very depths of human despair. This was a century that began with the certainties of absolute knowledge and ended with the knowledge of absolute uncertainty. It was a century in which physicists developed weapons with the capacity to destroy our reality, whilst at the same time denying us the possibility that we can ever properly comprehend it.Almost everything we think we know about the nature of our world comes from one theory of physics. This theory was discovered and refined in the first thirty years of the twentieth century and went on to become quite simply the most successful theory of physics ever devised. Its concepts underpin much of the twenty-first century technology that we have learned to take for granted. But its success has come at a price, for it has at the same time completely undermined our ability to make sense of the world at the level of its most fundamental constituents.Rejecting the fundamental elements of uncertainty and chance implied by quantum theory, Albert Einstein once famously declared that 'God does not play dice'. Niels Bohr claimed that anybody who is not shocked by the theory has not understood it. The charismatic American physicist Richard Feynman went further: he claimed that nobody understands it.This is quantum theory, and this book tells its story.Jim Baggott presents a celebration of this wonderful yet wholly disconcerting theory, with a history told in forty episodes -- significant moments of truth or turning points in the theory's development. From its birth in the porcelain furnaces used to study black body radiation in 1900, to the promise of stimulating new quantum phenomena to be revealed by CERN's Large Hadron Collider over a hundred years later, this is the extraordinary story of the quantum world.Oxford Landmark Science books are 'must-read' classics of modern science writing which have crystallized big ideas, and shaped the way we think.
The Clockwork Universe: Isaac Newton, the Royal Society, and the Birth of the Modern World
Edward Dolnick - 2011
A meld of history and science, this book is a group portrait of some of the greatest minds who ever lived as they wrestled with nature’s most sweeping mysteries. The answers they uncovered still hold the key to how we understand the world.At the end of the seventeenth century—an age of religious wars, plague, and the Great Fire of London—when most people saw the world as falling apart, these earliest scientists saw a world of perfect order. They declared that, chaotic as it looked, the universe was in fact as intricate and perfectly regulated as a clock. This was the tail end of Shakespeare’s century, when the natural land the supernatural still twined around each other. Disease was a punishment ordained by God, astronomy had not yet broken free from astrology, and the sky was filled with omens. It was a time when little was known and everything was new. These brilliant, ambitious, curious men believed in angels, alchemy, and the devil, and they also believed that the universe followed precise, mathematical laws—-a contradiction that tormented them and changed the course of history.The Clockwork Universe is the fascinating and compelling story of the bewildered geniuses of the Royal Society, the men who made the modern world.
Data Science from Scratch: First Principles with Python
Joel Grus - 2015
In this book, you’ll learn how many of the most fundamental data science tools and algorithms work by implementing them from scratch.
If you have an aptitude for mathematics and some programming skills, author Joel Grus will help you get comfortable with the math and statistics at the core of data science, and with hacking skills you need to get started as a data scientist. Today’s messy glut of data holds answers to questions no one’s even thought to ask. This book provides you with the know-how to dig those answers out.
Get a crash course in Python
Learn the basics of linear algebra, statistics, and probability—and understand how and when they're used in data science
Collect, explore, clean, munge, and manipulate data
Dive into the fundamentals of machine learning
Implement models such as k-nearest Neighbors, Naive Bayes, linear and logistic regression, decision trees, neural networks, and clustering
Explore recommender systems, natural language processing, network analysis, MapReduce, and databases
The Elements of Statistical Learning: Data Mining, Inference, and Prediction
Trevor Hastie - 2001
With it has come vast amounts of data in a variety of fields such as medicine, biology, finance, and marketing. The challenge of understanding these data has led to the development of new tools in the field of statistics, and spawned new areas such as data mining, machine learning, and bioinformatics. Many of these tools have common underpinnings but are often expressed with different terminology. This book describes the important ideas in these areas in a common conceptual framework. While the approach is statistical, the emphasis is on concepts rather than mathematics. Many examples are given, with a liberal use of color graphics. It should be a valuable resource for statisticians and anyone interested in data mining in science or industry. The book's coverage is broad, from supervised learning (prediction) to unsupervised learning. The many topics include neural networks, support vector machines, classification trees and boosting—the first comprehensive treatment of this topic in any book. Trevor Hastie, Robert Tibshirani, and Jerome Friedman are professors of statistics at Stanford University. They are prominent researchers in this area: Hastie and Tibshirani developed generalized additive models and wrote a popular book of that title. Hastie wrote much of the statistical modeling software in S-PLUS and invented principal curves and surfaces. Tibshirani proposed the Lasso and is co-author of the very successful An Introduction to the Bootstrap. Friedman is the co-inventor of many data-mining tools including CART, MARS, and projection pursuit.
The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2000
David Quammen - 2000
David Quammen, together with series editor Burkhard Bilger, has assembled a remarkable group of writers whose selections appeared in periodicals from NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC, SCIENCE, and THE NEW YORKER to PUERTO DEL SOL and DOUBLETAKE. Among the acclaimed writers represented in this volume are Richard Preston on “The Demon in the Freezer,” John McPhee bidding “Farewell to the Nineteeth Century,” Oliver Sacks remembering the “Brilliant Light” of his boyhood, and Wendell Berry going “Back to the Land.” Also including such literary lights as Anne Fadiman, David Guterson, Edward Hoagland, Natalie Angier, and Peter Matthiessen, this new collection presents selections bound together by their timelessness.