Presents a commentary on the history of science that examines historic clashes and collaborations between science and the competing realms of religion, technology, poetry, mathematics, and philosophy.

A unique approach to the philosophy of science that focuses on the liveliest and most important controversies surrounding science Is science more rational or objective than any other intellectual endeavor' Are scientific theories accurate depictions of reality or just useful devices for manipulating the environment' These core questions are the focus of this unique approach to the philosophy of science. Unlike standard textbooks, this book does not...

"Today, only a few people outside of the scientific community are conversant with the tradition of science and its many breakthroughs. The rest are scientifically illiterate. So say Frank R. Spellman and Joni Price-Bayer, authors of In Defense of Science: Why Scientific Literacy Matters. This book explains why ordinary citizens need to have an understanding of science, its methods, and its groundbreaking discoveries. The authors introduce the most...

Do all questions have answers? How much can we know about the world? Is there such a thing as an ultimate truth? To be human is to want to know, to understand our origins and the meaning of our lives. In The Island of Knowledge, physicist Marcelo Gleiser traces our search for answers to the most fundamental questions of existence, the origin of the universe, the nature of reality, and the limits of knowledge. In so doing, he reaches a provocative...

In The Lagoon, acclaimed biologist Armand Marie Leroi recovers Aristotle's science. He revisits Aristotle's writings and the places where he worked. He goes to the eastern Aegean island of Lesbos to see the creatures that Aristotle saw, where he saw them. He explores Aristotle's observations, his deep ideas, his inspired guesses--and the things he got wildly wrong. He shows how Aristotle's science is deeply intertwined with his philosophical system...

"Edited by Ronald Numbers and Kostas Kampourakis, Newton's Apple and Other Myths about Science debunks the widespread belief that science advances when individual geniuses experience 'Eureka!' moments and suddenly comprehend what those around them could never imagine. Science has always been a cooperative enterprise of dedicated, fallible human beings, for whom context, collaboration, and sheer good luck are the essential elements of discovery, "--Amazon.com....

"Drawing on the lives of five great scientists -- Charles Darwin, William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), Linus Pauling, Fred Hoyle and Albert Einstein -- scientist/author Mario Livio shows how even the greatest scientists made major mistakes and how science built on these errors to achieve breakthroughs, especially into the evolution of life and the universe."--Publisher information.