Publisher: Pantheon Books
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 03/06/2012
ISBN-13: 9780375422775
ISBN-10: 0375422773

This "mesmerizing tale, brilliantly told" (Kirkus Reviews) by acclaimed science historian George Dyson (son of renowned physicist Freeman Dyson) recounts how scientists at Princeton's Institute for Advanced Studies built a machine called MANIAC -- short for Mathematical Analyzer, Numerical Integrator, and Computer. Inspired by mathematician Alan Turing's dream of a "a single machine which can be used to compute any computational sequence," Hungarian-American polymath John von Neumann assembled a team of genuises -- including Kurt Gödel, Julian Bigelow, and others -- to bring this vision to life in the 1940s and '50s. If you enjoyed the scope of James Gleick's The Information, you'll be enthralled by this sprawling history of the computer.

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Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 04/10/2012
ISBN-13: 9780307263612
ISBN-10: 0307263614

Although British paleontologist Richard Fortey readily admits that he has spent nearly his entire career "looking at thoroughly dead creatures," he's equally fascinated by living ones. Of particular interest to Fortey, a trilobite expert, are species that have remained virtually unaltered for millions of years despite sea-level changes, ice ages, and even mass extinctions -- including horseshoe crabs (which are, in fact, arthropods and not crustaceans) and lungfish. This prompted a journey in search of "living fossils," the ancient (but still thriving) species that bear a striking resemblance to their extinct relatives. Captivated by Fortey's dry wit and enthusiasm for the natural world? Check out Dry Storeroom no. 1 about his career at London's Natural History Museum.

Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 02/28/2012
ISBN-13: 9780312563110
ISBN-10: 0312563116

In 2004, while working as a zookeeper at a Florida animal park, primatologist Andrew Halloran witnessed an amazing event: a group of chimpanzees escaped from their artificial habitat (located on a small island in a canal), commandeered a rowboat, and paddled to shore. The chimps, it seems, had fled a rival group and set out to claim new territory. But how had they managed to engineer and execute such a daring plan? Halloran concludes that chimpanzees think and communicate in a much more complex manner than previously suspected. Having studied chimpanzee social interactions, resulting in a detailed lexicon of vocalizations, Halloran makes a case for the structural complexity of primate languages.

First Chapter  

Publisher: Random House
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 03/27/2012
ISBN-13: 9781400068715
ISBN-10: 1400068711

Art isn't "a byproduct of evolution, but rather an evolutionary adaptation...that helps us survive because it is crucial to our well-being." That's what Nobel Prize-winning neuroscientist Eric Kandel, author of the acclaimed In Search of Memory, believes. In this wide-ranging but profound meditation on the intersection of art and science, Kandel explores the unique social milieu of 19th-century Vienna, an intellectually fertile environment that produced such visionaries as Modernist painter Gustav Klimt and founding father of psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud, while encouraging intellectual cross-pollination among art, the humanities, and medicine -- all of which helped lay the groundwork for numerous fields including psychology, neuroscience, and aesthetics.

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Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 03/27/2012
ISBN-13: 9780230108752
ISBN-10: 023010875X

Human evolution expert Ian Tattersall, an emeritus curator of anthropology at New York's American Museum of Natural History, documents in concise, accessible prose the four-million-year evolutionary journey of humankind, explaining how early hominids (such as the Australopithecines) took the steps that enabled them to become today's Homo sapiens. He also describes how modern humans (a surprisingly young 200,000 years old) made a major leap forward 60,000 years ago, when their brains developed the capacity to process information symbolically -- a milestone that led to language, art, and sophisticated social organization, all of which gave our species a competitive edge that enabled us to drive other hominids to extinction.

Publisher: W.W. Norton
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 03/26/2012
ISBN-13: 9780393080025
ISBN-10: 0393080021

Unlike most cosmology books, which begin with the Big Bang (13.7 billion years ago) and move outward to our present time and place, How It Began essentially travels backwards in time, beginning with the formation of our own solar system and broadening its scope to encompass increasingly distant stars and galaxies. But this "astute tour of the cosmos by a skillful teacher" (Kirkus Reviews) is no dry textbook, thanks to the colorful prose of astronomer Chris Impey -- who, in explaining Venus' retrograde rotation, describes the planet as having been "knocked on its ass." Though complex, this accessible and vividly presented guided tour of the universe will instill in readers awe for the wonders of the cosmos.

Publisher: Greystone Books
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 04/01/2011
ISBN-13: 9781553658313
ISBN-10: 1553658310

Using the metric of CO2e or "equivalent carbon dioxide," climate change expert Mike Berners-Lee analyzes the carbon footprint (i.e., the carbon emissions that result from manufacture and transportation) of everyday items, actions, and events, from sending text messages (.014 grams CO2e each) to having a child (377 metric tonnes CO2e) to waging a war (over 1 million metric tonnes CO2e). Readers in need of a climate change primer should be aware that CO2e -- which measures the immediate impact of greenhouse gas concentrations -- is related to but distinct from CDE, or "carbon dioxide equivalent," a quantity that describes global warming potential (GWP) over a specified timescale. But back to original question: how bad are bananas? Not very, as it turns out: even when imported from afar, they generate only 80 grams CO2e. Bon appétit!

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Publisher: Broadway Paperbacks
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 06/07/2011
ISBN-13: 9780307459664
ISBN-10: 0307459667

In their Ig Nobel Prize-winning experiment, psychologists Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons show a video of basketball players passing a ball while a woman in a gorilla suit walks around the court -- something that 50 percent of viewers fail to notice, because they're too busy counting the number of passes. This "inattentional blindness," or people's ability to overlook the obvious while focusing on something else, say the authors, is just one example that shows how little we really know about how our minds work -- and how often we overestimate our mental abilities. The Invisible Gorilla is an informative, entertaining look at the human mind that should appeal to fans of authors such as Oliver Sacks or of Malcolm Gladwell's Blink.

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Publisher: HarperCollins
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 02/15/2011
ISBN-13: 9780060765392
ISBN-10: 0060765399

Could humans live for thousands of years? Or perhaps forever? This book by Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer Jonathan Weiner surveys the relatively young field of gerontology, focusing on the efforts Aubrey de Gray, the British scientist who, as one of its leading proponents, firmly believes that what we call the process of aging is really a disease that can be cured -- perhaps within the next 25 years. Those interested in prolonging their lifespans will certainly want to check out Long for this World, which updates readers on topics addressed in Stephen S. Hall's 2003 book Merchants of Immortality. And fans of Mary Roach's books on the quirkier side of science, such as Stiff or Bonk, may enjoy this well-researched, accessible glimpse into humanity's possible future.

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Publisher: Avery
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 12/30/2010
ISBN-13: 9781583333914
ISBN-10: 1583333916

From Seoul National University's canine clone "Snuppy" to Texas A&M's "Missyplicity Project" (funded by a billionaire who longed to duplicate a beloved pet) to the former Miss Wyoming (who owns five genetic replicas of her deceased dog), it's clear that goodbye doesn't have to be forever when it comes to companion animals -- especially if you've got money. Yet, as Pulitzer-Prize winning investigative journalist John Woestendiek demonstrates in this thought-provoking book, dogs aren't the only animals who get a shot at resurrection. He discusses the origins of Dolly the sheep, as well as "Second Chance," a particularly violent copy of a champion bull that ended up goring his owner (fans of NPR's This American Life may be familiar with this story, which aired in 2005). If you're fascinated by the the intersection of science, commerce, and ethics, don't miss Dog, Inc.

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