The End Of Science: Facing The Limits Of Knowledge In The Twilight Of The Scientific Age

(Paperback)

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Description

As a writer for "Scientific American", the author routinely interviews contemporary scientists such as Richard Dawkins, Murray Gell-Mann, Stephen Hawking, Karl Popper, Richard Feynmann and Noam Chomsky. In this book he discusses with them whether all the big scientific questions have been answered and all the knowledge worth knowing become known. Will there eventually be a "theory of everything" that signals the end At a time when scientific rationality is under fire from many quarters, Horgan provides an overview of current scientific enterprise as he discusses God, Star Trek, superstrings, quarks, consciousness and many other topics.

Reviews

'A fine example of popular science writing. Accessible, argumentative, stimulating, informative, highly polished and hugely enjoyable ... this is a feast of a book' TES 'I wish I could write like John Horgan ... [he] has a novelist's eye for character revealing detail, and we can almost see, as well as hear these scientists engaging in their passionate arguments.' NEW SCIENTIST 'Horgan covers a stunning set of thinkers, with whom he discusses a remarkable range of scientific ideas' FINANCIAL TIMES 'A hugely entertaining book, certain to create controversy.' E.O Wilson 'Horgan certainly puts the argument skillfully enough to provoke reaction. You could learn a lot about where science is going.' GUARDIAN 'we all owe a debt to Horgan for giving us a more realistic picture of the ways as well as the thoughts of some of the great minds of science.' FOCUS 'gives memorable and serious glimpses into the winding-down worlds of physics, quantum mechanics and molecular biology.' LITERARY REVIEW 'Horgan weaves a skilful and often entertaining portraits of his star-studded cast, explaining the science succinctly and accessibly in the process.' IRISH TIMES 'John Horgan buttonholes the most interesting scientists on the planet- and he listens, he argues, he thinks. He has an exceedingly accurate instinct... it's a privilege to be able to follow along as he peers behind the curtain.' James Gleick, author of CHAOS 'Intellectually bracing... often brilliant... makes the powerful case that the best and most exciting scientific discoveries are behind us... a wonderfully concise introduction to the greatest scientific hits of the last 15 or 20 years... Mr Horgan is a master thumbnail artists, introducing every character with a few phrases that capture the person's appearance and temprament with dead-on-wit... impressive and entertaining.' THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 'Horgan's talent is for translating scientific jargon into colloquial terms without condescending the reader... there are some genuinely funny moments.' CHICAGO TRIBUNE 'A wonderful, provocative book.' WASHINGTON POST 'One of the most appealing aspects of Horgan's books is its sheer entertainment value. The go-for-the-jugular writing style, coupled with the fact that just about everyone who's anyone in the scientific world has been subjected to one of Horgan's interviews, gives the reader an opportunity to see world-class scientists as "demigods on stilts"... the book is amusing and the issues it raises are of great importance.' John L. Casti, NATURE 'Fun to read in spite of its grim subject matter. Horgan writes gracefully and well, and he seems to have interviewed everyone who's anyone among the deep thinkers.' SCIENCE 'For readers who like ambitious, big-idea books... very clever... Horgan exhibits a fine, good humoured, writerly appreciation for the distinctive cadences of language, personal habits, physical traits and towering egos of each prestigious interviewee. While the book's legitimacy derives from its reasoned case that science is winding down, its greatest pleasures flow from Horgan's encounters with the characters who have made science their lives, and whose lives have largely made contemporary science what it is.' SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE 'Thanks to Mr Horgan's smooth prose style, puckish sense of humour and wicked eye for details, these encounters [with the scientists] make for zesty roading. Frequently, they are hilarious... a thumping good book.' WALL STREET JOURNAL 'A fascinating thesis, and one Horgan buttresses with arguments from history and philosophy as well as science... provocative.' NEWSWEEK 'A compelling tale... A deft wordsmith and keen observer, Horgan offers lucid expositions of everything from the supersting theory and Thomas Kuhn's analysis of scientific revolutions to the origin of life.' BUSINESS WEEK 'Provocative and passionate... Horgan strikes at the heart of civilisation as we know it... Horgan's audacious book, rather than merely serving to treatise on the demise of science, may, in fact, open the door to a more important dimension of inquiry for all of us.' THE HERALD 'As good a case as can be made that just as we discovered the globe only once... so we have already discovered the basic laws of physics, biology, cosmology and so on... fascinating.' WIRED 'To make this argument, Horgan gives us a tour through the minds, offices and sometimes sitting rooms of eminent scientists he has interviewed over the years. He does this with an irreverance that is bracing... what higher praise can you pay to a book than that you loved it, even though you thought its central thesis was wrong' TORONTO GLOBE 'Provocative, entertaining, cheeky... Horgan's book, a condensation of profiles of scientists he has written during his ten years at SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN is a fascinating, engaging survey of bright minds and brilliant ideas.' THE SEATTLE TIMES 'Brilliant.' NEW YORK TIMES 'Agree with him or not, readers will find his ideas provocative and engaging.' SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER AND CHRONICLE 'THE END OF SCIENCE... gives memorable and serious glimpses into the winding-down worlds of physics, quantum mechanics and molecular biology.' LITERARY REVIEW 'In a series of interviews with luminaries of modern science, Scientific American senior editor John Horgan conducts a guided tour of the scientific world and where it might be headed in The End of Science. The book, which generated great controversy and became a bestseller, now appears in paperback with a new afterword by the author. Through a series of essays in which he visits with such figures as Roger Penrose, Stephen Jay Gould, Stephen Hawking, Freeman Dyson and others, Horgan captures the distinct personalities of his subjects while investigating whether science may indeed be reaching its end. While this book is in no way dumbed down, it is accessible and can take the general reader to the outer edges of scientific exploration.' AMAZON.CO.UK REVIEW

Author Bio

John Horgan is a senior writer at SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN. His articles have appeared in THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE NEW REPUBLIC, DISCOVER, NEW SCIENTIST and OMNI. He lives in New York State's Hudson Valley with his wife and two children.