Philip Ball est un écrivain scientifique distingué dont le travail explore les liens complexes entre les principes scientifiques et les phénomènes sociaux ou économiques. Avec une profonde compréhension de la physique et de la chimie, il applique habilement des modèles mathématiques pour éclairer des systèmes complexes. Son écriture est saluée pour sa clarté dans l'explication de concepts sophistiqués, révélant des modèles sous-jacents dans divers domaines. Les idées de Ball encouragent les lecteurs à contempler les forces fondamentales qui façonnent notre monde.
Recent advancements in chemistry have led to groundbreaking innovations, such as superconducting ceramics for brain scanners and color-changing fabrics. Chemists are also transforming materials, creating drugs from crude oil, and identifying atmospheric pollutants while seeking solutions for environmental issues. Philip Ball, an editor at Nature, explores these developments, highlighting the versatile applications of buckminsterfullerene molecules, or "buckyballs," in various fields including medicine and electronics, making complex concepts accessible to general readers.
Philip Ball explores the science of the shapes we see in nature, revealing
how, from the stripes of a zebra to the development of a snowflake or even a
human embryo, there is a pattern-forming tendency in the basic processes of
nature, and from a few simple themes, and the repetition of simple rules,
endless beautiful variations can arise.
Understanding the human mind and how it relates to the world that we
experience has challenged philosophers for centuries. How then do we even
begin to think about 'minds' that are not human?Science now has plenty to say
about the properties of mind. In recent decades, the mind - both human and
otherwise - has been explored by scientists in fields ranging from zoology to
astrobiology, computer science to neuroscience. Taking a uniquely broad view
of minds and where they might be found - including in plants, aliens, and God
- Philip Ball pulls these multidisciplinary pieces together to explore what
sorts of minds we might expect to find in the universe. In so doing, he offers
for the first time a unified way of thinking about what minds are and what
they can do, arguing that in order to understand our own minds and imagine
those of others, we need to move on from considering the human mind as a
standard against which all others should be measured, and to think about the
'space of possible minds'.By identifying and mapping out properties of mind
without prioritizing the human, Ball sheds new light on a host of fascinating
questions. What moral rights should we afford animals, and can we understand
their thoughts? Should we worry that AI is going to take over society? If
there are intelligent aliens out there, how could we communicate with them?
Should we? Understanding the space of possible minds also reveals ways of
making advances in understanding some of the most challenging questions in
contemporary science: What is thought? What is consciousness? And what (if
anything) is free will?The more we learn about the minds of other creatures,
from octopuses to chimpanzees, and to imagine the potential minds of computers
and alien intelligences, the greater the perspective we have on if and how our
own is different. Ball's thrillingly ambitious The Book of Minds about the
nature and existence of minds is more mind-expanding than we could imagine. In
this fascinating panorama of other minds, we come to better know our own.
Science Book Prize-winning science writer Philip Ball explores the diversity
of thinking minds, from the variety of human minds to those of mammals,
insects, computers and plants, in a book that brilliantly illuminates how many
different ways there are to think and engage with the world; and how
particular are our own.
This book aims to stimulate the reader to think anew about some of the
relationships and differences between science and art, and to challenge some
of the common notions about particular 'famous experiments'.
While the natural world is often described as organic, it is in fact structured to the very molecule, replete with patterned order that can be decoded with basic mathematical algorithms and principles. In a nautilus shell one can see logarithmic spirals, and the Golden Ratio can be seen in the seed head of the sunflower plant. These patterns and shapes have inspired artists, writers, designers, and musicians for thousands of years. "Patterns in Nature: Why the Natural World Looks the Way It Does" illuminates the amazing diversity of pattern in the natural world and takes readers on a visual tour of some of the world s most incredible natural wonders. Featuring awe-inspiring galleries of nature s most ingenious designs, "Patterns in Nature" is a synergy of art and science that will fascinate artists, nature lovers, and mathematicians alike."
As part of a trilogy of books exploring the science of patterns in nature, acclaimed science writer Philip Ball here looks at the form and growth of branching networks in the natural world, and what we can learn from them.Many patterns in nature show a branching form - trees, river deltas, blood vessels, lightning, the cracks that form in the glazing of pots. These networks share a peculiar geometry, finding a compromise between disorder and determinism, though some, like the hexagonal snowflake or the stones of the Devil's Causeway fall into a rigidly ordered structure. Branching networks are found at every level in biology - from the single cell to the ecosystem. Human-made networks too can come to share the same features, and if they don't, then it might be profitable to make them do nature's patterns tend to arise from economical solutions.
