Today the shortlist for the 2011 Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books was announced. As it turns out, I’m a big fan of popular science books; when they are good, they are not only entertaining to read, but I often find insights and ideas that I then go on to use in my academic philosophical work. Of course, they are mostly a starting point, as you still need to do your homework and check the actual scientific articles/sources, but comprehensive overviews can be a valuable source of insight and inspiration.
The nominated books are:
· Alex’s Adventures in Numberland by Alex Bellos (Bloomsbury)
· Through the Language Glass: How Words Colour Your World by Guy Deutscher (William Heinemann)
· The Disappearing Spoon by Sam Kean (Doubleday (UK); Little, Brown and Company (USA) )
· The Wavewatcher’s Companion by Gavin Pretor-Pinney (Bloomsbury)
· Massive: The Missing Particle That Sparked the Greatest Hunt in Science by Ian Sample (Basic Books (USA); Virgin Books (UK))
· The Rough Guide to The Future by Jon Turney (Rough Guides)
In the official announcement you can read short descriptions of each of them, and download the first chapters of each. So far, I’ve only read Alex’s Adventures in Numberland, which I very much enjoyed (as reported on this M-Phi post), but pretty much all the others look like they could be really interesting.
And speaking of math, a few months ago I reported on Fields medalist Voevodsky apparently questioning the consistency of Peano Arithmetic. Well, now somebody else has gone even wilder: Edward Nelson, professor of mathematics in Princeton, claims to have a proof of the inconsistency of Peano Arithmetic! Details can be found here.
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