A Survival Guide to the Misinformation Age

From confronting our fear of quantitative reasoning and demystifying graphs to elucidating the key concepts of probability and data analysis and the use of precise language and logic, this book supplies an essential set of apps for the frontal cortex while making science both accessible and entertaining. Who says it has to be dull to learn to think like a scientist? Who says only a few can do it? Not David Helfand, one of our nation's leading astronomers and science educators. Helfand has taught scientific habits of mind to generations of Columbia University undergraduates, where he continues to wage a provocative and necessary battle against sloppy thinking and the encroachment of misinformation.

Autorentext

David J. Helfand is the chair of the Department of Astronomy at Columbia University where he has served on the faculty for four decades. He has also been a visiting scientist at the Danish Space Research Institute, the Sackler Distinguished Visiting Astronomer at Cambridge University, and president of the American Astronomical Society. He was a founding tutor and served as president and vice chancellor at Quest University Canada. He has published commentary in Nature, Physics Today, the Globe and Mail, the Washington Post, and the New York Times, among other publications.

Klappentext

A step-by-step strategy for protecting ourselves against the phony claims, trendy pseudoscience, and sloppy thinking that permeate our world.

Inhalt

Foreword
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Information, Misinformation, and Our Planet's Future

1. A Walk in the Park
2. What Is Science?
3. A Sense of Scale
   Interlude 1: Numbers
4. Discoveries on the Back of an Envelope
5. Insights in Lines and Dots
   Interlude 2: Language and Logic
6. Expecting the Improbable
7. Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics
8. Correlation, Causation . . . Confusion and Clarity
9. Definitional Features of Science
10. Applying Scientific Habits of Mind to Earth's Future
11. What Isn't Science
12. The Triumph of Misinformation; The Peril of Ignorance
13. The Unfinished Cathedral
    Appendix: Practicing Scientific Habits of Mind
    Notes
    Index