The Canon

Draws on interviews with the world's top scientists to offer a guide to scientific literacy, exploring the fundamental principles of the major scientific disciplines of physics, chemistry, biology, geology, and astronomy.

"Every sentence sparkles with wit and charm. . . it all adds up to an intoxicating cocktail of fine science writing." --Richard Dawkins

"Natalie Angier provides a masterful, authoritative synthesis of the state of knowledge across the entire scientific landscape." --Howard Gardner, Harvard University, author of Five Minds for the Future and Frames of Mind

"An essential experience . . . How dare she write so artfully, explain so brilliantly, rendering us scientists simultaneously proud and inarticulate!" --Leon Lederman, Nobel laureate

"Every single sentence . . . sparkles with enough intelligence and wit to delight science-phobes and science-philes alike. I loved it!" --Barbara Ehrenreich, author of Bait and Switch and Nickel and Dimed

"Natalie Angier makes planets and particles sexy. . .She turns guys with lab coats and pocket protectors into Daniel Craig." --Sylvia Nasar, author of A Beautiful Mind

"Exuberant . . . She writes with such verve, humor, and warmth." Library Journal Starred

"This bestselling author's love of words is writ large here . . . the excitement and challenge of science [is] masterfully conveyed." Kirkus Reviews, Starred

"Angier is a nimble stylist with a playful sense of alliteration and consonance." --Ben Dickinson Elle

"An excellent introduction (or refresher) to the beautiful basics of science, and I hope it is widely read." --Steven Pinker The New York Times Book Review

Autorentext
NATALIE ANGIER is a Pulitzer-Prize winning science columnist for The New York Times. She is the author of several books including The Canon, Woman, The Beauty of the Beastly, and Natural Obsessions. She lives outside Washington, D.C.,

Klappentext

From the Pulitzer Prize winner and best-selling author of Woman, a playful, passionate guide to the science all around us. The Canon is an ebullient celebration of science that stands to become a classic.
Drawing on conversations with hundreds of the world's top scientists and on her own work as a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer for The New York Times, Natalie Angier creates a thoroughly entertaining guide to scientific literacy.
The Canon is vital reading for anyone who wants to understand the great issues of our time — from stem cells and bird flu to evolution and global warming. And it's for every parent who has ever panicked when a child asked how the earth was formed or what electricity is.
Angier's sparkling prose and memorable metaphors bring the science to life, reigniting our own childhood delight in discovering how the world works. The Canon is a joyride through the major scientific disciplines: physics, chemistry, biology, geology, and astronomy. Along the way, we learn what is actually happening when our ice cream melts or our coffee gets cold, what our liver cells do when we eat a caramel, why the horse is an example of evolution at work, and how we're all really made of stardust. It's Lewis Carroll meets Lewis Thomas — a book that will enrapture, inspire, and enlighten. The Canon is an ebullient celebration of science that stands to become a classic.

Inhalt
Introduction: Sisyphus Sings with a Ying 1

1. Thinking Scientifically: An Out-of-Body Experience 18 2. Probabilities: For Whom the Bell Curves 47 3. Calibration: Playing with Scales 71 4. Physics: And Nothing’s Plenty for Me 87 5. Chemistry: Fire, Ice, Spies, and Life 121 6. Evolutionary Biology: The Theory of Every Body 147 7. Molecular Biology: Cells and Whistles 183 8. Geology: Imagining World Pieces 212 9. Astronomy: Heavenly Creatures 235

References 267 Acknowledgments 280 Index 282