David Vandermast
A review of American Chestnut: The Life, Death, and Rebirth of a Perfect Tree, by Susan Freinkel. The American chestnut has been mourned by many since being decimated by blight in the first half of the 20th century. Despite ongoing restoration efforts, Vandermast thinks it unlikely that the species will ever recover
Anna Lena Phillips
Conservationist, author of Aldo Leopold's Odyssey
David Schneider, Kristen Greenaway, Dane Summers
Short takes on three how-to books: Eccentric Cubicle • Stomp Rockets, Catapults, and Kaleidoscopes • Amazing Rubber Band Cars. Sometimes the best way to understand science is to make something by hand. These three books offer a variety of projects for adults and young people to try
Silvan S. Schweber
A review of Panofsky on Physics, Politics and Peace: Pief Remembers, by Wolfgang K. H. Panofsky. Wolfgang Panofsky was one of the few scientists of his generation to create an environment that nurtured scientists who could influence not only fellow scientists but also the public at large. Reviewer Silvan S. Schweber asks who is nurturing this essential tradition now
Jan Golinski
A review of Objectivity, by Lorraine Daston and Peter Galison. This is an ambitious, deeply thoughtful, thoroughly researched and beautifully illustrated book, says Golinski, written to help us understand the nature of objectivity and how it has worked in scientific practice
Brian Hayes
A review of Digital Dice: Computational Solutions to Practical Probability Problems, by Paul J. Nahin. Nahin suggests writing computer programs based on the Monte Carlo method to solve probability puzzles; Hayes finds that taking this useful approach can provide insights if you poke at the problem hard enough
Michael Lynch
A review of Rethinking Expertise, by Harry Collins and Robert Evans. Collins and Evans's typology of expertises includes what they refer to as a "parasitical" form, characterized by an ability to "talk the talk" without being able to "walk the walk"
David Walker
A review of The Biology of Human Longevity: Inflammation, Nutrition and Aging in the Evolution of Lifespans, by Caleb. E Finch. Finch offers a comprehensive overview of the effects of free radicals in aging and age-related diseases; he also integrates the free-radical theory with what is known about other forms of damage, particularly inflammation
Michael Ruse
A review of Re-engineering Philosophy for Limited Beings: Piecewise Approximations to Reality, by William C. Wimsatt, Integrating Evolution and Development: From Theory to Practice, edited by Roger Sansom and Robert N. Brandon, and Evidence and Evolution: The Logic Behind the Science, by Elliott Sober. Excellent work is being done in the field of philosophy of science, as these three very different titles show, says Ruse
Fred Taylor
A review of Titan Unveiled: Saturn's Mysterious Moon Explored, by Ralph Lorenz and Jacqueline Mitton. Lorenz and Mitton's account of the spacecraft Cassini's voyage to Saturn and of the Huygens probe's descent to the surface of Titan is personalized by inclusions of excerpts from the diary Lorenz kept as he helped build Huygens and interpreted data from it
Elizabeth Tyler
A review of The Unnatural History of the Sea, by Callum Roberts. Roberts offers a moving glimpse of the amazing abundance of marine life in earlier times and of the reasons for its decline, says Tyler, but in her view, the book’s policy recommendations leave a lot to be desired
Susan M. Squier
A review of The Politics of Life Itself: Biomedicine, Power, and Subjectivity in the Twenty-First Century, by Nikolas Rose. Is it possible to create a neutral map of the emerging technologies, attitudes and policies of biomedicine?
Robert McC. Adams
A review of The Shock of the Old: Technology and Global History Since 1900, by David Edgerton. Technologies are created and improved not just in the laboratory but in the environments in which they are used
David Nye
A review of The Grid: A Journey through the Heart of Our Electrified World, by Phillip F. Schewe. The author provides a useful historical overview that presents electrification as a tool that has helped our species flourish
David H. DeVorkin
A review of Into the Black: JPL and the American Space Program, 1976–2004, by Peter J. Westwick. This probing study of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory tracks the decisions that have kept it afloat despite fluctuations in support from NASA
Peter Pesic
A review of Music: A Mathematical Offering, by David J. Benson. The author explores such topics as the physics of sound, scale construction, Chladni patterns and the synthesis of digital sounds
Brian Hayes
A review of The Volterra Chronicles: The Life and Times of an Extraordinary Mathematician, 1860–1940, by Judith R. Goodstein. From this biography one learns a great deal about a man who stood firm against fascism, but little about what made his mathematics extraordinary
Michael Arbib
A review of Why Choose This Book?: How We Make Decisions, by Read Montague. This uneven book provides a valuable tour of reinforcement learning, explaining what is known about how reward signals in the brain guide our actions
Tal Golan
A review of The Lie Detectors: The History of an American Obsession, by Ken Alder. A gripping account of the adventures of the men who conceived, developed and marketed the lie detector
Bernard Schutz
A review of Traveling at the Speed of Thought: Einstein and the Quest for Gravitational Waves, by Daniel Kennefick. The fascinating story of how gravitational-wave theory, long plagued by mathematical confusion and battling egos, became a dead certainty
Ken Binmore
A review of A Beautiful Math: John Nash, Game Theory, and the Modern Quest for a Code of Nature, by Tom Siegfried. This tour of new ideas in game theory is entertaining, says Binmore, but pays little attention to economics, the subject where game theory has had its biggest successes
Peter Andrews
A review of A New Human: The Startling Discovery and Strange Story of the “Hobbits” of Flores, Indonesia, by Mike Morwood and Penny van Oosterzee. A firsthand account of the discovery of a tiny skeleton that may represent another hominin species
John Morgan
A review of The Poincaré Conjecture by Donal O'Shea. O'Shea's historical account of this important conjecture and its dramatic proof by Grigory Perelman contains much to interest readers of all mathematical backgrounds, says Morgan
Paul S. Sutter
A review of Aldo Leopold's Odyssey: Rediscovering the Author of A Sand County Almanac, by Julianne Lutz Newton. A study of the intellectual and scientific development of the man who brought ecological thinking to American conservation
David Schoonmaker
A review of The Gentle Subversive: Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, and the Rise of the Environmental Movement, by Mark Hamilton Lytle, and Courage for the Earth: Writers, Scientists, and Activists Celebrate the Life and Writing of Rachel Carson, edited by Peter Matthiessen. Reflections on two books that bring to life Carson's writings, convictions and dedication
Seymour Mauskopf
A review of The Periodic Table: Its Story and Significance, by Eric R. Scerri. Scerri shows that the relation between quantum mechanics and the explanation of chemical periodicity is complex