| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (pages 389-397) and index. |
| Contents |
The evolutionary idea. A package of information / George C. Williams -- The pattern of life's history / Stephen Jay Gould -- A survival machine / Richard Dawkins -- Biology is just a dance / Brian Goodwin -- Why is there so much genetic diversity? / Steve Jones -- A battle of words / Niles Eldredge -- Gaia is a tough bitch / Lynn Margulis. |
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A collection of kludges. Smart machines / Marvin Minsky -- Information is surprises / Roger Schank -- Intuition pumps / Daniel C. Dennett -- The thick moment / Nicholas Humphrey -- The emergent self / Francisco Varela -- Language is a human instinct / Steven Pinker -- Consciousness involves noncomputable ingredients / Roger Penrose. |
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Questions of origins. An ensemble of universes / Martin Rees -- A universe in your backyard / Alan Guth -- A theory of the whole universe / Lee Smolin -- The synthetic path / Paul Davies. |
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What was Darwin's algorithm? Plectics / Murray Gell-Mann -- Order for free / Stuart Kauffman -- A dynamical pattern / Christopher G. Langton -- The second law of organization / J. Doyne Farmer. |
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Something that goes beyond ourselves. Close to the singularity / W. Daniel Hillis. |
| Summary |
The Third Culture is an eye-opening look at the intellectual culture of today - in which science, not literature or philosophy, takes center stage in the debate over human nature and the nature of the universe. Thirty-five years ago, C.P. Snow, in a now famous essay, wrote about the polarization of the "two cultures"--Literary intellectuals on the one hand, and scientists on the other. Although he hoped for the emergence of a "third culture" that would bridge the gap, it is only recently - when books such as Daniel C. Dennett's Consciousness Explained, Stephen Jay Gould's Wonderful Life, Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time, Roger Penrose's The Emperor's New Mind, and Steven Pinker's The Language Instinct became bestsellers - that science has changed the intellectual landscape. |
| Subjects (Topics) |
Scientists -- Interviews.
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Intellectuals -- Interviews.
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Science and the humanities.
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| Bib utility control no. |
31901447 |
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