Chaos: Making a New Science
By addebook • Jul 15th, 2008 • Category: Physics •
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Chaos: Making a New Science
Chaos: Making a New Science
By James Gleick
Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics)
Number Of Pages: 368
Publication Date: 1988-12-01
ISBN-10 / ASIN: 0140092501
ISBN-13 / EAN: 9780140092509
Binding: Paperback
Few writers distinguish themselves by their ability to write about complicated, even obscure topics clearly and engagingly. James Gleick, a former science writer for the New York Times, resides in this exclusive category. In Chaos, he takes on the job of depicting the first years of the study of chaos–the seemingly random patterns that characterize many natural phenomena.
This is not a purely technical book. Instead, it focuses as much on the scientists studying chaos as on the chaos itself. In the pages of Gleick’s book, the reader meets dozens of extraordinary and eccentric people. For instance, Mitchell Feigenbaum, who constructed and regulated his life by a 26-hour clock and watched his waking hours come in and out of phase with those of his coworkers at Los Alamos National Laboratory.
As for chaos itself, Gleick does an outstanding job of explaining the thought processes and investigative techniques that researchers bring to bear on chaos problems. Rather than attempt to explain Julia sets, Lorenz attractors, and the Mandelbrot Set with gigantically complicated equations, Chaos relies on sketches, photographs, and Gleick’s wonderful descriptive prose.
Summary: Good read
Rating: 3
Nutshell review - a good book, written well and very entertaining. A good introduction to chaos and complexity science for us lay-people.
Summary: Non-Fiction
Rating: 4
A popular science type of book (the popular part you can see from the numbers), where Gleick takes a look at the science of Chaos theory.
Not in a rigorous mathematical way, but more in a history of and introduction and overview of the subject, with of course examples of what he is talking about throughout.
3.5 out of 5
Summary: Play it again, Sam
Rating: 5
Okay, so it was a bestseller. That doesn’t mean you didn’t miss it. It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t read it again. Order in chaos and vice versa, the butterfly that creates a typhoon, fractal geometry, wildlife populations and dripping faucets (about which, more in a future Soupletter) - a book about ideas formerly on the scientific fringe that are now considered on a par with Relativity Theory (which, you will remember, made a considerable bang). ContempIating this review, I picked up CHAOS at the library (three or four years had elapsed since my first read) and was sucked in afresh. Meet a scientist who experimented with 26 hour days, another who found an operational definition of free will. Fascinatin’ Rythms, Smooth Noodle Maps, Ice Ages and heartbeats. This is physics where the rubber meets the road. You don’t need to follow the math (I don’t, I just roll on by …) to appreciate the ride. “Beautifully lucid,” according to the San Francisco Chronicle which one notes, is published beside a once lucidly beautiful bay.
Summary: New Perspective
Rating: 5
James Gleick changed my view on the scientific world forever in his book Chaos. I feel that I’ve removed my old, Euclidean perception of the world and have replaced it with a more complex, organic, and dynamic view. This book is a great introduction to chaos and is not meant to describe the applications of this theory. The applied sciences of chaos, complexity, or systems theories are readily available in journals and other pubs, just do a little research.
Summary: A “must” if you strive to understand the mystery of the universe
Rating: 4
No, this book won’t change your life or anything, but if you’re an enthusiastic reader of lay science books, like me, it’s a must read. Gleick’s style can get dense and repetitive at times, but the concepts that he is conveying are slippery, at best. It’s hard to get an intellectual bead on them. So the repetition is appropriate.
And if you’ve ever wondered how in the universe order could evolve out of chaos, this book gives us a peak at the best clues there are to what lies behind the kimono.
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