New Books in Physics and Chemistry

The book discussed in this interview is Everyday Calculus: Discovering the Hidden Math All around Us (Princeton University Press, 2014) by Oscar E. Fernandez, who teaches mathematics – and calculus in particular – at Wellesley College. While it can be read by someone who wants to obtain a sense of what calculus is and how it’s used, it is even more enjoyable and enlightening if the reader has taken the first semester of a calculus course. The author takes the reader through a day in the author’s life, during which things one typically encounters – stock price quotations, cooling cups of coffee, getting good seats at a movie – afford an opportunity to investigate how calculus explains these everyday occurrences. Fernandez also introduces some instances where calculus has totally unexpected applications to our lives – why our GPS system relies upon Einstein’s Theory of Relativity, and why we obtain electricity via alternating current rather than direct current.  Everyday Calculus should not only add to the appreciation of calculus by those who have studied the subject, the book will hopefully persuade readers unfamiliar with calculus to take a course in it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David Kaiser‘s recent book is one of the most enjoyable and informative books on the history of science that you’ll read, full-stop. The deservedly award-winning How the Hippies Saved Physics: Science, Counterculture, and the Quantum Revival (W.W. Norton, 2012) takes readers into the “hazy, bong-filled excesses of the 1970s New Age movement” in order to explain and reveal the origins of some of the most transformative breakthroughs in twentieth-century quantum physics. Kaiser shows how the roots of quantum information science, a field that has given us the technology behind electronic bank transfers and information encryption systems, emerged from a rich soil made up of equal parts playful speculation, sophisticated calculation, and philosophical reflection, all entwined in the practices of the Fundamental Fysiks Group in the 1970s. It is a story that pays careful tribute to Einstein andThe Dancing Wu Li Masters, psychedelic mushrooms and the double-slit experiment, opera and Bell’s Theorem, quantum entanglement and Uri Geller. It is also a story of transformations in what it has looked, meant, and felt like to be a physicist since World War II. Whether you come to How the Hippies Saved Physics primarily for the hippies or the physics, you will come away with a sense of awe both for the brilliance of these tricksters and for the deft hand that Kaiser has brought to creating a thoroughly enjoyable account of their lives, work, and legacy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

[Re-posted with permission from Wild About Math]I’ve admitted before that Physics and I have never gotten along. But, science fiction is something I enjoy. So, when Princeton University Press sent me a copy of Physics Professor Chuck Adler‘s new book Wizards, Aliens, and Starships: Physics and Math in Fantasy and Science Fiction (Princeton University Press, 2014), I was intrigued enough that I wanted to interview the author. This interview rambled, but in a good way. Chuck is a great guest, he’s passionate about physics and math as well as fantasy and science fiction. We flowed through a number of subjects and had a grand time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Angela Creager‘s deeply researched and elegantly written new book is a must-read account of the history of science in twentieth-century America. Life Atomic: A History of Radioisotopes in Science and Medicine (University of Chicago Press, 2013) traces a history of radioisotopes as military and civilian objects, for experimentation and therapeutic use, from the 1930s through the late twentieth century. Creager follows the emergence of a political and economic market for radioisotopes, looking carefully at their use as controversial political instruments, as representations of the benefits of atomic energy for US citizens, and as commodities.After six chapters that trace these broader contexts of the production and circulation of radioisotopes, the second half of the book offers a set of fascinating case studies that explore representative users and uses of the technology in biochemistry, molecular biology, medicine, and ecology. Aspects of the story touch on the history of scientific and medical research using human and animal subjects, the early history of radiation therapy, and the history of ecology and environmental science. Not only is it a historiographically important and meticulously crafted work based on exhaustive research, but it’s also a great set of stories. The pages of Life Atomic are full of guinea pigs, scientific vaudeville, and stories and characters from many different fields of the modern life sciences, expertly weaving them together into a compelling set of arguments. Enjoy! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The book discussed in this interview is Love and Math: The Heart of Hidden Reality Basic Books, 2013) by Edward Frenkel of the University of California at Berkeley.It’s a toss-up which is more interesting – the description of Frenkel’s life or his description of his interest in – and love for – mathematics and physics. Before he was twenty years old, Frenkel had written a paper that a visiting Swedish physicist thought so intriguing that he smuggled it out of Russia.That paper started Frenkel on a career which resulted in his collaborating with some of the world’s foremost mathematicians and physicists – and to his writing Love and Math. It’s a fascinating read. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tim Maudlin‘s Philosophy of Physics: Space and Time (Princeton University Press, 2012) is a clear, approachable, and engaging introduction to the philosophy of physics that focuses on fundamental notions of space and time. The book expertly interweaves the history and philosophy of science in the course of its narrative; readers will explore the historical development of ideas about space and time in the course of learning the outlines and intricacies of some of the most powerful physical concepts in the history of science. Maudlin is an expert teacher in these pages, using material examples to explain and explore aspects of the philosophy of physics from the geometrical structure of space to the topology of time. Over the course of our conversation, we talked about the place of the volume within the larger trajectory of Maudlin’s work, the ways that his experience as a student and a teacher of the philosophy of physics has shaped the volume, and some of the ways that the work significantly departs from similar introductions to the field. Enjoy! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How do you measure a star?In the middle of the 20thcentury, an interdisciplinary and international community of scientists began using radio waves to measure heavenly bodies and transformed astronomy as a result. David P. D. Munns‘s new book charts the process through which radio astronomers learned to see the sounds of the sky, creating a new space for Cold War science. A Single Sky: How an International Community Forged the Science of Radio Astronomy (MIT Press, 2012) uses the emergence of radio astronomy to upend some of the commonly-held assumptions about the history of the modern sciences. Munns emphasizes the relative freedom of radio astronomers that stands in contrast to the popular meta-narrative of Cold War scientists bound by the interests of the military-industrial complex. He also shifts our focus from the more commonly-studied individual local and national contexts of science to look instead at scientific communities that transcended disciplinary and national boundaries, blending accounts of Australia, the UK, the Netherlands, and the US into a story that emphasizes the importance of cooperation (not competition) in driving scientific development. In addition to this, A Single Sky pays special attention to the importance of material culture (especially that of big radio telescopes) and pedagogy in shaping modern radio astronomy. It’s a fascinating story. Enjoy!For more information about The Dish, a film that Munns mentioned in the course of our conversation, see here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The book discussed in this interview is Dice World: Science and Life in a Random Universe (Icon Books, 2013), by Brian Clegg, an acclaimed British writer of books on science for the general public. Brian has a knack for taking concepts that seem abstruse and explaining them in ways that those who lack a technical background can readily understand. This talent is on display inDice World, where he takes the reader on an intriguing trip through the world of probability and statistics, and shows how these disciplines are essential to our understanding of how the Universe came into existence, how it functions, and how it will evolve. Brian Clegg can be contacted at brian@brianclegg.net. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What is alchemy? Who were the alchemists, what did they believe and do and dream, and what did they accomplish?Lawrence M. Principe‘s new book explores these questions and some possible answers to them in a wonderfully written and argued introduction to the history of western alchemy. The Secrets of Alchemy (University of Chicago Press, 2012) traces the genealogy of alchemical practices from their early Greco-Egyptian foundations through early modern chymistry, pausing along the way to reflect on the reinterpretation and refashioning of alchemy from the eighteenth century to the present. Principe’s pages reveal histories of alchemy that are wonderfully rich and diverse, and we meet them in laboratories, recipes, images, dramatic plays, and poems. In the course of our conversation, we talked about aspects of the craft of the alchemist as well as that of the historian, including Principe’s fascinating attempts to recreate alchemical recipes and practices in his own laboratory. Enjoy! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In A Universe from Nothing: Why There is Something Rather than Nothing (Atria, 2012), Lawrence M. Krauss presents this big idea: something can–and perhaps must–come from nothing. That something is, well, everything–you, me, and the entire universe. If that doesn’t get your attention, nothing will. Of course, as Lawrence explains, nothing usually turns out on close inspection to be something. Listen in and find out how. Lawrence and I also discussed the relationship between science (especially physics) and religion, and in particular the question “What came before that?” and whether said question has any meaning at all. No matter what you believe, I’m sure you’ll find what Lawrence has to say of great interest. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices