This Idea Is Brilliant: Lost, Overlooked, And Underappreciated Scientific Concepts Everyone Should Know

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Synopsis

The latest volume in the bestselling series from Edge.org—dubbed “the world’s smartest website” by The Guardian—brings together 206 of the world’s most innovative thinkers to discuss the scientific concepts that everyone should know.

As science informs public policy, decision making, and so many aspects of our everyday lives, a scientifically literate society is crucial. In that spirit, Edge.org publisher and author of Know This, John Brockman, asks 206 of the world’s most brilliant minds the 2017 Edge Question: What scientific term or concept ought to be more widely known?

Contributors include: author of The God Delusion RICHARD DAWKINS on using animals’ “Genetic Book of the Dead” to reconstruct ecological history; MacArthur Fellow REBECCA NEWBERGER GOLDSTEIN on “scientific realism,” the idea that scientific theories explain phenomena beyond what we can see and touch; author of Seven Brief Lessons on Physics CARLO ROVELLI on “relative information,” which governs the physical world around us; theoretical physicist LAWRENCE M. KRAUSS on the hidden blessings of “uncertainty”; cognitive scientist and author of The Language Instinct STEVEN PINKER on “The Second Law of Thermodynamics”; biogerontologist AUBREY DE GREY on why “maladaptive traits” have been conserved evolutionarily; musician BRIAN ENO on “confirmation bias” in the internet age; Man Booker-winning author of Atonement IAN MCEWAN on the “Navier-Stokes Equations,” which govern everything from weather prediction to aircraft design and blood flow; plus pieces from RICHARD THALER, JARED DIAMOND, NICHOLAS CARR, JANNA LEVIN, LISA RANDALL, KEVIN KELLY, DANIEL COLEMAN, FRANK WILCZEK, RORY SUTHERLAND, NINA JABLONSKI, MARTIN REES, ALISON GOPNIK, and many, many others.

Chapters

  • 001 This Idea is Brilliant

    Duration: 19s
  • 002 Preface

    Duration: 03min
  • 003 The Longevity Factor

    Duration: 05min
  • 004 The Illusion of Explanatory Depth

    Duration: 04min
  • 005 Synaptic Transfer

    Duration: 04min
  • 006 The Genetic Book of the Dead

    Duration: 05min
  • 007 Exaptation

    Duration: 06min
  • 008 The Virial Theorem

    Duration: 06min
  • 009 The Second Law of Thermodynamics

    Duration: 06min
  • 010 Emergence

    Duration: 05min
  • 011 Natural Selection

    Duration: 05min
  • 012 DNA

    Duration: 03min
  • 013 Genetic Rescue

    Duration: 04min
  • 014 Positive Feedbacks in Climate Change

    Duration: 07min
  • 015 The Anthropocene

    Duration: 03min
  • 016 The Noosphere

    Duration: 05min
  • 017 The Gaia Hypothesis

    Duration: 04min
  • 018 Ocean Acidification

    Duration: 05min
  • 019 Intertemporal Choice

    Duration: 06min
  • 020 Future Self-Continuity

    Duration: 05min
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