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Closer To Truth Science, Meaning, and the Future
Robert Lawrence Kuhn
Book Code: C9389
ISBN: 0-275-99389-2
ISBN-13: 978-0-275-99389-4
328 pages
Praeger Publishers
Publication: 2/28/2007
List Price: $49.95 (UK Sterling Price: £27.95)
Availability: In Stock
Media Type: Hardcover
Also Available: Ebook
Trim Size: 6 1/8 x 9 1/4
Subjects: Reviews:
  • The book is a valuable resource for the most recent developments in science and trends in intellectual thought. It will inspire readers to learn more about the fundamental issues of human existence, to think about who they are, why they are here, and where they are going. In a short section following the debates, Kuhn discusses different scientific models for explaining reality. The reader is given helpful background information for each discussion with an introduction and interview of panel participants. Although the topics are advanced, the discussions do not go into great scientific detail or use extensive scientific terminology. Overall, this book is aimed at those who wish to explore philosophical questions in a scientific context. Summing Up: Recommended. General readers; lower-division undergraduates; two-year technical program students.
    —Choice     October 2007
  • [E]xplores the latest scientific research, philosophical thinking and considerations of the challenges facing mankind in the future, and is based on the PBS TV show of the same name. Specialists debate a range of social scientific and ethical questions, from how alternative medicine may be validated to how science supports political and social interests. In offering up a blend of debate and dialogue, Closer to Truth supercedes similar titles and provides both college level science holdings and general interest collections with a powerful survey.
    —The Bookwatch     November 2007
  • [E]xamine issues such as the nature of consciousness, autism, the legitimization of alternative medicine, pharmaceutical testing controversies, the origins of order in the universe, the possibility extra-terrestrial life, the frontiers of quantum computing, and the role of basic science in national security.
    —SciTech Book News     June 2007
  • Endorsement From John Leslie,
    Fellow, Royal Society of Canada
    University Professor Emeritus of Philosophy, University of Guelph
    Author of Immortality Defended, Infinite Minds, Universes, and The End of the World:     How does it feel being autistic? Can science fiction warn of risks to humankind? Is 'alternative medicine' of benefit, or music, or mood-altering pills? Will alien life be found soon? Are more universes being born? Does immortality await us in heaven or inside immensely powerful computers? Forty-eight experts discuss the cosmos and what makes life interesting. Robert Lawrence Kuhn's our guide, host, editor. An intellectual feast for a mental gourmet!
Description: Closer To Truth: Science, Meaning, and the Future explores the latest scientific research, philosophical thinking, and expressions of human creativity. Some of the world's most esteemed experts--Nobel laureates, best-selling authors, and renowned scholars--engage in spontaneous and intimate conversations that combine hard facts with an inspiring--and breathtaking--look into our future. Based on the public television program of the same name, Closer To Truth features distinguished specialists who forcefully debate provocative subjects that have broad ramifications for the population at large: Who gets to validate alternative medicine? How does basic science support national security? Can we believe in both religion and science? At the heart is the question: how will scientific advances and the philosophical issues they create affect the individual as well as humanity as a whole? Whether the subject is the meaning of human consciousness, the ethics of testing experimental drugs on sick people, scientific thinking versus religious beliefs, or how music may help mental development, Closer To Truth uncovers exciting new lines of inquiry and offers fresh perspectives. Participants include Nobel laureates Murray Gell-Mann and David Baltimore; authors Michael Crichton, Octavia Butler, and David Brin; astrophysicists Alan Guth and Neil deGrasse Tyson; planetary scientist Bruce Murray; physicist Steven Koonin; quantum theorist Seth Lloyd; molecular biologist Lucy Shapiro; neuroscientists Nancy Andreasen, Terry Sejnowski, and Christof Koch; psychiatrist Leslie Brothers; Psychology Today's Robert Epstein; musicologists Jeanne Bamberger and Robert Freeman; ethicist Alexander Capron; skeptic Michael Shermer; theologian Nancey Murphy; and Islamic scientist Muzaffar Iqbal.
LC Card Number: 2006038657
LCC Class: Q175
Dewey Class: 500
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