The Sun, the Genome & the Internet

The Sun, the Genome & the Internet PDF Author: Freeman J. Dyson
Publisher: New York : Oxford University Press
ISBN: 9780195129427
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 144

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Book Description
In this visionary look into the future, Freeman Dyson argues that technological changes fundamentally alter our ethical and social arrangements and that three rapidly advancing new technologies--solar energy, genetic engineering, and world-wide communication--together have the potential to create a more equal distribution of the world's wealth. Dyson begins by rejecting the idea that scientific revolutions are primarily concept driven. He shows rather that new tools are more often the sparks that ignite scientific discovery. Such tool-driven revolutions have profound social consequences--the invention of the telescope turning the Medieval world view upside down, the widespread use of household appliances in the 1950s replacing servants, to cite just two examples. In looking ahead, Dyson suggests that solar energy, genetics, and the Internet will have similarly transformative effects, with the potential to produce a more just and equitable society. Solar power could bring electricity to even the poorest, most remote areas of third world nations, allowing everyone access to the vast stores of information on the Internet and effectively ending the cultural isolation of the poorest countries. Similarly, breakthroughs in genetics may well enable us to give our children healthier lives and grow more efficient crops, thus restoring the economic and human vitality of village cultures devalued and dislocated by the global market. Written with passionate conviction about the ethical uses of science,The Sun, the Genome, and the Internetis both a brilliant reinterpretation of the scientific process and a challenge to use new technologies to close, rather than widen, the gap between rich and poor.

The Sun, the Genome & the Internet

The Sun, the Genome & the Internet PDF Author: Freeman J. Dyson
Publisher: New York : Oxford University Press
ISBN: 9780195129427
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 144

Get Book Here

Book Description
In this visionary look into the future, Freeman Dyson argues that technological changes fundamentally alter our ethical and social arrangements and that three rapidly advancing new technologies--solar energy, genetic engineering, and world-wide communication--together have the potential to create a more equal distribution of the world's wealth. Dyson begins by rejecting the idea that scientific revolutions are primarily concept driven. He shows rather that new tools are more often the sparks that ignite scientific discovery. Such tool-driven revolutions have profound social consequences--the invention of the telescope turning the Medieval world view upside down, the widespread use of household appliances in the 1950s replacing servants, to cite just two examples. In looking ahead, Dyson suggests that solar energy, genetics, and the Internet will have similarly transformative effects, with the potential to produce a more just and equitable society. Solar power could bring electricity to even the poorest, most remote areas of third world nations, allowing everyone access to the vast stores of information on the Internet and effectively ending the cultural isolation of the poorest countries. Similarly, breakthroughs in genetics may well enable us to give our children healthier lives and grow more efficient crops, thus restoring the economic and human vitality of village cultures devalued and dislocated by the global market. Written with passionate conviction about the ethical uses of science,The Sun, the Genome, and the Internetis both a brilliant reinterpretation of the scientific process and a challenge to use new technologies to close, rather than widen, the gap between rich and poor.

The Sun, The Genome, and The Internet : Tools of Scientific Revolution

The Sun, The Genome, and The Internet : Tools of Scientific Revolution PDF Author: Freeman J. Dyson
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 9780199881468
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 144

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Book Description
In this visionary look into the future, Freeman Dyson argues that technological changes fundamentally alter our ethical and social arrangements and that three rapidly advancing new technologies--solar energy, genetic engineering, and world-wide communication--together have the potential to create a more equal distribution of the world's wealth. Dyson begins by rejecting the idea that scientific revolutions are primarily concept driven. He shows rather that new tools are more often the sparks that ignite scientific discovery. Such tool-driven revolutions have profound social consequences--the invention of the telescope turning the Medieval world view upside down, the widespread use of household appliances in the 1950s replacing servants, to cite just two examples. In looking ahead, Dyson suggests that solar energy, genetics, and the Internet will have similarly transformative effects, with the potential to produce a more just and equitable society. Solar power could bring electricity to even the poorest, most remote areas of third world nations, allowing everyone access to the vast stores of information on the Internet and effectively ending the cultural isolation of the poorest countries. Similarly, breakthroughs in genetics may well enable us to give our children healthier lives and grow more efficient crops, thus restoring the economic and human vitality of village cultures devalued and dislocated by the global market. Written with passionate conviction about the ethical uses of science, The Sun, the Genome, and the Internet is both a brilliant reinterpretation of the scientific process and a challenge to use new technologies to close, rather than widen, the gap between rich and poor.

The Sun, the Genome, the Internet

The Sun, the Genome, the Internet PDF Author: Freeman John Dyson
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780197743447
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Dyson argues that technological changes alter our ethical and social arrangements. He shows that advancing technologies - solar energy, genetic engineering and communication - have the combined potential to create more equal distribution of wealth.

The Einsteinian Revolution

The Einsteinian Revolution PDF Author: Jürgen Renn
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691256497
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
How the Einsteinian revolution can be understood as the result of a long-term evolution of science The revolution that emerged from Albert Einstein’s work in the early twentieth century transformed our understanding of space, time, motion, gravity, matter, and radiation. Beginning with Einstein’s miracle year of 1905 and continuing through his development of the theory of general relativity, Einstein spurred a revolution that continues to reverberate in modern-day physics. In The Einsteinian Revolution, Hanoch Gutfreund and Jürgen Renn trace the century-long transformation of classical physics and argue that the revolution begun by Einstein was in fact the result of a long-term evolution. Describing the origins and context of Einstein’s innovative research, Gutfreund and Renn work to dispel the popular myth of Einstein as a lone genius who brought about a revolution in physics through the power of his own pure thought. We can only understand the birth of modern physics, they say, if we understand the long history of the evolution of knowledge. Gutfreund and Renn outline the essential structures of the knowledge system of classical physics on which Einstein drew. Examining Einstein’s discoveries from 1905 onward, they describe the process by which new concepts arose and the basis of modern physics emerged. These transformations continued, eventually resulting in the establishment of quantum physics and general relativity as the two major conceptual frameworks of modern physics—and its two unreconciled theoretical approaches. Gutfreund and Renn note that Einstein was dissatisfied with this conceptual dichotomy and began a search for a unified understanding of physics—a quest that continued for the rest of his life.

Information Theory And Evolution (Third Edition)

Information Theory And Evolution (Third Edition) PDF Author: John Scales Avery
Publisher: World Scientific
ISBN: 9811250383
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 329

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Book Description
This highly interdisciplinary book discusses the phenomenon of life, including its origin and evolution, against the background of thermodynamics, statistical mechanics, and information theory. Among the central themes is the seeming contradiction between the second law of thermodynamics and the high degree of order and complexity produced by living systems. As the author shows, this paradox has its resolution in the information content of the Gibbs free energy that enters the biosphere from outside sources. Another focus of the book is the role of information in human cultural evolution, which is also discussed with the origin of human linguistic abilities. One of the final chapters addresses the merging of information technology and biotechnology into a new discipline — bioinformation technology.This third edition has been updated to reflect the latest scientific and technological advances. Professor Avery makes use of the perspectives of famous scholars such as Professor Noam Chomsky and Nobel Laureates John O'Keefe, May-Britt Moser and Edward Moser to cast light on the evolution of human languages. The mechanism of cell differentiation, and the rapid acceleration of information technology in the 21st century are also discussed.With various research disciplines becoming increasingly interrelated today, Information Theory and Evolution provides nuance to the conversation between bioinformatics, information technology, and pertinent social-political issues. This book is a welcome voice in working on the future challenges that humanity will face as a result of scientific and technological progress.

TechVenture

TechVenture PDF Author: Mohan Sawhney
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0471189553
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 365

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Book Description
Drawn from the popular TechVenture program at the Kellogg School of Management, this book provides a deep understanding of the key finance and business trends in e-commerce Viewing Silicon Valley as a test lab for e-commerce strategies, this book delivers the latest financial and business models shaping the e-commerce industry. TechVenture focuses on the Silicon Valley phenomenon, the new financial strategies, and evolving e-business models. Each chapter draws from field research and interviews with the top minds in business today, and covers the most recent advances in e-finance, including: technology incubators, start-up funds, measuring intellectual capital, valuation techniques for Internet firms, and emerging technologies. In addition, TechVenture features intriguing and informative case studies and examples of major companies, including Idealab, Merrill Lynch, Pfizer, and Amazon.com. General business and finance readers, as well as those fascinated by the Internet economy, will find TechVenture an invaluable read that is on the cutting edge of e-business. Mohanbir Sawhney (Evanston, IL) is the McCormick Tribune Professor of Electronic Commerce and Technology at the Kellogg Graduate School of Management, Northwestern University. Mr. Sawhney was recently named one of the twenty-five most influential people in e-business by Business Week magazine. Ranjay Gulati (Chicago, IL) is the Associate Professor of Management and Organizations at the Kellogg Graduate School of Management and the Director of the Center for Resource on E-Business Innovation. Anthony Paoni (Chicago, IL) is Associate Professor at the Kellogg Graduate School of Management.

Ancient Egyptian Wisdom for the Internet

Ancient Egyptian Wisdom for the Internet PDF Author: Anna Mancini
Publisher: University Press of America
ISBN: 9780761823780
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 180

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Book Description
Western law, based on agriculture and industry, cannot deal with the virtual worlds created by the Internet, argues Mancini. The ancient Romans and Egyptians, on the other hand, were adept at virtuality, an intangible world that intersected with the tangible one, and it is to their laws that she turns for new frameworks and practices. Her study was accepted at a doctoral dissertation at the French National Scientific Research Center Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

The Prophet and the Astronomer: Apocalyptic Science and the End of the World

The Prophet and the Astronomer: Apocalyptic Science and the End of the World PDF Author: Marcelo Gleiser
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393352064
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 372

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Book Description
"An intellectual accomplishment that illuminates the magic and the wisdom of the heavens above."—Kirkus Reviews "Tracing our contemplation of the cosmos from the big bang to the big crunch" (The New Yorker), Marcelo Gleiser explores the shared quest of ancient prophets and today's astronomers to explain the strange phenomena of our skies—from the apocalypse foretold in Revelations to modern science's ongoing identification of multiple cataclysmic threats, including the impact of comets and asteroids on earthly life, the likelihood of future collisions, the meaning of solar eclipses and the death of stars, the implications of black holes for time travel, and the ultimate fate of the universe and time. Presenting insights to cosmological science and apocalyptic philosophy in an "easily accessible" (Library Journal) style, Gleiser is "a rare astrophysicist as comfortable quoting Scripture as explaining formulas" (Booklist). K. C. Cole praises his ability to "[work] the entwined threads of science and religion into a vision of 'the end' that is strangely comforting and inspiring."

Maverick Genius

Maverick Genius PDF Author: Phillip F. Schewe
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 1250021014
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 360

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Book Description
The biography of one of most inventive, courageous, and brilliant thinkers of our time, who worked for the Pentagon and NASA, helped write the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, and assisted Stanley Kubrick with 2001: A Space Odyssey. Scientist. Innovator. Rebel. For decades, Freeman Dyson has been regarded as one of the world's most important thinkers. The Atlantic wrote, "In the range of his genius, Freeman Dyson is heir to Einstein – a visionary who has reshaped thinking in fields from math to astrophysics to medicine, and who has conceived nuclear-propelled spaceships designed to transport human colonists to distance planets." Salon.com says that, "what sets Dyson apart among an elite group of scientists is the conscience and compassion he brings to his work." Now, in this first complete biography of Dyson, author Phillip F. Schewe examines the life of a man whose accomplishments have shaped our world in many ways. From quantum physics to national defense, from space to biotechnology, Dyson's work has cemented his position as a man whose influence goes far beyond the field of theoretical physics. It even won him the million dollar Templeton prize for his writing about science and religion. Recently, Dyson has made headlines for his controversial views on global warming, and he continues to make waves in the science community to this day. A colleague of Albert Einstein at Princeton and friends with leading thinkers including Robert Oppenheimer, George F. Kennan, and Richard Feynman, Freeman Dyson is a larger-than-life figure. Many of his colleagues, including Nobelists Steven Weinberg and Frank Wilczek, as well as his wives and his children, Esther and George Dyson, have been interviewed for this book. Maverick Genius, Schewe's definitive biography, paints a compelling and vibrant portrait of a man who has been both praised for his genius and criticized for his unorthodox views.

Cyberliteracy

Cyberliteracy PDF Author: Laura J. Gurak
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 9780300101577
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 210

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Book Description
This title explains computer communications and how to become literate in cyberspace. Using stories and case histories, the book shows how to detect hoaxes, identify advertising masquerading as product information, protect privacy, and contend with other issues related to Internet language.