Science & Technology / Modern Science & Technology
Format: Paperback
Pages: 330
ISBN: 9788869774515
Pub Date: 18 Apr 2024
Description:
Since their invention, computers have kept revolutionizing the world at a staggeringpace. And yet, through recent conquests in AI and computer graphics, the profound effects of this revolution threaten to upend much of the previous world order. Sitting squarely at the crossroads of computer science, history, socioeconomics, ethics, and philosophy, and written by an insider who contributed foundational work to many of the latest and most pervasive technologies, this book offers a much-needed reframing of the past, present, and future of computing.
Format: Paperback
Pages: 176
ISBN: 9788869774676
Pub Date: 10 Mar 2024
Description:
We live in the Golden Age of space exploration. Humanity’s achievements include the continued operation of the International Space Station, rapid advancements in reusable rockets, and soon, a return to the Moon. Within our lifetime, we might have human outposts on the lunar surface and flags flying on the plains of Mars.
These strides are not just about reaching new frontiers. They have profound implications for life on Earth. The data from climate satellites overhead, innovative materials and recycling systems designed for space habitats, and emerging spacebased energy solutions are essential to addressing Earth’s conservation challenges. Space enables the understanding of Earth as much as Earth enables the exploration of space. This bright tomorrow is not assured, however. Space junk, international conflicts and fiscal calamities loom as threats to all that might be accomplished. For the human adventure to continue beyond the Earth’s atmosphere, the time is now to reconsider the nature of sustainability.
Format: Hardback
Pages: 224
ISBN: 9781912589395
Pub Date: 15 Feb 2024
Illustrations: Colour line drawings throughout
Description:
When we are born, we are basically sterile. By the time we die, we are more microbe than human. Microscopic organisms are essential to the development of human life.
Until Antonie van Leeuwenhoek observed his own microbes under a self-made microscope in the seventeenth century, we were not even aware that they existed. Clinician-scientist Fergus Shanahan and graphic design artist Laura Gowers shed light on the microbial world. How can we nurture microbes in the face of the climate emergency? Why do Irish Travellers have a unique microbiome? A remarkable, ground-breaking graphic book.
Format: Hardback
Pages: 336
ISBN: 9780822947585
Pub Date: 31 Jan 2024
Description:
The Many Voices of Modern Physics follows a revolution that began in 1905 when Albert Einstein published papers on special relativity and quantum theory. Unlike Newtonian physics, this new physics often departs wildly from common sense, a radical divorce that presents a unique communicative challenge to physicists when writing for other physicists or for the general public, and to journalists and popular science writers as well. In their two long careers, Joseph Harmon and the late Alan Gross have explored how scientists communicate with each other and with the general public.
Here, they focus not on the history of modern physics but on its communication. In their survey of physics communications and related persuasive practices, they move from peak to peak of scientific achievement, recalling how physicists use the communicative tools available - in particular, thought experiments, analogies, visuals, and equations - to convince others that what they say is not only true but significant, that it must be incorporated into the body of scientific and general knowledge. Each chapter includes a chorus of voices, from the many celebrated physicists who devoted considerable time and ingenuity to communicating their discoveries, to the science journalists who made those discoveries accessible to the public, and even to philosophers, sociologists, historians, an opera composer, and a patent lawyer. With their final collaboration, Harmon and Gross offer a tribute to the communicative practices of the physicists who convinced their peers and the general public that the universe is a far more bizarre and interesting place than their nineteenth-century predecessors imagined.
Format: Paperback
Pages: 176
ISBN: 9781847308412
Pub Date: 30 Jun 2018
Description:
Climate change is the greatest challenge of our generation - we hear it all the time. It has almost become a refrain. But do we really believe it?
What if we were to let those words settle a little, penetrate minds and hearts deeply, and accept their troubling, terrifying truth? What if we were to understand that climate change isn't something far away out there in space and time, but something that affects us here and now? In Climate Generation: Awakening to Our Children's Future, Lorna Gold shares her personal journey in understanding what those two words 'climate change' mean for her as a mother seeking to protect her children and, by extension, the world of which we are all a part. Climate change is a real danger, which risks destroying our Children's future. This book tells the story of how one mother was awakened to this reality and how it changed her life. From fearing she could do nothing, she found herself catapulted into a big adventure. She discovered people from all walks of life who care about their children's futures and who are doing amazing things to make these voices heard. ADVANCE PRAISE "Lorna Gold has given all of herself to this small book. She takes us on an anguished, unflinching journey into the heart of the climate crisis, and emerges emboldened - with a radical, utterly convincing hope that we can spring into action to protect the future of everything, and everyone, we love most." Naomi Klein, author of This Changes Everything: Capitalism Vs. the Climate "We need more narratives on climate change so that people are encouraged to make it a personal issue in their lives. This compelling personal story of a mother and activist makes that emotional connection very well, as she wakes up to the danger her children are in and connects the dots on how to safeguard their future." Mary Robinson, President, Mary Robinson Foundation – Climate Justice "Written by one of the planet’s most stalwart and successful climate fighters, this is a truly necessary book. If you’ve ever wondered how you could dig in and make a real difference on the greatest problem the planet faces, wonder no longer. Just read." Bill McKibben, author of The End of Nature