Popular Science Book Project

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The h2g2 Popular Science Book Project is aimed at collecting together summaries and reviews of science books worth recommending, and it is hoped it will grow into a useful resource for people looking for good books on particular topics, or just suggestions for things to consider reading.


Suggestions of books to add to the list are welcome, as are offers to review or help review books or provide a few lines of summary. However, some intention of contributing to summaries or reviews *is* hoped for amongst suggesters - even for books where a full review is eventually intended, an initial short summary as a starting point could be very useful.


Short summaries (if present) can be accessed by a 'Summary' link in the final column.

People interested in non-science books might be interested in A745544

Author names link to the relevant entry on the alphabetical author page, allowing all the suggested works of an author to be found, even if their books range across multiple categories.


Where book titles are a link, they link to a full-article book review.

Please also read the notes at the foot of this article.

Biology

Evolution
Clive BromhallA4192805Summary
Charles DarwinThe Origin Of Speciesavailable
Richard DawkinsThe Selfish Geneavailable
The Blind Watchmakeravailable
River Out Of Edenavailable
A Devil's Chaplain (collected essays)available
Daniel DennettDarwin's Dangerous Ideaavailable
Jared DiamondGuns, Germs, and SteelSummary
Stephen Jay GouldWonderful Lifeavailable
Steve JonesY - The Descent Of Manavailable
Almost Like A WhaleSummary
Edward J LarsonEvolution : The Remarkable History of a Scientific TheorySummary
Elaine MorganThe Descent of Womanavailable
The Descent Of The Childavailable
The Scars Of Evolutionavailable
Matt RidleyThe Red Queenavailable
D'Arcy ThompsonA4191392Summary
Colin TudgeThe Day Before YesterdaySummary

Animal Behaviour
Stephen BudianskyA4264490Summary
A4259496Summary
The Covenant Of The WildSummary
Gordon GriceThe Red Hourglass - Lives of the Predatorsavailable
Christopher McGowanThe Raptor And The LambSummary
Roger TaborThe Wildlife Of The Domestic Catavailable

Mind/Brain/AI
Daniel DennettConsciousness ExplainedSummary
Freedom Evolvespending
Kinds of Mindsavailable
Brainchildren (essays)available
Steven Lavy - Artificial Life [The Quest for a New Creation]Summary
Roger PenroseThe Emperor's New MindSummary
Stephen PinkerThe Language InstinctSummary
Words and Rulesavailable
How The Mind Workspending
A4265336Summary
V S RamachandranPhantoms In The BrainSummary
A Brief Tour Of Human Consciousness (not recommended)Summary
The Emerging Mind (not recommended)Summary
Carl SaganThe Dragons Of Edenavailable

Perception
E H GombrichArt And Illusionavailable
Donald D HoffmanA4277865Summary

Miscellaneous
Ronald M NowakWalker's Mammals of the Worldavailable

Physics

John D BarrowThe Universe That Discovered ItselfSummary
Albert EinsteinRelativity: The Special And General Theoryavailable
Richard FeynmanThe Pleasure Of Finding Things Outavailable
Rudy RuckerThe Fourth Dimension : A Guided Tour of the Higher UniverseSummary
Carl SaganPale Blue Dotavailable

Materials Science

J E GordonStructures - or why things don't fall downavailable
The New Science of Strong Materials available

Chemistry

John EmsleyA4267541Summary
Simon GarfieldA4278288Summary
John MannA4278017Summary
Molecules at an ExhibitionSummary

Mathematics

John Allen PaulosInnumeracySummary
Simon SinghFermat's Enigmaavailable

Geology / Earth Sciences

Stephen DruryA4263923Summary
Roger OsborneThe Floating Eggavailable
P J SmallThe Study Of LandformsSummary

General Science

Bill BrysonA Short History Of Nearly Everythingavailable
Terry Pratchett,
Ian Stewart,
Jack Cohen
The Science of Discworldavailable

Science/Technology History

Stephen BudianskyA4285172Summary
A4280311Summary
Robert BuderiA4266524Summary
Tom StandageThe Victorian InternetSummary

Science vs. Pseudoscience and Mysticism, etc.

Martin GardnerScience Good, Bad and Bogusavailable
Carl SaganThe Demon-Haunted Worldavailable
Michael ShermerWhy People Believe Weird Thingsavailable


Reviewers are asked to write in their own words - possibly a choice phrase or a hint of which areas to cover could be usefully provided by back-cover summaries or reviews from elsewhere, but originality of review or summary is useful for people trying to work out what weight to put in a particular review. Possibly the best guide is that if a book doesn't inspire you to write a review of your own, it's best leaving for someone else to write about.



Note that 'available' essentially means that no-one has yet produced a review or summary of a particular book, or promised to do so.


However, since this page is only editable by one person, it is possible that the page contents are rather behind the contents of the threads hanging off this page, so it is suggested that the threads are also examined for other offers to write reviews for particular books before people closet themselves away to write the masterpiece review.


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