Book Reviews - Review 134

Science journalist George Johnson presents an overview of the current frontiers of scientific thinking. He also takes a step back from recent developments in physics, biology, mathematics and computer science to consider where science is taking humankind on a more general level. Are we on the brink of understanding the universe completely, or are we doomed to continue finding 'doors behind doors', perpetually blocking the way to ultimate truth? Is Western civilisation's belief that science can reveal the ultimate secrets of the universe any less naive than the superstitious rituals of the native Americans of northern New Mexico, who dwell in the valley below Los Alamos, former development site for the US's nuclear weapons and now the unofficial science capital of the world?

Johnson assumes the reader to be familiar with the basics of quantum theory, chaos theory and genetics; at least I assume he does, because the lack of examples and illustrations doesn't make things easy for the uninitiated. He starts every chapter with a scene, historical or contemporary, from northern New Mexico, getting the reader in a suitably awestruck state of mind for the scientific discussion that follows. It works quite well, making this a surprisingly atmospheric - nay, even, at times, poetic - scientific read. Johnson isn't particularly critical of the more controversial recent directions of scientific thinking - for example, information theory and computer science models of 'mind as algorithm' - preferring to emphasise the provisional nature of all scientific ideas, past and present. Even the western concept of time, he shows, is somewhat arbitrary when compared with the Tewa indians' division of phenomena simply into categories of 'the manifest' and 'the manifesting'.

A stimulating, speculative and quite original book, that perhaps a 'hard scientist' would have found difficult to pull off.