StarAstrologer - Books : The Canon: A Whirligig Tour of the Beautiful Basics of Science
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Binding: Audio CD
Dewey Decimal Number: 500
EAN: 9781598870893
Format: Audiobook, Unabridged
ISBN: 1598870890
Label: HighBridge Company
Manufacturer: HighBridge Company
Number Of Items: 11
Number Of Pages: 1
Publication Date: April 20, 2007
Publisher: HighBridge Company
Sales Rank: 689237
Studio: HighBridge Company
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Editorial Review:
Product Description:
A playful, passionate, ebullient guide to the science all around us by a Pulitzer Prize winner and best-selling author.
Buckle up for a joy ride through physics, chemistry, biology, geology, and astronomy. Drawing on conversations with hundreds of the world's top scientists and her own work as an award-winning science writer, Natalie Angier does the impossible: She makes science fascinating and seriously fun, even for those of us who, in Angier's words, "still can't tell the difference between a proton, a photon, and a moron."
Most of the profound questions we will explore in our lives—evolution, global warming, stem cells—have to do with science. So do a lot of everyday things, like our ice cream melting and our coffee getting cold and our vacuum cleaner running (or not). What does our liver do when we eat a caramel? How does the horse demonstrate evolution at work? Are we really made of stardust? (Yes, we are.)
In The Canon, Lewis Thomas meets Lewis Carroll in a book destined to become a modern classic—because it quenches our curiosity, sparks our interest in the world around us, reignites our childhood delight in discovering how things work, and instantly makes us smarter.
Average Rating: 
Rating:  -
I have serious, serious Natalie Angier love due to Woman:An Intimate Geography, but I was really disappointed in this book. Perhaps all of the little jokes would have been easier to skim over on the printed page, but they were unbearable as my husband and I listened to them in the car on the way back from Christmas vacation.
Her introduction took a solid hour and mostly consisted of anecdote and a lengthy discourse on people's lack of interest in science and lack of desire to know ... Read More
Rating:  -
This book was a huge disappointment! The topic was fascinating and the reviews compelling, but, I wanted to learn about science, not how clever the author thinks she is. Angier's style was so repulsive I finally had to put it aside about halfway through.
As another adherent of what I refer to as "gonzo non-fiction," Angier insists on injecting her own ego into the work at the expense of her subject and her readers. Almost every other sentence has a pun, word play or personal aside ... Read More
Rating: -
Natalie Angier can definitely write interestingly about science facts. I feel that if she turns her attention to biographies of living scientists, the results will be wonderful. But the hype for this book is undeserved.
The Canon is full of enthusiasm, bubbling prose, brilliant puns and autobiographic images--components that make a fashionable human-interest magazine article or work of fiction. What it makes up for in style and earnest good intentions, it lacks in content and clarity. The ... Read More
Rating: -
Inspiration 1/5,education 2/5,distraction 1/5,overall 2/5. An attempt to explain science with literary flourishes but without tables, pictures, graphs, abstracts or summaries. She uses none of the tools common in the scientific literature. Stories can be helpful but the stories here tend to be about modern researchers and their journey, not very inspirational and not very explanatory.
Rating:  -
The process of reading this book reminded me of a story I once heard in which Claire Booth Luce was asked if she like to write. "No," she replied, "but I like having written." Reading 'The Canon' was a lot like that: it was sometimes tough going, but I liked having read it. No one ever said science was easy, but with a little effort an attempt to understand the basics behind Physics, Chemistry, and the other branches of science can make living in the world a richer experience.
I am grateful ... Read More
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