Silliman Memorial Lectures Series – serie

In this classic work, one of the greatest mathematicians of the twentieth century explores the analogies between computing machines and the living human brain. John von Neumann, whose many contributions to science, mathematics, and engineering include the basic organizational framework at the heart of today's computers, concludes that the brain operates both digitally and analogically, but also has its own peculiar statistical language. In his foreword to this new edition, Ray Kurzweil, a futurist famous in part for his own reflections on the relationship between technology and intelligence, places von Neumann’s work in a historical context and shows how it remains relevant today.

The Silliman Lectures at Yale University have been responsible for many books which have greatly influenced the progress of scientific work in the twentieth century.  One of the foremost scientists of our time, Theodosius Dobzhansky, recipient of the Elliot and Kimbler prizes, and Da Costa Professor of Zoology at Columbia University, delivered the Silliman Lectures given in honor of the Centennial of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species.  Based upon these lectures, Mr. Dobzhansky’s latest book, Mankind Evolving, now takes its place beside his other great works. With a profound knowledge of the biological theory of evolution and modern genetics, Mr. Dobzhansky explores the possibilities of understanding mankind as a product of evolution and as an evolving whole.  Human evolution, contends Mr. Dobzhansky, cannot be understood as a purely biological process, nor can it be adequately described as a history of culture; rather, it is the interaction between the two components of evolution—the biological, or organic, and the cultural, or superorganic.  The interdependence of these two components is brought out most clearly if we consider that they both serve the same function—the adaptation to and control of man’s environment. Drawing upon evidence from human biology, and the study of fossil ancestors of now-living mankind, Mr. Dobzhansky explains how the biological process led to the inception and advancement of culture as an instrument of adaptation.  In producing the genetic basis of culture, biological evolution has transcended itself: it has produced the superorganic.  The superorganic, Mr. Dobzhansky points out, has not annulled the organic; and human welfare, both in individuals and in societies, is predicated upon the health of the genetic endowment of human population.  Man has not only evolved but is evolving, and Mr. Dobzhansky expounds the thesis that the genetic basis of culture should be improved, or at the very least should not be allowed to deteriorate.  Mankind Evolving is of vital importance not only for scientists but for all who are concerned with the health of future generations.   Winner of the Anisfield-Wolf Award and the Pierre Lecomte Du Nuoy Prize. "The most interesting . . . the most judicious scientific treatise that has ever been written on the nature of man . . . displays tremendous erudition over an even broader range of knowledge than is found in its author's previous works. . . . No one who is concerned with his own nature and that of mankind—and this included poets, philosophers, and theologians—can afford to miss this book."—George Gaylord Simpson.

This enlarged edition of Man Adapting includes a new chapter expanding Dr. Dubos’s discussion of the role of medicine in man’s adaptive processes.  In 1965 he wrote at length of the biological and social problems of human adaptation, while treating the medical aspects of this problem only in passing.  He believed that the goal of medicine was to help man function successfully with the particular circumstances of his environment and heredity.  But despite advancements in the prevention and treatment of disease, skepticism has developed during the last two decades concerning the usefulness of modern medicine.  Dr. Dubos turns here to readdress this question.Today physicians rely on sophisticated scientific knowledge, and no longer offer the traditional doctor-patient relationship which ministered to psychological as well as physical comfort.  But it is this spiritual aspect of human medicine, Dr. Dubos argues, which distinguishes it from general biology, and it will retain its unique position among the sciences only if it accepts responsibility for the human aspects of life.  Dr. Dubos demonstrates the complex interrelationship between man and his biological environment.  He writes, “I have attempted to focus my attention on the individual human being . . . trying as best he can to meet the emergencies of the day and to prepare for the uncertainties of the future.  He is Man Adapting.”

In his autobiography, published posthumously in 1960, Richard Goldschmidt wrote: “I am confident that in twenty years my [work], which is now ignored, will be given an honorable place in the history of evolutionary thought.”  The publication of this edition, now reissued with a new introduction by Stephen Jay Gould, proves Goldschmidt’s prediction to be correct.Goldschmidt, one of the world’s great geneticists, delivered the prestigious Silliman lectures at Yale University in 1939 and published his remarks in 1940 as The Material Basis of Evolution.  His intent was to inquire into the types of hereditary differences that produce new species.  Goldschmidt used a wide range of research to formulate his own picture of evolution.  Contrary to most scientists, he insisted that the neo-Darwinist theory of micromutations was no longer tenable as a general theory of evolution.  Instead, Goldschmidt claimed, macroevolution accounted for the larger steps in evolution. Although Goldschmidt’s views were reviled by scientists of his day, some of his basic ideas are now gaining acceptance.  As Gould writes in his introduction: “I do…believe that its general vision is uncannily correct (or at least highly fruitful at the moment) in several important areas where conventional Darwinian theory has become both hidebound and unproductive.”

This pedagogical introduction to the physics of black holes emphasizes the “membrane paradigm”, which translates the mathematics and physics of black holes into a form accessible to readers with little knowledge of general relativity but a solid grounding in nonrelativistic physics.  This is accomplished without resort to approximations or loss of content.  Instead of treating a black hole’s “event horizon” as a globally defined null surface in four-dimensional space time, the paradigm views it as a two-dimensional membrane in three-dimensional space.  Made of viscous fluid, electrically charged and conducting, with finite entropy and temperature but no power to conduct heat, this membrane is seen as having familiar properties that enable the reader to understand intuitively and compute quantitatively the behavior of black holes in complex astrophysical environments.

D. Allan Bromley, one of the world's leading nuclear physicists, was The Assistant to President George Bush for Science and Technology Policy from August 1989 to January 1993. He was the first Science Advisor to have this Cabinet-level rank.In this engrossing memoir of his years at the White House, Bromley brings the unique perspective of a scientist to the political realities of policy making with the President and his other Senior Assistants. Bromley recalls his efforts to rebuild the Office of Science and Technology Policy and the Federal Coordinating Council for Science, Engineering, and Technology, organizations that develop science policy and that oversee the federal agencies responsible for the science and technology enterprise of the United States; the Bush Administration initiatives to improve the global environment, the health and quality of life of all Americans, national security, international science and technology, and funding of U.S. science and technology; and the landmark reports prepared under his supervision that called for a revamping of the science and mathematics curricula in U.S. precollege education and a rethinking of the relationships between the research intensive universities and the federal government. He discusses the people with whom he interacted—George Bush, John Sununu (Bromley's strongest ally in the White House), Richard Darman, Senator Al Gore, and many others—and he includes provocative anecdotes about his attempts—many successful—to foster closer cooperative scientific ventures with other countries. Bromley's memoir is both a broad overview of the role of science and technology in the Bush Administration and an insider's account of the ambiance, personalities, and politics that mold specific policy decisions in Washington. It is fascinating and thought-provoking reading.

Radioactive Transformations describes Ernest Rutherford’s Nobel Prize-winning investigations into the mysteries of radioactive matter. In this historic work, Rutherford outlines the scientific investigations that led to and coincided with his own research—including the work of Wilhelm Rӧntgen, J. J. Thomson, and Marie Curie—and explains in detail the experiments that provided a glimpse at special relativity, quantum mechanics, and other concepts that would shape modern physics.This new edition features a comprehensive introduction by Nobel Laureate Frank Wilczek which engagingly explains how Rutherford's early research led to a better understanding of topics as diverse as the workings of the atom’s nucleus, the age of our planet, and the fusion in stars.

First published in 1951, Enrico Fermi’s Elementary Particles remains a valuable guide for physicists and scholars. Fermi’s descriptions of the then-known particle universe and its nascent conceptual framework allow readers to glimpse the foundations of the field from the perspective of one of its most distinguished contributors.Over sixty years of research have provided answers to some of the questions Fermi poses in this book, but the biggest mysteries, regarding the origin and unification of forces, remain. As the high-energy physics community analyzes the results from ongoing experiments, such as those at the Large Hadron Collider, this historic work will be of interest to researchers, academics, and students. A new foreword by Yale University physicist Thomas Appelquist provides an engaging update and gives the work historical context.