Description
Book SynopsisHarold Morowitz has long been regarded highly both as an eminent scientist and as an accomplished science writer. The essays in The Wine of Life, his first collection, were hailed by C.P. Snow as some of the wisest, wittiest and best informed that I have read, and Carl Sagan called them a delight to read. In later volumes such as Mayonnaise and the Origin of Life and The Thermodynamics of Pizza, he has established a reputation for a wide-ranging intellect, an ability to see unexpected connections and draw striking parallels, and a talent for communicating scientific ideas with optimism and wit. Kirkus Reviews praised Mayonnaise as wonderfully diverting and very wise. Nature wrote of Thermodynamics, his chocolate-coated nuggets of science will continue to entertain and do surreptitious good. With Entropy and the Magic Flute, Morowitz once again offers an appealing mix of brief reflections on everything from litmus paper to the hippopotamus to the sociology of Palo Alto coffee shops. Man
Trade ReviewA delightful cornucopia of short essays on diverse topics, some purely scientific and others more personal. * Science News, Vol. 144 *
Table of ContentsPart One; Entropy and the magic flute; The perversion of J. Willard Gibbs, les Atomes, Triscentennial, Albertus Magnus, Fundamental laws of nature; Part Two; jesus, Moses, Aristotle, and Laboratory Animals; Tubes; Humans, animals, and physicians' waiting rooms; The oath; Autism and authority; the missing volumes; he smoking gun; Part Three; Just say no; The fromagification of America; Killer cheese; a bioenergeticist's revenge; A two-coffee culture; Deliver us; Part Four; Roots of a American tail; Justice; The sidewalks of New York; Brighten the corner where you are; Nixon and thermodynamics; George Mason, one of our really great men; Part Five; Koobi Fora; Clitoridectomy; Mammals I have known; Daibutsu and Descartes; Taitami taxonomy; Madan Pele; The sociology of Palo Alto coffee shops; Part Six; Dirty Neoplatonists; Quadrivial pursuits; Twenty books clad in black and red; The litmus test; Expertise; The afternoon session; Literati; Potlatch; Part Seven; What is Life?; Brekekekex; A rose by any other name.
