Science Book Reviews

Dogs That Know When Their Owners Are Coming Home : And Other Unexplained Powers of Animals , by Rupert Sheldrake (Crown Publishing; 0609805339; paperback; 9/12/2000; Science / Pets) Filled with captivating stories and thought-provoking analysis, Dogs That Know When Their Owners Are Coming Home is a groundbreaking exploration of animal behavior that will profoundly change the way we think about animals, and ourselves. After five years of extensive research involving thousands of people who own and work with animals, Sheldrake conclusively proves what many pet owners already know -- that there is a strong connection between humans and animals that lies beyond present-day scientific understanding.

Measuring the Universe , by Kitty Ferguson (Walker & Company; 0802713513; hardcover; Science / Astronomy). Measuring the Universe is an eloquent chronicle of the men and women--from Aristarchus to Cassini, Sir Isaac Newton to Henrietta Leavitt and Stephen Hawking--who have gradually unlocked the mysteries of "how far" and in so doing have changed our ideas about the size and nature of the universe and our place in it.

Greenhouse : The 200-Year Story of Global Warming , by Gale E. Christianson (Walker & Company; 0802713467; hardcover; Science / History). For anyone interested in the history of science and the fate of planet Earth, Greenhouse is a unique and landmark book that will help shape the issues of the inevitable public debate to come.

Wild Nights : Nature Returns to the City , by Anne Matthews (North Point Press; 0865475601; hardcover; 5/12/01; Science / Nature) Deer in Manhattan, coyotes in the Bronx, wild turkeys flying down Broadway: among the traffic and tall buildings of America's most urban terrain, another city -- suppressed and segregated during daylight, exceedingly lively from twilight to dawn -- has begun to stake a new claim. Wild Nights is a startling tour of this other New York, revealing how stubbornly nature reasserts itself, adapting its survival strategies to even the most violently resculpted terrain. Animated by Anne Mathew's keen wit and eye, and anatomized by the often warring theories of scientists, historians, and environmentalists, New York emerges as a case study in civilization on the brink of ecological overreach.

Surviving Galeras , by Stanley Williams and Fen Montaigne (Houghton Mifflin; 0618031685; hardcover; 4/17/01; Science / Geology) Through a harrowing, first-person account of an eruption and its aftermath, Surviving Galeras reveals the fascinating, high-risk realm of vocanology and explores the profound impact volcanoes have had on the earth's landscapes and civilizations. In 1993, Stanley Williams, an eminent vocanologist, was standing on top of a Colombian volcano called Galeras when it erupted, incinerating several of his colleagues instantly. The tale of how Williams survived Galeras becomes the framework for a groundbreaking book about volcanoes, their physical and cultural impact, and the tiny cadre of scientists who risk their own lives to gain knowledge that might one day save many other lives.

The Last River : The Tragic Race for Shangri-la , by Todd Balf (Crown Publishing; 0609606255; hardcover; 9/19/2000; Science / Nature) In October 1998 an American whitewater paddling team traveled deep into the Tsangpo Gorge in Tibet to run the Yarlung Tsangpo, known in paddling circles as the Everest of rivers. On Day 12 of that trip, the team's ace paddler, one of four kayakers on the river, launched off an eight-foot waterfall and flipped. He and his overturned kayak spilled into the heart of the thunderous "freight training" river and were swept downstream, never to be seen again. The Last River: The Tragic Race for Shangri-la is a breathtaking account of this ill-fated expedition, a fascinating exploration of what propelled these kayakers to take on the seething big water and perilous Himalayan terrain of the deepest gorge on the planet.

The Scalpel and the Butterfly : The War Between Animal Research and Animal Protection , by Deborah Rudacille (Farrar, Straus & Giroux; 0374254206; hardcover; 9/26/2000; Science / Animal Rights) The heart of a pig may soon beat in a human chest. Sheep, cattle, and mice have been cloned. Slowly but inexorably scientists are learning how to transfer tissues, organs, and DNA between species. Some think this research is moving too far, too fast, without adequate discussion of possible consequences Is it ethical to breed animals for spare parts? When does the cost in animal life and suffering outweigh the potential benefit to humans? In precise and elegant prose, The Scalpel and the Butterfly explores the ongoing struggle between the promise offered by new research and the anxiety about safety and ethical implications in the context of the conflict between experimental medicine and animal protection that dates back to the mid-nineteenth century. Deborah Rudacille offers a compelling and cogent look at the history of this divisive topic, from the days of Louis Pasteur and the founding of organized antivivisection in England to the Nazi embrace of eugenics, from animal rights to the continuing war between PETA and biomedical researchers, and the latest developments in replacing, reducing, and refining animal use for research and testing.

Living on the Wind : Across the Globe with Migratory Birds , by Scott Weidensaul (Farrar, Straus and Giroux; 0865475431; hardcover; Science / Nature / Birds). The magnificent story of the natural world's most epic journeys. At whatever moment you read these words, there are birds aloft in the skies of the Western Hemisphere, migrating. If it is spring or fall, the great pivot points of the year, then the continents are swarming with hundreds of millions of traveling birds-a flood so great that even the most ignorant or unobservant notice the skeins of geese and the flocks of robins. A magisterial book, Living on the Wind vivifies what may be the most compelling drama of the natural world.

The Second Creation , by Ian Wilmut , Keith Campbell , and Colin Tudge

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(Farrar, Straus & Giroux; 0374141231; hardcover; Medical Science) The story of the first mammalian cloning by the scientists who accomplished it. In this book, the authors explain the possibilities-good and bad-that have been opened up by their revolutionary new techniques. The Second Creation is a landmark work detailing arguably the most exciting and challenging scientific discovery of the twentieth century.

The Mummy Congress : Science, Obsession, and the Everlasting Dead , by Heather Pringle

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(Theia; 0786865512; hardcover; 6/6/01; Science / Archaeology) The Mummy Congress takes readers on a journey over five continents and across nearly 7,000 years to reveal how mummies have been venerated as saints, fought over by politicians, collected as artistic treasures, analyzed for cures to ancient diseases, investigated for clues to drug use, and imitated by today's cosmetics and beauty industries. From the elaborately prepared child mummies of northern Chile to the preserved household pets of ancient Egypt, from the self-preservation regimens of 19th century Japanese monks to the new crop of mummification services now being hyped on the Internet, this astounding book shows what mummies and the people who study them can tell us about ourselves -- about our fears of mortality and our dreams of eternal life, about the lives of our ancestors and about the possibilities for future generations.

Food's Frontier : The Next Green Revolution , by Richard Manning

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(North Point Press; 0865475938; hardcover; 10/30/2000; Science / Environment) An eye-opening look at how the world will feed itself in the coming decades. Richard Manning reports on this emerging Green Revolution, pioneering the fruit of agricultural projects under way in Ethiopia, Mexico, Uganda, Zimbabwe, China, India, Peru, and Chile. By placing their stories in social and political context and bringing in the voices of scientists, farmers, and ordinary citizens, Manning creates a mosaic portrait of where our next meals are coming from and presents some surprising and controversial solutions to our most pressing environmental problem.

Heinz Kohut : The Making of a Psychoanalyst , by Charles B. Strozier

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(Farrar, Straus & Giroux; 0374168806; hardcover; 4/21/01; Science / Psychology / Biography) Heinz Kohut was at the center of the twentieth-century psychoanalytic movement. After fleeing his native Vienna when the Nazis took power there, he settled in Chicago and worked in its university; within a decade he became the leader of the Chicago Institute for Psychoanalysis, a site for some of the most important research and clinical practice in the field. In this biography, Charles B. Strozier shows us Kohut as a paradigmatic figure in American intellectual life: a charismatic man whose ideas enriched many, but one who could be unbearably self-centered and grandiose. He brings to his telling of Kohut's life all the tools of an analyst -- intelligence, erudition, empathy, contrary insight, and a willingness to look far below the surface.

Clone Age : Twenty Years at the Forefront of Reproductive Technology , by by Lori B. Andrews (Henry Holt; 0805060804; hardcover; Biology / Medical Science) Lori Andrews passed her bar exam the day the first test-tube baby was born. Since that time she has become the world's most visible expert on the legal and ethical implications of reproductive technology, sought after to assess the rights of cryogenically suspended severed heads, the legal entanglements of surrogate motherhood, and the ethics of creating babies from dead men's sperm. She has been an advisor on genetic and reproductive technology to the president and Congress, the World Health Organization, the FBI, and such oddly interested parties as the emirate of Dubai.

Fire in the Valley : Making of a Personal Computer , by Paul Freiberger & Michael Swaine (McGraw-Hill; 0071358927; Science / Computers) In 1984, two beat reporters wrote what has since become the seminal work on the creation of the PC industry. Now back by popular demand, this updated re-issue of Fire in the Valley contains more outrageous tales about, and photos of, the individuals that created the personal computer.

Tigers in the Snow , by Peter Matthiessen (Farrar, Straus & Giroux; 0865475768; hardcover; Science / Environment). The future of the Siberian tiger. Accompanying researchers into the field, Matthiessen allows the reader to participate vicariously in the battle for the tiger's future. Along the way, he tells how the species evolved and evokes its crucial, often totemic role in human cultures and mythologies. He has made of the tiger's dilemma a drama-underscored by Hornocker's one-of-a-kind photographs-that conveys powerfully what a loss to our collective imagination the disappearance of these great cats would be.

Galileo's Daughter : A Historical Memoir of Science, Faith, and Love , by Dava Sobel (Walker and Co.; 0802713432; hardcover; Science / History) Inspired by a long fascination with Galileo, and by the remarkable surviving letters of Galileo's daughter, a cloistered nun, Dava Sobel has written a biography unlike any other of the man Albert Einstein called "the father of modern physics -- indeed of modern science altogether." Galileo's Daughter also presents a stunning portrait of a person hitherto lost to history, described by her father as "a woman of exquisite mind, singular goodness, and most tenderly attached to me."

A Rum Affair , by Karl Sabbagh (Farrar Straus & Giroux; 0374252823; hardcover; Science / Nature) Fascinating true story of fraud and intrigue set on the Isle of Rum in the Inner Hebrides involving British botanist John Heslop Harrison of Newcastle University who claimed to have discovered several species of rare and previously unknown plants on the island.

ENIAC - Triumphs, Tragedies of the World's First Computer , by Scott McCartney (Walker and Co.; 0802713483; hardcover; Computers / Science) Story of modern computer era ushered in by John Mauchly and Presper Eckert, based on original interviews and study of personal papers.

Flu , by Gina Kolata (Farrar, Straus & Giroux; 0374157065; hardcover; Science / Medicine). The story of the Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the search for the virus that caused it. The fascinating true story of the world's deadliest disease.

The Practical Archaeologist - 2nd Edition , by Jane McIntosh (Checkmark Books / Facts On File; 0816039518; paperback; Science / Archaeology). How we know what we know about the past - combines an outstanding introduction to archaeology with a practitioner's view of how archaeologists work and interpret the evidence they discover. Detailed chapters explore archaeological history, topography, methodology, tools and technology, and interpretive techniques.

The River : A Journey to the Source of HIV and AIDS , by Edward Hooper (Little, Brown & Co.; 0316372617; hardcover; Medical Science) An extraordinary investigation into the origins of the AIDS epidemic -- a true-life medical detective story based on years of research and original source material. The author examines over two dozen theories of origin, and eventually discards most of them. What remains is a remarkable and well-supported theory for the sudden appearance of AIDS, and the definitive story of its lethal spread.

Genes, Peoples, and Languages , by Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza and Mark Seielstad (Farrar, Straus & Giroux; 0865475296; hardcover; Science / Biology / Anthropology) A fascinating investigation into the relationship between genes, language, race, and culture.

Birds of North America -- Focus Guides series , by Kenn Kaufman (Houghton Mifflin; 0395964644; paperback; 9/15/00; Science / Nature / Birds) Recent field guides have catered to the expert birder and overwhelmed the more casual birder. Birds of North America is a back-to-basics guide, produced by one of the foremost birding experts, with a clear and direct approach to recognizing every North American bird. Contains more than 2,000 digitally enhanced photographs. Kaufman's innovative technique of combining the best features of photographs and paintings results in the most accurate and helpful images ever to appear in any field guide.

The Impact of the Gene : From Mendel's Peas to Designer Babies , by Colin Tudge (Farrar, Straus & Giroux; 0374175233, hardcover; 7/11/01; Science / Biology) Every day a new development in genetics seems to make headline news. Some scientists and entrepreneurs are even contemplating cloned and genetically engineered human beings. And while advocates of evolutionary psychology suggest that their findings provide essential insight into "human nature," opponents level charges of "genetic determinism." Most of the world's politics is rooted in primitive notions of heredity -- of tribe and race. The Impact of the Gene traces how the ideas that underpin the spectrum of controversies are interrelated and flow naturally from the insights of Gregor Mendel, who first established the principles of modern genetics with his deceptively simple experiments on peas in a monastery garden.

Annals of the Former World , by John McPhee

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(Farrar, Straus & Giroux; 0374518734; paperback; Science / Geology) Pulitzer Prize-winning survey of U.S. geology via author's journeys back and forth across the nation at the fortieth parallel.

Life's Matrix , by Philip Ball

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(Farrar Straus & Giroux; 0374186286; hardcover; Science) Comprehensive history of water in all its forms (ice, snow etc.), its fascinating pervasiveness, and how it is central to our planetary environment.

The Seven Sins of Memory : How the Mind Forgets and Remembers , by Daniel L. Schacter

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(Houghton Mifflin; 0618040196; hardcover; 5/7/01; Science / Psychology) Daniel L. Schacter, Harvard University's chairman of psychology and a leading memory expert, has developed the first framework that describes the basic memory miscues we all encounter constantly. Just like the ancient seven deadly sins, the seven memory sins appear routinely in everyday life. And while we may hate these difficulties, as Schacter notes, they're surprisingly vital to a keen mind. This book provides great reassurance to millions of time-stressed individuals -- whether they be twenty-something technophiles, overcommitted power brokers, or the huge segment of baby boomers who mutter nervously about senior moments and wonder about gingko's effects on memory enhancement.