Science and Natural History discussion

Any good book for March?

Members whose book is chosen through the poll will be kindly encouraged to lead the discussion.

The Hidden Half of Nature: The Microbial Roots of Life and Health

I'll definitely read that book this year.

To Much of a Good Thing by Lee Goldman

Got it! Thanks Michelle.

This one's a bit older, but I'll suggest it anyway:


Why We Get Sick: The New Science of Darwinian Medicine

Looks like march has a health theme, haha.

Amanda wrote: "

Why We Get Sick: The New Science of Darwinian Medicine

.

This one is good - I enjoyed it a lot and learned quite a bit.

Very interesting. It will be added. Evolutionary medicine is very useful.

On a similar topic to Amanda's suggestion and also an older book:
Survival of the Sickest: A Medical Maverick Discovers Why We Need Disease which I enjoyed immensely.

This is great. I just read the blurb. Thank you Phair.

Overpowered: The Dangers of Electromagnetic Radiation (EMF) and What You Can Do about It

Just a Note: Why We Get Sick and Survival of the Sickest cover the same topics - Why We Get Sick has a more science tone, while Survival of the Sickest is more chatty. Despite the 10 years difference between publication date, I didn't find anything in the newer book that wasn't discussed in the older book.

Which one is the newest one?

Survival of the Sickest is newer (2007) than Why We Get Sick (1996)

Thank you, Amanda. Both will be added to our shelve.
I think inflated use of words, overplayed phrases are becoming too common in the science world. "Survival of the sickest", "dark matter of the genome", heaven's sake, if the purpose is to get as much interest from people as possible, these writers should be orators and not scientists.

Survival of the Sickest: A Medical Maverick Discovers Why We Need Disease -> I'm sorry, but the phrases sicken me, and someone should raise this issue up.

Ha. I agree with you. I am also unfamiliar with the authors of Survival of the Sickest. I know that the authors of Why we Get Sick are two notable evolutionary biologists.

I'd love to read both. I'd also like to add a classic that has been on my shelf for some time. One, Two, Three...Infinity: Facts and Speculations of Science

Sooooooo, which book/books are we reading in March? April?

Scrambled emails are very confusing. Two winners: lol
One, Two, Three...Infinity: Facts and Speculations of Science
Why We Get Sick: The New Science of Darwinian Medicine

I have an idea.
What if instead of reading one book each month, we discuss one question each month? And to answer the question we can use as many books as we want.

Shall we try that? Perhaps this can successfully gather more participants.

Andreas wrote: "I have an idea.
What if instead of reading one book each month, we discuss one question each month? And to answer the question we can use as many books as we want."

Yes, lets try that. Most of the time I have to be in the right mood/frame of mind for a particular topic and that doesn't usually correspond to the book/topic that gets selected every month.

What question did you have in mind for our first attempt at this?

We can start it on April. We'll create another discussion for April. I have so many questions. Biology, chemistry, physics, math.
One could be 'do you think we'll be able to create a robot that is self-conscious?'

As you know, I want to study consciousness.

What about you? Any topic?

I myself will be more interested in topics than in a particular book. Any science topic will work for me, but not all books will..

Andreas wrote: "We can start it on April. We'll create another discussion for April. I have so many questions. Biology, chemistry, physics, math.
One could be 'do you think we'll be able to create a robot that is ..."

Is it worthwhile to include in the discussion some debate about what the guidelines for topics are? I'm not trying to pick on the topic, Andreas, but it is the only example so far: Can we really answer (in a meaningful way) the question of whether we can create non-human consciousness? But maybe I am pre-supposing the wrong thing: no one said these discussions have to answer anything.

I guess I worry a bit that, in the universe of possible questions, it is very easy to get away from 'science' and into opinion-only philosophical debate/arguments; or into purely speculative 'science-fiction' types of discussions.

Now, to perhaps contradict myself in some amount, I would be interested in discussing the ethics and/or path forward with 'human improvement.' 'Designer babies' (beyond e.g. sex selection) are off in the future a bit, but from sports to academia drugs are used to improved performance. The line, for decades in the case of sports, has been zero tolerance (at least in principle.) But can that really hold, going forward? Should it?

I wasn't looking for speculative or philosopical answers, and I'll be certainly not interested in discussion about ethics. Lol.

I don't think I can read your mind but are you answering 'no' to the question about whether we can build 'non-human' consciousness?

I really like the idea of pursuing questions with books. I vote in for the idea!

Let's see what it'll bring us :). I will broadcast the message. Thank you Vish.