Closer To Truth

Explore the latest scientific research, philosophical thinking, and expressions of human creativity. Some of the world's most esteemed experts—Nobel laureates, best-selling authors, and renowned scholars—engage in spontaneous and intimate conversations that combine hard facts with an inspiring, and breathtaking, look into our future. Based on the public television program of the same name, Closer To Truth features distinguished specialists who forcefully debate provocative subjects that have broad ramifications for the population at large: Who gets to validate alternative medicine? How does basic science support national security? Can we believe in both religion and science? At the heart is the question: how will scientific advances and the philosophical issues they create affect the individual as well as humanity as a whole? Closer To Truth: Science, Meaning, and the Future explores the latest scientific research, philosophical thinking, and expressions of human creativity. Some of the world's most esteemed experts—Nobel laureates, best-selling authors, and renowned scholars—engage in spontaneous and intimate conversations that combine hard facts with an inspiring—and breathtaking—look into our future. Based on the public television program of the same name, Closer To Truth features distinguished specialists who forcefully debate provocative subjects that have broad ramifications for the population at large: Who gets to validate alternative medicine? How does basic science support national security? Can we believe in both religion and science? At the heart is the question: how will scientific advances and the philosophical issues they create affect the individual as well as humanity as a whole? Whether the subject is the meaning of human consciousness, the ethics of testing experimental drugs on sick people, scientific thinking versus religious beliefs, or how music may help mental development, Closer To Truth uncovers exciting new lines of inquiry and offers fresh perspectives. Participants include Nobel laureates Murray Gell-Mann and David Baltimore; authors Michael Crichton, Octavia Butler, and David Brin; astrophysicists Alan Guth and Neil deGrasse Tyson; planetary scientist Bruce Murray; physicist Steven Koonin; quantum theorist Seth Lloyd; molecular biologist Lucy Shapiro; neuroscientists Nancy Andreasen, Terry Sejnowski, and Christof Koch; psychiatrist Leslie Brothers; Psychology Today's Robert Epstein; musicologists Jeanne Bamberger and Robert Freeman; ethicist Alexander Capron; skeptic Michael Shermer; theologian Nancey Murphy; and Islamic scientist Muzaffar Iqbal.

An intimate and inspirational exploration of Stephen Hawking--the man, the friend, and the physicist. Stephen Hawking was one of the most famous and influential physicists in the world. He left a mark in our culture that touched the lives of millions. His books have inspired countless scientists-to-be, and his research on the laws of black holes and the origin of the universe charted new territory. Recalling his nearly two-decades as a friend and collaborator with Stephen Hawking, Leonard Mlodinow brings a complex man into focus like no one has before. He introduces us to Hawking the colleague, for whom no detail is too minor to get right, a challenge for a man who could only type one word per minute. We meet Hawking the friend, who creates such strong connections with those around him that he can communicate powerfully with just the raise of an eyebrow. We witness Hawking the genius, who, against all odds, flourishes after he is diagnosed with ALS and pours his mind into uncovering the mysteries of the universe. Brilliant, impish, and kind, Hawking endeared himself to almost everyone he came into contact with. This beautiful portrait is inpirational and is sure to stick with you long after you've read it.

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER A Best Book of 2021—Bloomberg Businessweek; A Best Science Book of 2021—The Guardian; A Best Science Book of 2021—Financial Times; A Best Philosophy Book of 2021—Five Books; A Best Book of 2021—The Economist Anil Seth's quest to understand the biological basis of conscious experience is one of the most exciting contributions to twenty-first-century science. What does it mean to “be you”—that is, to have a specific, conscious experience of the world around you and yourself within it? There may be no more elusive or fascinating question. Historically, humanity has considered the nature of consciousness to be a primarily spiritual or philosophical inquiry, but scientific research is now mapping out compelling biological theories and explanations for consciousness and selfhood. Now, internationally renowned neuroscience professor, researcher, and author Anil Seth is offers a window into our consciousness in BEING YOU: A New Science of Consciousness. Anil Seth is both a leading expert on the neuroscience of consciousness and one of most prominent spokespeople for this relatively new field of science. His radical argument is that we do not perceive the world as it objectively is, but rather that we are prediction machines, constantly inventing our world and correcting our mistakes by the microsecond, and that we can now observe the biological mechanisms in the brain that accomplish this process of consciousness. Seth has been interviewed for documentaries aired on the BBC, Netflix, and Amazon and podcasts by Sam Harris, Russell Brand, and Chris Anderson, and his 2017 TED Talk on the topic has been viewed over 11 million times, a testament to his uncanny ability to make unimaginably complex science accessible and entertaining.

This compelling study of the origins of all that exists, including explanations of the entire material world, traces the responses of philosophers and scientists to the most elemental and haunting question of all: why is anything here—or anything anywhere? Why is there something rather than nothing? Why not nothing? It includes the thoughts of dozens of luminaries from Plato and Aristotle to Aquinas and Leibniz to modern thinkers such as physicists Stephen Hawking and Steven Weinberg, philosophers Robert Nozick and Derek Parfit, philosophers of religion Alvin Plantinga and Richard Swinburne, and the Dalai Lama. The first accessible volume to cover a wide range of possible reasons for the existence of all reality, from over 50 renowned thinkers, including Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Descartes, Leibniz, Hume, Bertrand Russell, Stephen Hawking, Steven Weinberg, Robert Nozick, Derek Parfit, Alvin Plantinga, Richard Swinburne, John Polkinghorne, Paul Davies, and the Dalai Lama Features insights by scientists, philosophers, and theologians Includes informative and helpful editorial introductions to each section Provides a wealth of suggestions for further reading and research Presents material that is both comprehensive and comprehensible

In a universe filled by chaos and disorder, one physicist makes the radical argument that the growth of order drives the passage of time -- and shapes the destiny of the universe. Time is among the universe's greatest mysteries. Why, when most laws of physics allow for it to flow forward and backward, does it only go forward? Physicists have long appealed to the second law of thermodynamics, held to predict the increase of disorder in the universe, to explain this. In The Janus Point, physicist Julian Barbour argues that the second law has been misapplied and that the growth of order determines how we experience time. In his view, the big bang becomes the "Janus point," a moment of minimal order from which time could flow, and order increase, in two directions. The Janus Point has remarkable implications: while most physicists predict that the universe will become mired in disorder, Barbour sees the possibility that order -- the stuff of life -- can grow without bound. A major new work of physics, The Janus Point will transform our understanding of the nature of existence.

"The doctrine of the Atonement is the distinctive doctrine of Christianity. Over the course of many centuries of reflection, highly diverse interpretations of the doctrine have been proposed. In the context of this history of interpretation, Eleonore Stump considers the doctrine afresh with philosophical care. Whatever exactly the Atonement is, it is supposed to include a solution to the problems of the human condition, especially its guilt and shame. Stump canvasses the major interpretations of the doctrine that attempt to explain this solution and argues that all of them have serious shortcomings. In their place, she argues for an interpretation that is both novel and yet traditional and that has significant advantages over other interpretations, including Anselm's well-known account of the doctrine. In the process, she also discusses love, union, guilt, shame, forgiveness, retribution, punishment, shared attention, mind-reading, empathy, and various other issues in moral psychology and ethics."--

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The epic story of the greatest quest in all of science—the holy grail of physics that would explain the creation of the universe—from renowned theoretical physicist and author of The Future of the Mind and The Future of Humanity When Newton discovered the law of gravity, he unified the rules governing the heavens and the Earth. Since then, physicists have been placing new forces into ever-grander theories. But perhaps the ultimate challenge is achieving a monumental synthesis of the two remaining theories—relativity and the quantum theory. This would be the crowning achievement of science, a profound merging of all the forces of nature into one beautiful, magnificent equation to unlock the deepest mysteries in science: What happened before the Big Bang? What lies on the other side of a black hole? Are there other universes and dimensions? Is time travel possible? Why are we here? Kaku also explains the intense controversy swirling around this theory, with Nobel laureates taking opposite sides on this vital question. It is a captivating, gripping story; what’s at stake is nothing less than our conception of the universe. Written with Kaku’s trademark enthusiasm and clarity, this epic and engaging journey is the story of The God Equation.

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A Science News favorite science book of 2019 As you read these words, copies of you are being created. Sean Carroll, theoretical physicist and one of this world’s most celebrated writers on science, rewrites the history of 20th century physics. Already hailed as a masterpiece, Something Deeply Hidden shows for the first time that facing up to the essential puzzle of quantum mechanics utterly transforms how we think about space and time. His reconciling of quantum mechanics with Einstein’s theory of relativity changes, well, everything. Most physicists haven’t even recognized the uncomfortable truth: physics has been in crisis since 1927. Quantum mechanics has always had obvious gaps—which have come to be simply ignored. Science popularizers keep telling us how weird it is, how impossible it is to understand. Academics discourage students from working on the "dead end" of quantum foundations. Putting his professional reputation on the line with this audacious yet entirely reasonable book, Carroll says that the crisis can now come to an end. We just have to accept that there is more than one of us in the universe. There are many, many Sean Carrolls. Many of every one of us. Copies of you are generated thousands of times per second. The Many Worlds Theory of quantum behavior says that every time there is a quantum event, a world splits off with everything in it the same, except in that other world the quantum event didn't happen. Step-by-step in Carroll's uniquely lucid way, he tackles the major objections to this otherworldly revelation until his case is inescapably established. Rarely does a book so fully reorganize how we think about our place in the universe. We are on the threshold of a new understanding—of where we are in the cosmos, and what we are made of.