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The Upright Thinkers: The Human Journey from Living in Trees to Understanding the Cosmos
Unavailable
The Upright Thinkers: The Human Journey from Living in Trees to Understanding the Cosmos
Unavailable
The Upright Thinkers: The Human Journey from Living in Trees to Understanding the Cosmos
Audiobook12 hours

The Upright Thinkers: The Human Journey from Living in Trees to Understanding the Cosmos

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

4/5

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About this audiobook

A few million years ago, our ancestors came down from the trees and began to stand upright, freeing our hands to create tools and our minds to grapple with the world around us.

Leonard Mlodinow takes us on a passionate and inspiring tour through the exciting history of human progress and the key events in the development of science. In the process, he presents a fascinating new look at the unique characteristics of our species and our society that helped propel us from stone tools to written language and through the birth of chemistry, biology, and modern physics to today's technological world.

Along the way he explores the cultural conditions that influenced scientific thought through the ages and the colorful personalities of some of the great philosophers, scientists, and thinkers: Galileo, who preferred painting and poetry to medicine and dropped out of university; Isaac Newton, who stuck needlelike bodkins into his eyes to better understand changes in light and color; and Antoine Lavoisier, who drank nothing but milk for two weeks to examine its effects on his body. Charles Darwin, Albert Einstein, Werner Heisenberg, and many lesser-known but equally brilliant minds also populate these pages, each of their stories showing how much of human achievement can be attributed to the stubborn pursuit of simple questions (why? how?), bravely asked.

The Upright Thinkers is a book for science lovers and for anyone interested in creative thinking and in our ongoing quest to understand our world. At once deeply informed, accessible, and infused with the author's trademark wit, this insightful work is a stunning tribute to humanity's intellectual curiosity.

LanguageEnglish
Release dateMay 5, 2015
ISBN9780553551129
Unavailable
The Upright Thinkers: The Human Journey from Living in Trees to Understanding the Cosmos

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Rating: 3.8879310224137935 out of 5 stars
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  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I've read (and heard) many bio/historical books (written and audio) on science and scientists, but Leonard Mlodinow's clear and thorough presentation of the 'standard' giants of science and of their contributions is among the very best. Thank you for making this audiobook available!
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    A heartfelt personal journey through the history of human curiosity and scientific achievement. Mlodinows humor offers self deprecating wit to an otherwise compelling historical narrative of the key figures our species scientific revolution. To be sure, this is a history of physical science from a physicist; nonetheless the scope of the story highlights our species remarkable ascent.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This overview of humanity's quest to understand the physical world is broad in scope, not overly detailed, and engaging. It's not defending any particular position or arguing any specific theory. It simply summarizes key events that have advanced our species' knowledge of nature. There's probably not much in here that people with a casual interest in science isn't already familiar with from similar books. This one is organized chronologically, showing how one discovery led to another, how theories were often resisted and then accepted, and how they changed how people viewed the world. It's an account of iterative progress, but an exceptionally well presented one. I can recommend it to readers with an interest in the history of human understanding.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    A well done thought provoking book by a physicist who can take complexity and make it appealing to us average folks in a narrative style. Mlodinow walks us through the earliest of our origin who gazed out in wonder at the star studded night sky to the leading theorists of the twentieth century on quantum mechanics we think rules the universe. And I emphasize, we think, as eventually even Einstein's work will in all likelihood be shown inadequate. That is the challenge and allure that awaits some of us who will be around to see and hear. These are the kinds of ideas this author looks at in the book while sentimentally managing to weave in the life and experiences his father.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The subtitle of this book, "The Human Journey from Living in trees to Understanding the Cosmos," perhaps sums up the book. This book deals with archeology, anthropology, Physics - classical and Quantum, - Chemistry and Biology. It does so in as easy and conversational a way as possible given the complexity of the subject matter. Even so, Mlodinov himself says, if it all sounds horribly complicated it is because it is! At the end of this journey, i was left with an appreciation of the human mind and the mechanics of scientific inquiry, more than anything else. If you are of a curious bent of mind or if you just want to understand how you arrived where you are, this is the book for you.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I found pieces of this book very engaging. However I felt the author lacked a central theme or over-riding reason for writing this book. At times it was hard science, sometimes anthropology, a bit of history and a smattering of human-interest anecdotes. Overall I was a bit disappointed.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is a slightly strange book to review. I'm still not exactly sure what the author is trying to achieve. I was reading the book at a local cafe when some friends stopped to say hi! They asked me what was I reading ..and what was it about. I hesitated for a moment thinking ...."how can i summarise this in a sentence". And then, Lather lamely, I fear, I simply said " It's kind-of a history of science". They seemed satisfied by that but I'm not. At the start Mlodinow (who has co-authored books with Stephen Hawking and Deepak Chopra and has a degree in theoretical physics) says something about humankind's insatiable curiosity...and in a way, this book is an exploration of that kind of curiosity. The will to know. He starts with an investigation of the roots of our culture and an investigation into Gobekli Tepe in Turkey , which dates back to 11,500 years ago and appears to have been some sort of religious site rather than a city. And it was constructed by people who were still hunter gatherers.Mlodinow makes the observation that what sets humankind apart (from other animals) is that we seem to be able to build upon the knowledge and inventions of the past. He has a chapter about the development of civilisation and the role of language and writing in holding the structure of cities and empires together. And a rational approach to nature started to emerge (around the Mediterranean)....that the universe was ordered not chaos. (Thales b.624BC, Pythagoras, 570-490BC). Both had travelled and Mlodinow makes the point, several times, that travel broadens the mind. Their work, leading on to Aristotle (D 322 BC) who was the first to write like a professional teacher rather than as an inspired prophet. Though his work tended to be qualitative rather than quantitative.Then came the Romans and then Christianity and the the fall of the Roman Empire and stultifying hand of Christianity on science for 1000 years or so. Fortunately, the Islamic world maintained an interest in science during this period and kept alive the books of Aristotle and others.....though Islamic science seemed to have fallen into the same trap as Christianity. New Ideas were frozen. Education became via the madrasas where religion was studied and the Koran learned by heart. (Though never subject to critical study on its origins, structure, content etc).Mlodinow mentions a group called the Merton scholars at Oxford who laid some of the mathematical foundations for Newton. Their work was taken up by Nicole Oresme (1320-1382) in France who developed a geometric style proof. He suggest that the scientific revolution was driven primarily by innovation with water mills, windmills etc. not in terms of scientific knowledge but in terms of the prosperity that permitted specialisation in theoretical science. Then cam printing and the moveable type. (In 1483 to set uo a book for printing the Ripoli press would charge 3x what it cost for scribe to copy it....but Ripoli could produce aq thousand copies whilst the scribe had produced one. Mlodinow runs through the familiar catalog of the renaissance: Leonardo da Vinci, Galilelo....disproving Aristotle),......he hardly mentions Kepler, Newton. We get quite a lot about Newton which is quite interesting. Apparently he was pretty much a solitary curmudgeon.He had a pretty lonely awful life as a kid and this seemed to translate into his adult life.He was at the bottom of the pecking order in his undergraduate days in Cambridge...but world 18 hrs a day x 7 days per week....and kept this up for decades.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Leonard Mlodinow's new book is a wonderful journey through the history of humanity. Of course, many books have made that journey, but this one focuses on the development of human intelligence/thought from the earliest stages when human beings were hardly distinguishable from their primate ancestors to the more recent human condition wherein human beings have generated tools which help expand human knowledge and understanding at an awesome rate that continues to accelerate.
    Mlodinow's primary focus is on the development of science and scientific thought and he deals with some pretty complex scientific concepts including quantum physics. But molding is a gifted writer who is able to make even the most complex of topics understandable. The book won't make readers into physicists, but it will make them understand the work such scientists do.
    What is most enjoyable about the book, however, is the general light tone in which it is written. personal stories, wise cracks, and other uses of personalized mnarative make the book a joy to read and one that the reader can relate to,
    My friend gave me this book and all I can say is that gifts like this make me value my friendship even more.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    In The Upright Thinkers, Leonard Mlodinow sets out to summarize the development of humanity’s perception of the world and the role of human beings in it. He takes us from the first anthropoids to stand upright, to early civilizations and the appearance of cities, to the development of philosophy by the ancient Greeks, through the scientific revolution led by Galileo and Newton, and finally to the modern physics of relativity and quantum mechanics. Along the way, he also covers the history of chemistry from medieval alchemists through the development of atomic theory and the periodic chart. Biology too gets its share with a long section on Darwin. All this in 352 pages interspersed with personal recollections and a fair amount of humor. Mlodinow is a lucid writer, and this is a fine introduction to the history of science for the non-scientist or casual reader. It is also a pleasant read for someone who knows a bit about the subject. It is interesting to contrast this book with Steven Weinberg's To Explain the World, a book that covers much of the same material in an entirely different way. Weinberg shows the details of formerly accepted but now discarded theories. For example, he shows how Ptolemy was able to “preserve the appearances” of phenomena in his earth centered model of the universe through the construction of epicycles and equants. By contrast, Mlodinow paints with a broader brush, omitting Weinberg’s mathematical rigor, although his discussion of Newton does describe the use of infinitesimals in the invention of calculus.Several themes permeate Mlodinow’s description of the practice of science. Most prominent is that science is hard work, and that brilliant ideas do not simply appear to prescient scientists. Newton struggled for years to articulate his theory of gravity and Darwin spent years writing about barnacles before his big idea of evolution through natural selection began to emerge. Even after a great idea finally is fully-formed and clearly expressed, it is not always readily accepted by the scientific community. Mlodinow echoes Thomas Kuhn’s idea that revolutionary theories are seldom generally accepted until the existing scientific cohort dies off.Mlodinow writes that the “most human” of our desires is the search for knowledge. And indeed, real progress has been made in mankind’s understanding of the universe. As Einstein said, "the most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is comprehensible." Evaluation: This is an enjoyable tour of science - not too technical, and with plenty of background for new initiates to the subject.A Few Notes on the Audio Production:I listened to the audio version of the book, read by the author. Although he does not have the polished diction of a professional actor, he is understandable and not annoying. Even though the book is about science, its lack of equations and diagrams obviates the visual aspect of comprehension. Note from JAF: I listened to this along with JAB, and it is totally accessible to a “lay” listener. (Sometimes, what counts as non-mathy and non-sciencey to someone who practices differential equations all day is not the same as someone who reads, say, healthy doses of young adult books. But in this case, I enjoyed the book as much as JAB.)(JAB)
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Leonard Mlodinow believes that upright thinkers are often odd, always tenacious, frequently iconoclastic, and definitely bold. His aim in this book is to follow the evolution of scientific thought from the cavemen to the present by characterizing several of these thinkers. His intent is to describe scientific thought in a way that any reasonably intelligent and inquisitive layperson might easily understand it. He uses his father as a stand-in for that person. This choice is admirable since it incorporates a homespun humorous element to a narrative that could otherwise be pretty dry. Mlodinow’s dad once gave up food when he was in the Nazi camps just to learn the solution to a scientific puzzle. It would not be too surprising to suggest that most of the scientists Mlodinow characterizes in his book would do likewise.The three sections of the book emphasize several important concepts. First, that the evolution of scientific thought has been accelerating, with progress starting slowly over thousands of years but rapidly moving to today where new findings seem to arise almost daily. Second, that progress does not come in flashes of brilliance but actually takes much effort and is often accompanied by blind alleys and false starts. Third, that the traditional scientific disciplines actually have considerable overlap and this will only increase in the future. Fourth, that mankind tends to accept concepts that are prevalent and is highly resistant to ideas that seem to contradict conventional thinking.The writing is engaging for lay readers, although probably old news for most scientists. Mlodinow avoids scientific jargon and the acronyms that seem so prevalent today. He injects humorous anecdotes into the stories he tells and definitely conveys a high level of excitement and wonder for the progress we have made in understanding the natural world.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    For the most part, very well written and enjoyable to read. I noticed that the humour tended to disappear once the time frame moved into the 20th century. Probably a bit too subjective to be humorous about....Still, for a very easy read, considering the subject, this was thoroughly enjoyable and well worth the time.