Catalog All books
Georges Charpak, Roland Omnès
Becoming a Magician is Becoming Prophet
In a simple, accessible style the authors address questions that we all ask ourselves about science: Why hasn't science made human beings wiser? Hasn't it even had the opposite effect, rendering humans' criminal tendencies even more devastating? To answer these questions, the authors develop the idea that the advent and triumph of modern science have induced a profound change in humanity because science has given human beings the capacity to understand and master phenomena occurring on the microscopic level - a scale that is alien to them. Some of the fundamental elements of contemporary physics are presented here in game form. The authors argue that physics has left free human beings face to face with an equally free interplay of natural forces and that, without causality and finality, the world has become deprived of meaning. It is therefore hardly surprising that many have taken refuge in religion. But the authors propose an alternative to religion, arguing that we can fulfil our modernity by helping our children develop their love of experimentation so that they can discover the meaning of things for themselves - instead of embracing ideologies that can only be imposed through terror. Georges Charpak is a physicist and Nobel Prize Laureate in Physics. Roland Omnès is a physicist and Emeritus Professor at the University of Paris XI-Orsay.
Yves-Alain Fontaine
Eels and Man
In this book, the author, an expert in his field, describes the most fascinating stages in the eels biological cycle, its migrations and the modifications it undergoes during its life. Eels interest us not only because of their life and breeding cycles, but also because of the questions they raise concerning our ideas about evolution. Does the notion of adaptation suffice to explain everything the eel has become? Doesnt a living creature maintain a certain amount of independence in relation to the world that surrounds it? Or is the relationship between a living creature and the environment which surrounds it more complex that we have generally realised ?
Alain Sauteraud
Living On After Your Death The Psychology of Grieving
Down-to-earth advice to help mourners understand the grieving process and then adapt to their new lives
Claude Berrou, Vincent Gripon
Some Brain Mathematics A Theory of Mental Information
How the human brain processes information — an explanation between neuroscience and information technology.
François Godement
Whither China?
A fascinating inquiry into the core of Chinese political life, by an eminent expert on China.
Malvine Zalcberg
Women in Love — What Love Does to Them
Why does love seem to play a more significant role in a woman’s life than in a man’s?
Pierre Bey, Jean-Pierre Gérard, Martin Schlumberger
Should We Fear Radioactivity?
A clear, precise and uncompromising account of radioactivity, its dangers and advantages
Edouard Pélissier
Why Croissants and Cholesterol Are Both Killers
A new concept — systemic inflammation — offers a global approach to fight against many diseases
André Holley
In Praise of our Sense of Smell
Disparaged by the great philosophers and even by Darwin, who considered it useless, yet praised by Proust and Baudelaire for the richness of the emotions it inspires, the human sense of smell is generally considered secondary to the other senses. But is it really? André Holley makes a scientific argument for this powerful yet ambiguous sense. He also examines the tendency on the part of our society to deodorise to refuse accept that smells are sometimes bad, on the other hand inventing entirely new smells with the help of chemistry. Researcher at the CNRS, André Holley is a professor of neuroscience at the university Claude-Bernard in Lyon.
Daniel Pinto
The Clash of Capitalisms How we were deprived of our entrepreneurial genius and what we can do to reinvent it
Does capitalism still have a future? This book shows that it does, but only if it retrieves the formula that led to its success: the spirit of enterprise coupled with state support.