Science-Book Challenge 2008
From Scienticity
Reading about science is fun and rewarding. We encourage others to read about science, and help readers find books that they might enjoy, by publishing our Book Notes, which are written by Ars Hermeneutica employees, volunteers, and friends. We're looking for science-book readers who will help us help other science-book readers by sharing their own science-book reading experiences.
The 2008 Science-Book Challenge
- Read at least three nonfiction books in 2008 related to the theme "Living a Rational Life", broadly construed. Each book should have something to do with science, how science operates, or science's relationship with its surrounding culture. The books might be popularizations of science, they might be history, they might be biography, they might be anthologies; they can be recent titles or older books.
- After you've read a book, write a short note about it; 500 words would suffice. What goes in the note? The things you would tell a friend if you wanted to convince said friend to read it, too. Naturally, you can read some of the existing Book Notes for ideas.
- Don't worry if you find that you've read a book someone else has also read; we welcome multiple notes on one title.
- Get your book note to us and we'll post it with the other notes in our Book Note section. Use the book-note form or the comment form to get in touch with us.
- Tell two other people about the Science-Book Challenge: http://ArsHermeneutica.org/besieged/Science-Book_Challenge_2008.
Stuck for ideas about what books to read? Write to us and we'll see if we can't come up with some books that would match your interests.
If you'd like to sign up and make your participation in the Science-Book Challenge public, leave a comment at the Bearcastle Blog page where we originally announced the Challenge. Use your own blog to spread the word and use our Science-Book Challenge 2008 graphic to make it pretty.
The Science-Book Challengers
Everyone should feel free to accept the challenge any time during 2008. Decide on your book list at the beginning or be more spontaneous and choose titles as you go. If you like, let us know that you're taking the challenge and we'll put your name here with other challengers. You can use the handy comment form.
Here are the people we are aware of who have accepted the Science-Book Challenge 2008.
| Challenger | Link | Titles & Links to Book Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Melanie | The Indextrious Reader | spontaneous |
| Eva | A Striped Armchair | [some possibles:] Death by Black Hole, by Neil deGrasse Tyson The Discoverers, by Daniel Boorstin The Origin of the Species, by Charles Darwin The Canon, by Natalie Angier A Brief History of Time, by Stephen Hawking Web of Life, by Fritjof Capra |
| Wendy | A Novel Challenge | tbd |
| Bibliohistoria | Bibliohistoria | tbd |
| Gautami Tripathy | Reading and More Reading | tbd |
| Callista | SMS Book Reviews | Muses, Madmen and Prophets, by Daniel B. Smith A Clone Of Your Own, by Arlene Judith Klotzko Quirkology, by Richard Wiseman [extra credit:] 40 Days and 40 Nights, by Matthew Chapman |
| Melanie | Cynical Optimism | [spontaneous] Michael Pollan, The Botany of Desire : A Plant’s Eye View of the World |
| raidergirl3 | an adventure in reading | spontaneous |
| Maggie | Maggie Reads | [spontaneous] Bill Hayes, The Anatomist : A True Story of Gray’s Anatomy Natalie Angier, The Canon : A Whirligig Tour of the Beautiful Basics of Science |
| Sheralyn | libri ortus | doing 3 books in 3 subjects! first subject is "cosmology & theoretical physics": Stephen Hawking, "The Universe in a Nutshell" Bruce Bassett, "Introducing Relativity" JP McEvoy, "Introducing Quantum Theory" second subject will be "ecology & environment [books tba]" |
| RRT | n/a | [spontaneous] Jackson and Jamieson, unSpun : Finding Facts in a World of Disinformation Howard Bloom, Out There : The Government's Secret Quest for Extraterrestrials |
| SJB | n/a | spontaneous |
| JNS | Bearcastle Blog | [spontaneous] Chet Raymo, Walking Zero : Discovering Cosmic Space and Time Along the Prime Meridian Jared Diamond, The Third Chimpanzee : The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal Edward O. Wilson, The Creation: An Appeal to Save Life on Earth Andrew Robinson, The Story of Measurement John H. Lienhard, Inventing Modern : Growing up with X-Rays, Skyscrapers, and Tailfins Scott Huler : Defining the Wind |
