The Oxford Book Of Modern Science Writing

Boasting almost one hundred articles and book excerpts, The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing is a breathtaking celebration of the finest writing by scientists--the best such collection in print--packed with scintillating essays on everything from "The Discovery of Lucy" to "The Terror and Vastness of the Universe."

Edited by best-selling author and renowned scientist Richard Dawkins, this sterling collection brings together exhilarating pieces by a who's who of scientists and science writers, including Stephen Pinker, Stephen Jay Gould, Martin Gardner, Albert Einstein, Julian Huxley, and many dozens more. Readers will find excerpts from bestsellers such as Douglas R. Hofstadter's Godel, Escher, Bach, Francis Crick's Life Itself, Loren Eiseley's The Immense Journey, Daniel Dennett's Darwin's Dangerous Idea, and Rachel Carson's The Sea Around Us. There are classic essays ranging from J.B.S. Haldane's "On Being the Right Size" and Garrett Hardin's "The Tragedy of the Commons" to Alan Turing's "Computing Machinery and Intelligence" and Albert Einstein's famed New York Times article on "Relativity." And readers will also discover lesser-known but engaging pieces such as Lewis Thomas's "Seven Wonders of Science," J. Robert Oppenheimer on "War and Physicists," and Freeman Dyson's memoir of studying under Hans Bethe.

Features

• An anthology of diverse and inspiring pieces to browse and to treasure, confirming science writing as a literary genre of its own.
• Captures the poetry and excitement of scientific understanding and discovery from 1900 to the present day.
• Each essay or extract has been selected and is personally introduced by Richard Dawkins, producing a collection that is as wide-ranging and intellectually substantial as it is pleasureable to read.
• Includes extracts from the works of J.B.S. Haldane, Stephen Jay Gould, Albert Einstein, D'Arcy Thompson, Alan Turing, Richard Feynman, C.P. Snow, James Watson, Martin Rees, Steve Pinker, Jared Diamond, and Erwin Schrodinger among others

About The Author
Richard Dawkins is the first holder of the Charles Simonyi Chair of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford, and is a Fellow of New College, Oxford. His bestselling books include The Selfish Gene, The Blind Watchmaker, River Out of Eden, Climbing Mount Improbable, Unweaving the Rainbow, and The Ancestor's Tale. Dawkins is a Fellow of both the Royal Society and the Royal Society of Literature.