Science Friction
Where the Known Meets the Unknown
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Narrated by:
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Michael Brant Shermer
About this listen
In each of the essays in Science Friction, Shermer explores the very personal barriers and biases that plague and propel science, especially when scientists push against the unknown. What do we know, and what do we not know? How does science respond to controversy, attack, and uncertainty? When does theory become accepted fact?
©2009 Michael Shermer (P)2009 Michael ShermerListeners also enjoyed...
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"If your perceptions have ever rubbed you the wrong way, you'll find Science Friction fascinating." (Bill Nye, The Science Guy)
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Nobel Laureate Eugene Wigner once wondered about "the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics" in the formulation of the laws of nature. Is God a Mathematician? investigates why mathematics is as powerful as it is. From ancient times to the present, scientists and philosophers have marveled at how such a seemingly abstract discipline could so perfectly explain the natural world. More than that - mathematics has often made predictions, for example, about subatomic particles or cosmic phenomena that were unknown at the time, but later were proven to be true.
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Origins of Mathematics
- By Rick B on 07-08-21
By: Mario Livio
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Know This
- Today's Most Interesting and Important Scientific Ideas, Discoveries, and Developments
- By: John Brockman
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman, Dan John Miller
- Length: 14 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Scientific developments radically alter our understanding of the world. Whether it's technology, climate change, health research, or the latest revelations of neuroscience, physics, or psychology, science has, as Edge editor John Brockman says, "become a big story, if not the big story". In that spirit this new addition to Edge.org's fascinating series asks a powerful and provocative question: What do you consider the most interesting and important recent scientific news?
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Pete and Repeat and Re-repeat
- By Daniel L on 02-25-18
By: John Brockman
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The Equation That Couldn't Be Solved
- How Mathematical Genius Discovered the Language of Symmetry
- By: Mario Livio
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 11 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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For thousands of years mathematicians solved progressively more difficult algebraic equations, until they encountered the quintic equation, which resisted solution for three centuries. Working independently, two prodigies ultimately proved that the quintic cannot be solved by a simple formula. The first popular account of the mathematics of symmetry and order, The Equation That Couldn't Be Solved is told not through abstract formulas but in a beautifully written and dramatic account of the lives and work of some of the greatest and most intriguing mathematicians in history.
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Historical Perspective Appreciated
- By Michael Hanrahan on 01-22-20
By: Mario Livio
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Entangled Minds
- Extrasensory Experiences in a Quantum Reality
- By: Dean Radin PhD
- Narrated by: Al Kessel
- Length: 9 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Is everything connected? Can we sense what's happening to loved ones thousands of miles away? Why are we sometimes certain of a caller's identity the instant the phone rings? Do intuitive hunches contain information about future events? Is it possible to perceive without the use of the ordinary senses? Many people believe that such "psychic phenomena" are rare talents or divine gifts. Others don't believe they exist at all. But the latest scientific research shows that these phenomena are both real and widespread.
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Boring as all get out but…
- By rebekah higgins on 01-12-20
By: Dean Radin PhD
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The Book of Why
- The New Science of Cause and Effect
- By: Judea Pearl, Dana Mackenzie
- Narrated by: Mel Foster
- Length: 15 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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"Correlation does not imply causation". This mantra has been invoked by scientists for decades and has led to a virtual prohibition on causal talk. But today, that taboo is dead. The causal revolution, sparked by Judea Pearl and his colleagues, has cut through a century of confusion and placed causality - the study of cause and effect - on a firm scientific basis.
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Great book! Not a great audiobook.
- By rrwright on 05-30-18
By: Judea Pearl, and others
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The Devil's Delusion
- Atheism and its Scientific Pretensions
- By: David Berlinski
- Narrated by: Dennis Holland
- Length: 6 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Militant atheism is on the rise. In recent years, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett, and Christopher Hitchens have produced a steady stream of best-selling books denigrating religious belief. These authors are merely the leading edge of a larger movement that includes much of the scientific community. In response, mathematician David Berlinski, himself a secular Jew, delivers a biting defense of religious thought.
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Riddled With Problems
- By Ben on 11-01-13
By: David Berlinski
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The Science of Good and Evil
- Why People Cheat, Gossip, Care, Share, and Follow the Golden Rule
- By: Michael Shermer
- Length: 2 hrs and 21 mins
- Abridged
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In The Science of Good and Evil, psychologist and science historian Michael Shermer explores how humans evolved from social primates into moral primates, how and why morality motivates the human animal, and how the foundation of moral principles can be built upon empirical evidence. Along the way he explains the implications of scientific findings for fate and free will, the existence of pure good and pure evil, and the development of early moral sentiments among the first humans.
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Read by author
- By Gregory A. Townsend on 04-16-23
By: Michael Shermer
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Undeniable
- How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Is Designed
- By: Douglas Axe
- Narrated by: Neil Hellegers
- Length: 7 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Throughout his distinguished and unconventional career, engineer-turned-molecular-biologist Douglas Axe has been asking the questions that much of the scientific community would rather silence. Now, he presents his conclusions in this brave and pioneering book. Axe argues that the key to understanding our origin is the "design intuition" - the innate belief held by all humans that tasks we would need knowledge to accomplish can be accomplished only by someone who has that knowledge.
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Seductively Challenge what are consider facts
- By Rafael Vila on 10-08-16
By: Douglas Axe
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The Spiritual Brain
- A Neuroscientist's Case for the Existence of the Soul
- By: Mario Beauregard, Denyse O'Leary
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 12 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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Does religious experience come from God, or is it just the random firing of neurons in the brain? Drawing on brain research on Carmelite nuns that has attracted major media attention and provocative new research in near-death experiences, The Spiritual Brain proves that genuine, life-changing spiritual events can be documented. The authors make a convincing case for what many in science are loathe to consider: that it is God who creates our spiritual experiences, not the brain.
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interesting topic, but frustrating listen
- By Barry T on 08-27-08
By: Mario Beauregard, and others
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The Varieties of Scientific Experience
- A Personal View of the Search for God
- By: Carl Sagan, Ann Druyan - editor
- Narrated by: Adrienne C. Moore, Ann Druyan
- Length: 7 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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The late great astronomer and astrophysicist describes his personal search to understand the nature of the sacred in the vastness of the cosmos. Exhibiting a breadth of intellect nothing short of astounding, Sagan presents his views on a wide range of topics, including the likelihood of intelligent life on other planets, creationism and so-called intelligent design.
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Sagan's lectures about the possibility of God
- By David T. on 11-13-17
By: Carl Sagan, and others