
The Demon in the Machine
How Hidden Webs of Information Are Solving the Mystery of Life
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Narrated by:
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Nigel Patterson
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By:
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Paul Davies
About this listen
What is life? For generations, scientists have struggled to make sense of this fundamental question, for life really does look like magic: even a humble bacterium accomplishes things so dazzling that no human engineer can match it. Huge advances in molecular biology over the past few decades have served only to deepen the mystery.
In this penetrating and wide-ranging book, world-renowned physicist and science communicator Paul Davies searches for answers in a field so new and fast-moving that it lacks a name; it is a domain where biology, computing, logic, chemistry, quantum physics, and nanotechnology intersect. At the heart of these diverse fields, Davies explains, is the concept of information: a quantity which has the power to unify biology with physics, transform technology and medicine, and force us to fundamentally reconsider what it means to be alive—even illuminating the age-old question of whether we are alone in the universe.
The Demon in the Machine journeys across an astounding landscape of cutting-edge science. Weaving together cancer and consciousness, two-headed worms and bird navigation, Davies reveals how biological organisms garner and process information to conjure order out of chaos, opening a window onto the secret of life itself.
©2019 Paul Davies (P)2023 TantorListeners also enjoyed...
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Story
Most people think genres are simply categories on Netflix or Amazon that provide a helpful guide to making entertainment choices. Most people are wrong. Genre stories aren’t just a small subset of the films, video games, TV shows, and books that people consume. They are the all-stars of the entertainment world, comprising the vast majority of popular stories worldwide. That’s why businesses—movie studios, production companies, video game studios, and publishing houses—buy and sell them. Legendary writing teacher John Truby provides a guide to understanding the major genres of the story world.
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Audible is not the best medium for this book
- By Ken on 02-13-25
By: John Truby
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When Death Becomes Life
- Notes from a Transplant Surgeon
- By: Joshua D. Mezrich
- Narrated by: Josh Bloomberg
- Length: 11 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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At the University of Wisconsin, Dr. Joshua Mezrich creates life from loss, transplanting organs from one body to another. In this intimate, profoundly moving work, he illuminates the extraordinary field of transplantation that enables this kind of miracle to happen every day.
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Memoir and history, beautifully written
- By Bonny on 01-22-19
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Doctor Faustus
- By: Thomas Mann
- Narrated by: David Rintoul
- Length: 26 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Thomas Mann's last great novel, first published in 1947 and now newly rendered into English by acclaimed translator John E. Woods, is a modern reworking of the Faust legend, in which Germany sells its soul to the Devil. Mann's protagonist, the composer Adrian Leverkühn, is the flower of German culture, a brilliant, isolated, overreaching figure, his radical new music a breakneck game played by art at the very edge of impossibility. In return for twenty-four years of unparalleled musical accomplishment, he bargains away his soul—and the ability to love his fellow man.
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Literary self flagellation
- By Lipton101 on 02-13-25
By: Thomas Mann
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Journey of the Mind
- How Thinking Emerged from Chaos
- By: Ogi Ogas, Sai Gaddam
- Narrated by: Cary Hite
- Length: 10 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Why do minds exist? How did mud and stone develop into beings that can experience longing, regret, love, and compassion - beings that are aware of their own experience? Until recently, science offered few answers to these existential questions. Journey of the Mind is the first book to offer a unified account of the mind that explains how consciousness, language, the Self, and civilization emerged incrementally out of chaos.
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Consciousness: objectively physical yet subjective
- By Jeffrey W. Rudisel on 04-16-22
By: Ogi Ogas, and others
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Cult of the Dead Cow
- How the Original Hacking Supergroup Might Just Save the World
- By: Joseph Menn
- Narrated by: Jonathan Davis
- Length: 8 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Cult of the Dead Cow is the tale of the oldest, most respected, and most famous American hacking group of all time. Though until now it has remained mostly anonymous, its members invented the concept of hacktivism. Today, the group and its followers are battling electoral misinformation, making personal data safer, and battling to keep technology a force for good instead of for surveillance and oppression. Cult of the Dead Cow shows how governments, corporations, and criminals came to hold immense power over individuals and how we can fight back against them.
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Liberal Bias Rife and Unchecked
- By Sam Kopp on 12-18-19
By: Joseph Menn
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Sink
- A Memoir
- By: Joseph Earl Thomas
- Narrated by: Joseph Earl Thomas
- Length: 6 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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"A brilliant and brilliantly different" (Kiese Laymon), wrenching and redemptive coming-of-age memoir about the difficulty of growing up in a hazardous home and the glory of finding salvation in geek culture.
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Great memoir
- By Jason on 02-26-23
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The Insect Epiphany
- How Our Six-Legged Allies Shape Human Culture
- By: Barrett Klein
- Narrated by: Sean Patrick Hopkins
- Length: 8 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Insects surround us. They fuel life on Earth through their roles as pollinators, predators, and prey, but rarely do we consider the outsize influence they have had on our culture and civilization. Their anatomy and habits inform how we live, work, create art, and innovate. From ancient etchings to avant-garde art, from bug-based meals to haute couture, The Insect Epiphany proves that our world would look very different without insects, not just because they are crucial to our ecosystems, but because they have shaped and inspired so many aspects of what makes us human.
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Bee-yond Brilliant !
- By Sophie S. on 11-07-24
By: Barrett Klein
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Edison's Ghosts
- The Untold Weirdness of History's Greatest Geniuses
- By: Katie Spalding
- Narrated by: Susie Riddell
- Length: 10 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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“As Albert Einstein almost certainly never said, everyone is a genius—but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” So begins Katie Spalding’s spunky takedown of the Western canon, and how genius may not be as irrefutably great as we commonly understand. While most of us may never become Einstein, it may surprise you to learn that there’s probably a bunch of stuff you can do that Einstein couldn’t. And, as Spalding shows, the famous prodigies she explores here were quite odd by any definition.
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Wonderful Wonderful Read.
- By marc edge on 06-01-23
By: Katie Spalding
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Agent of Influence
- How to Use Spy Skills to Persuade Anyone, Sell Anything, and Build a Successful Business
- By: Jason Hanson
- Narrated by: Jason Hanson
- Length: 7 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Discover how to use proven spy techniques to bolster your business strategies - from self-advocation to selling to interviewing - and ultimately make more money with this unique guide.
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Former CIA agent turns sales man
- By James M. on 11-11-19
By: Jason Hanson
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Introduction to Cognitive Science
- By: Thad A. Polk, The Great Courses
- Narrated by: Thad A. Polk
- Length: 12 hrs and 53 mins
- Original Recording
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For millennia, philosophers and scientists have been trying to unlock the secrets of the mind with only limited success—until now. Today, with modern technologies including the best in neuroscience, medical imaging, and recent advances in artificial intelligence, we are making more progress than ever before. In Introduction to Cognitive Science, Professor Thad A. Polk takes you on a fascinating tour of the latest discoveries in the relatively new field of cognitive science. In 24 exciting lectures, Professor Polk shares dozens of the most challenging questions in cognitive science today.
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AI is over rated
- By hilda shurbaji on 01-19-25
By: Thad A. Polk, and others
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Mavericks
- Life Stories and Lessons of History's Most Extraordinary Misfits
- By: Jenny Draper
- Narrated by: Jenny Draper
- Length: 8 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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In her first book, popular TikTok historian J Draper uses her characteristic wit and intellect to introduce us to extraordinary figures marginalized by history, and the lessons we can learn from them. Witty and engaging TikTok historian J.D. Draper digs out unusual stories of individuals that have shaped the world, and discovers the lessons their unique experiences can teach us. Breaking away from history as told through the lens of kings, queens and nobles, this book instead lifts the lid on 24 fascinating stories of little-known underdogs, mavericks, trailblazers and oddballs.
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excellent writing
- By Anonymous User on 05-04-25
By: Jenny Draper
Amongst the widest views of life I have found
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Good but leaves u with more questions than answers
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Thought provoking and rich with insight
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Rather deep for average reader but full of new research
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One of the most important reads of our time
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Informative and relevant
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To be sure, it's not a perfect book. There are a lot of tangential asides (indeed, the whole book seems like a series of tangents), and it's ultimate conclusion is unsatisfying. The author really can't say how information processing through DNA arose, so he concludes that "new laws of physics" (perhaps, that themselves evolve) are needed. That's not a great answer. Still, there are enough good ideas here that it is more than worth reading/listening to.
Thought Provoking
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