Pulse: The Coming Age of Systems and Machines Inspired by Living Things [Hardcover]

Robert Frenay (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 4, 2006

Pulse is not about dance music, not about heart rates—and not about electromagnetic fields. What it does describe is a sea change in human affairs, a vast and fundamental shift that is about to transform every aspect of our lives. Written in lively prose for lay readers, Pulse shows how ideas that have shaped Western science, industry, and culture for centuries are being displaced by the rapid and dramatic rise of a “new biology”—by human systems and machines that work like living things.

In Pulse, Robert Frenay details the coming world of
• emotional computers
• ships that swim like fish
• hard, soft, and wet artificial life
• money that mimics the energy flows in nature
• evolution at warp speed

And these are not blue-sky dreams. By using hundreds of vivid and concrete examples of cutting-edge work, Frenay showcases the brilliant innovations and often colorful personalities now giving birth to a radical new future. Along the way, he also offers thoughtful conclusions on the promises—and dangers—of our transformation to the next great phase of “human cultural evolution.”

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The computer HAL in the film 2001: A Space Odyssey is infamous for its dispassion, but former Audubon contributing editor Frenay tells readers that computers with emotions will arrive sooner than we may feel comfortable with. In this wide-ranging look at how biology and technology are being integrated in almost every area of human invention, Frenay writes of virtual communities and societies that are springing up online, some with economic systems that mimic those of the real world. Scientists have already created virtual life forms that have developed "sex" all by themselves and are exhibiting evolutionary traits. In the book's most original chapter, the author explains why some economists even advocate using biological metaphors to explain adaptive behaviors in our sophisticated interest rate–based economies. Occasionally the author throws his net rather wide, scooping up more topics than he can discuss adequately, and some of this material has been addressed better by other writers. Still, readers well versed in science who want to avoid future shock will encounter unusual matters on the frontiers of science that may be coming soon to a computer, merchant or medical facility near you. (Mar.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

In journalistic fashion, Frenay refracts what environmentally aware scientists, farmers, and economists are saying about technologies, markets, and the biosphere. Distilling their viewpoints, Frenay expounds on developments that take into account the environmental costs of industrialism and overpopulation. The array of material--artificial intelligence, organic farming, and more--tends to fragment the narrative. But the constant changes in topic will give readers interested in practical over ideological environmentalism a survey of what's happening greenwise across the board. Frenay sustains a metaphor that devices, companies, and economies will perform better if they behave like organisms and ecosystems in the biosphere, that is, as decentralized, open systems balancing flows of energy and matter. The "new biology" Frenay touts promises the technological mimicry of living things rather than machine-age mastery of them. His optimism, however, stands in contrast to his indignant pessimism about corporate business practices. A smorgasbord de luxe, Frenay's reportage is sustaining fare for environmentalists. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 576 pages
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux; First Edition edition (April 4, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374113270
• ISBN-13: 978-0374113278
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.4 x 1.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,643,783 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars a good tech reviewer with a zealot's politics, May 8, 2007

By 

Andrew Lyle Jones "andrew" (seosan, south korea) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Pulse: The Coming Age of Systems and Machines Inspired by Living Things (Hardcover)

Frenay is an excellent writer when it comes to his coverage of technology and his linking of the philosophy behind complexity to other fields, but he takes a polemic view of politics devoting nearly 300 pages to far leftist rhetoric that isn't popular even in Europe. This book would have been better marketed as a treatise on politics and also Frenay would have been better recommending the anti-wto, anti-corporate, media which he heavily qoutes from than trying to summarize and paraphrase it. The first 150 pages are nice and some of the better tech reporting I can think of, the rest is interspersed with good ideas, but depicted in skewed arguements with few accurate summaries of the opposition and often a looping repetitive prose that seems more like an attempt of the author to convince himself of the validity of his views than a proper arguement. Frenay quite rightly notes the WTO's rules are universal and including human and environmental rights would mean everyone would be on the same playing field and the world shouldering environmental and moral costs they'd probably be more than happy to pay also seems like a good idea along with many of Frenay's numerous political points, however he then goes on to espouse Europe as a norm to emulate and while Europe has high GDPs and Denmark is very environmental, it's important to remember many of the problems Frenay is rallying against affect European business and society too, while most American businesses obey UN human rights charters for instance, Ikea has refuysed all human rights inspections, etc. It's not a balanced arguement, but it catches many of the world's major problems quite easily.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Futurist speculation based on the metaphors of ecosystems and the human brain, July 6, 2007

By 

Rolf Dobelli "getAbstract" (Switzerland) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Pulse: The Coming Age of Systems and Machines Inspired by Living Things (Hardcover)

This sprawling and fascinating book explores biology, technology, agriculture, neurology and economics, among other disciplines. It contends that systems and ways of thinking based on the machine age must and will change in light of new discoveries in biology. Robert Frenay provides prodigious research and some impressive reporting. One caveat: His discussion of economics and the monetary system seems to be based on somewhat arguable information about the workings of the Federal Reserve and the Eurodollar market. The author's passion for the subject of biology is clear, and we find that much of what he says is interesting. The book is not so much a narrative as a catalogue of facts, experiments and initiatives in various fields, with an accompanying argument against today's corporations and monetary systems that will challenge executives and economists.

5.0 out of 5 stars Positioning for the future, September 8, 2008

By 

Richard J. Boyd "ricosan" (Chapel Hill, NC) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Pulse: The Coming Age of Systems and Machines Inspired by Living Things (Hardcover)

I recommend this book to anyone who is wondering what guidance we can follow to position humanity for the future. Nanotechnology and Moore's law are accelerating development cycles and each successive decision we make as a species becomes more important. Synchronising teechnolgy with the tried and true systems of nature results in more efficient systems (ant food search algorithms for networks, fibonacci spirals for design)and results in better harmony for our planet.

The one big revelation I had while reading this book was the understanding that our econmic system, based on banks loaning money at compounding interest rates, volates the laws of nature. The Second law of thermodnnamics, as Frenay points out, dictates that energy dissipates when it is transferred from one physical system to another. Bank and credit loans defy this law, resulting in the boom and bust cycles we see in our economies today. His recommendation that we revert to barter systems was incredibly thought provoking.