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What Should We Be Worried About?: Real Scenarios That Keep Scientists Up at Night by John Brockman
"What Should We Be Worried About?" is a thought-provoking book of scientific essays brought to you by The Edge. The Edge is an organization that presents original ideas by today's leading thinkers from a wide spectrum of scientific fields. The 2014 Edge question is, "What should we be worried about?" This interesting 531-page book provides 153 short essays that address the question. The quality of the essays in this book range from a couple of one star duds to a handful of outstanding 5-star essays.
For my sake, I created a spreadsheet of all the essays and graded them from zero to five stars based on overall quality. A quality essay to me is well written, interesting, addresses the topic, and either teaches me something new or uses the best of our current knowledge effectively. On the other hand, those receiving a one or even a zero represent essays that were not worthy of this book. Of course, this is just one reviewer's personal opinion.
Positives:
1. Generally well-written, succinct essays. High quality-value.
2. An excellent question, "What Should We Be Worried About?"
3. You don't have to read the essays in order.
4. Well-balanced book, covers the question from many scientific angles.
5. There were a number of outstanding essays. The following outstanding positives cover an outstanding essay starting with, "We are in denial about catastrophic risks" by Martin Rees. Does a wonderful job of covering a range of end world scenarios.
6. "A synthetic world" by Serian Sumner. He worries the natural world becoming naturally unnatural.
7. "Who's afraid of the big bad words?" by Benjamin Berger. "I learned something new based on research. The fact that no words is so terrible that merely hearing them would pose any danger to young ears."
8. "The rise of anti-intellectualism and the end of progress" by Tim O'Reilly. This essay really resonated with me. "What I fear most is that we will lack the will and foresight to face the world's problems squarely and will instead retreat from them into superstition and ignorance."
9. "Objects of Desire" by Sherry Turkle. This is an essay that will resonate with parents.
10. "The is-ought fallacy of science and morality" by Michael Shermer. One of my favorite essays. "Scientists should have a voice in determining human values and morals."
11. "That we won't make use of the error catastrophe threshold" by William McEwan. Excellent essay. "Viruses replicate near the boundary of fidelity required to successfully pass information to the next generation. I worry that we will not devise a way to push them over that boundary."
12. "Misplaced worries" by Dan Sperber. "What I am particularly worried about is that humans will be less and less able to appreciate what they should be worrying about and that their worries will do them more harm than good."
13. "Unfriendly physics, monsters from the ID, and self-organizing collective delusions" by John Tooby. "Cooperative scientific problem solving is the most beautifully effective system for the production of reliable knowledge the world has ever seen."
14. "Data disenfranchisement" by David Rowan. "We need to start seeing data literacy as a requisite fundamental skill in a 21st-century democracy, and to campaign--and perhaps even legislate--to protect the interests of those being left behind."
15. "Big experiments won't happen" by Lisa Randall. "I worry that people will gradually stop the major long-term investments in research that are essential if we are to answer difficult (and often abstract) scientific questions."
16. "Quantum Mechanics" by Lee Smolin. "I don't believe quantum mechanics gives a complete description of nature. I strongly believe there is another, truer description waiting to be discovered."
17. "What--me worry?" by J. Craig Venter. "I firmly believe that only science can provide solutions for these challenges, but the adoption of these ideas will depend on the will of governments and individuals."
18. "Natural death" by Antony Garrett Lisi. One of my favorite essays. "Knowing that our lives are so short makes each moment and each interaction more precious. The happiness and love we find and make in life are all we get. The fact that there is no supernatural being in the universe that cares about us makes it that much more important that we care about one another."
19. "Classic social sciences' failure to understand modern states shaped by crime" by Eduardo Salcedo-Albar. Timely essay that captures in essence what is going on in the Ukraine and Venezuela.
20. "Science has not brought us closer to understanding cancer" by Xeni Jardin. "The research and science that will cure cancer will not necessarily be done by big-name cancer hospitals or by Big Pharma. It requires a new way of thinking about illness, health, and science itself."
21. "Exaggerated expectations" by Stuart Firestein. "Facts are not immutable, and discoveries are provisional. This is the messy process of science. We should worry that our unrealistic expectations will destroy this amazing mess."
22. "Where did you get that fact?" by Victoria Stodden. "Without the ability to question findings, we risk fooling ourselves into thinking we are capitalizing on the Information Age when we're really just making decisions based on evidence that no one, except perhaps the people who generated it, can actually understand. That's the door closing."
23. "C.P. Snow's two cultures and the nature-nurture debate" by Simon Baron-Cohen. "What worries me is that the debate about gender differences still seems to polarize nature vs. nurture, with some in the social sciences and humanities arguing that biology plays no role at all, apparently unaware of the scientific evidence to the contrary."
24. "Unknown unknowns" by Gary Marcus. "Oxford philosopher Nick Bostrom has pointed out that the three greatest unknowns we should worry about are biotechnology, nanotechnology, and the rise of machines more intelligent than human beings."
25. "What we learn from firefighter: how fat are the fat tails?" by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. "Only a rule of skin in the game--that is, direct harm from one's errors--can puncture the game aspect of such research and establish some form of contact with reality."
Negatives:
1. There are just a few essays that were not worthy of this book, but just a few.
2. I was surprised not to see more apocalyptic type scenarios including wars or natural disasters.
3. Some essays are not really of major concern.
4. Requires an investment of time to get through.
In summary, I'm a big fan of The Edge and these types of books. They're fun to read and provide many different perspectives on a given question. Philosophy is asking the right questions and good science is providing the answers based on the best of our current knowledge. You should be worried about not reading these types of books. I highly recommend it!
Further recommendations: "This Explains Everything: Deep, Beautiful, and Elegant Theories of How the World Works", "This Will Make You Smarter: New Scientific Concepts to Improve Your Thinking" and "This Will Change Everything: Ideas That Will Shape the Future" by the same author, John Brockman, "Spectrums" by David Blatner, "The Elegant Universe" and "Hidden Reality" by Brian Greene, "A Universe From Nothing" by Lawrence M. Krauss, "About Time" by Adam Frank, "Higgs Discovery" and "Warped Passages" by Lisa Randall, "The Grand Design" by Stephen Hawking, "The Quantum Universe" by Brian Cox, "The Blind Spot" by William Byers, and "The Fallacy of Fine-Tuning" and "God and the Atom" by Victor Stenger.
- Series: Edge Question Series
- Paperback: 528 pages
- Publisher: Harper Perennial (February 11, 2014)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 9780062296238
- ISBN-13: 978-0062296238
- ASIN: 006229623X
- Product Dimensions: 5.3 x 0.8 x 8 inches
- Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
- Customer Reviews: 53 customer reviews
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Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
#485,381 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #422 in Cognitive Psychology (Books)
- #240 in Science Essays & Commentary (Books)
- #1422 in Medical Cognitive Psychology
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