Some of these books are easy reads, others less so. All of them perform the essential function of science: they explain a lot about why the world is the way it is.
How We Know What Isn’t So, Thomas Gilovich – a field guide to the intellectual traps we all are prey to. I’ve given it out to my employees as a Christmas gift. My supervisors were not so thrilled when I gave it to them.
The Eighth Day of Creation, Horace Judson – the origin story of molecular biology
The Red Queen, Matt Ridley – a convincing answer to the question of why sex exists
Guns, Germs and Steel, Jared Diamond – not science per se, but high-level history informed by science. And thus despised by historians.
Darwin’s Dangerous Idea, Daniel Dennett – why Darwinism is the most subversive idea ever
Godel, Escher, Bach, Douglas Hofstader – I’ve read this three times, and I think I am beginning to understand it.
Thinking Fast and Slow by Kahneman and Tversky carries on where Gilovich left off.
Consilience, E.O. Wilson – this is the book that Stephen Gould would have written if he were not such an insufferable pedant. Accordingly it is 150 pages and not 600.
The Vital Question, Nick Lane – the origin of life is one of science’s most vexing questions. Lane’s preferred scenario may not prove correct, but he starts from a compelling premise: that energy precedes information. This deceptively simple dictum explains much of biology and narrows the range of plausible origin scenarios.
Hi Drew, thanks for this list. And, a favorite of mine: “Who Goes First?” by Lawrence Altman. It’s a remarkable series of stories about the tradition of self experimentation in medicine, or what doctors have done to themselves to understand the cause of malaria (allow themselves to be bitten by malarial mosquitos thus contracting the disease), whether a given analgesic actually works (fill in the blank), and the accidental discovery of Anabuse.
I’ll check it out, thanks!