The Swings of Science From Complexity to Simplicity and Back /
This book is a personal account of some aspects of the emergence of modern science, mostly from the viewpoint of those branches of physics which provided the much needed paradigm shift of "more is different" that heralded the advent of complexity science as an antidote to the purely reduct...
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| Author / Creator: | |
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| Other Corporate Authors / Creators: | SpringerLink (Online service) |
| Format: | Electronic eBook |
| Language: | English |
| Edition: | 1st ed. 2018. |
| Imprint: | Cham : Springer International Publishing : Imprint: Springer, 2018. |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | Available in Springer Physics and Astronomy eBooks 2018 English/International. |
| Summary: | This book is a personal account of some aspects of the emergence of modern science, mostly from the viewpoint of those branches of physics which provided the much needed paradigm shift of "more is different" that heralded the advent of complexity science as an antidote to the purely reductionist approach in fundamental physics. It is also about the humans that have helped to shape these developments, including personal reminiscences and the realization that the so-called exact sciences are inevitably also a social endeavour with all its facets. Served by the razor-sharp wit of the author, this erudite ramble is meant to be neither comprehensive nor systematic, but its generous insights will give the inquisitive academically trained mind a better understanding of what science, and physics in particular, could or should be about. This book is a personal account of some aspects of the emergence of modern science, mostly from the viewpoint of those branches of physics which provided the much needed paradigm shift of "more is different" that heralded the advent of complexity science as an antidote to the purely reductionist approach in fundamental physics. It is also about the humans that have helped to shape these developments, including personal reminiscences and the realization that the so-called exact sciences are inevitably also a social endeavour with all its facets. <p>Served by the razor-sharp wit of the author, this erudite ramble is meant to be neither comprehensive nor systematic, but its generous insights will give the inquisitive academically trained mind a better understanding of what science, and physics in particular, could or should be about.</p> |
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| ISBN: | 9783319997773 (online) |
| Author Notes: | He has published two monographs - Vortices in Nonlinear Fields: From liquid crystals to superfluids, From non-equilibrium patterns to cosmic strings (Oxford University Press, 1999), Patterns and Interfaces in Dissipative Dynamics (Springer, 2006) - and is member of the editorial board of The European Physical Journal Special Topics . |