Paradigms Regained: A Further Exploration of the Mysteries of Modern Science - Softcover

Casti, John L.

3.27

55 ratings by Goodreads

9780380731718: Paradigms Regained: A Further Exploration of the Mysteries of Modern Science

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0380731711 ISBN 13: 9780380731718

Publisher: Harper Perennial, 2001

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The author of Paradigms Lost explores the complexities of modern scientific thought by examining the mysteries of modern science, ranging from the origins of life to the roots of human language. Reprint.

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Review:

In Paradigms Regained, John Casti reexamines the six big questions he looked at in his 1989 book, Paradigms Lost: Did life begin naturally and on Earth? Is human behavior genetically determined? Is there a language organ in the human brain? Can computers think? Can we talk to ET? Is there a Real World?

In Paradigms Lost, he presents the evidence for yes and no answers to each question as though in a trial by jury, with witnesses arguing for the prosecution and defense, then a summary of the evidence and a verdict. Paradigms Regained takes the same questions to an appeals court, summarizes the evidence from the "trial" and introduces new evidence from the intervening decade.

Casti's goal is to show how science works, how "the single most characteristic feature of science is that its conclusions are tentative." So in three cases he now reaches a ruling of "appeal upheld," overturning his previous verdicts. In fact, the only one truly overturned is his conclusion of "not proven" to the question about the genetic determination of human behavior: he thinks the evidence for "yes" has become much stronger. In the cases of the origin of life and the existence of a Real World, he has kept the same one-word answers but now favors different mechanisms.

Together, the two books are good illustrations of how science looks at the questions that most interest nonscientists and of how scientific knowledge builds and changes. They make excellent maps to the borders between science and philosophy, science and religion, and science and pseudoscience. --Mary Ellen Curtin

About the Author:

John L. Casti received his Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Southern California in 1970. In 1974, after holding positions at the RAND Corporation and the University of Arizona, he became one of the first research staff members at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) in Vienna, where he stayed until 1986. Since 1992, he has been a professor and resident researcher at the Santa Fe Institute. He is also a professor at the Technical University of Vienna. The author of numerous books, he divides his time between Santa Fe, New Mexico, and Vienna.

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