Wednesday, February 25, 2004

The Privileged Planet...

"For centuries scientists and philosophers have marveled at an eerie coincidence. Mathematics, a creation of human reason, can predict the nature of the universe, a fact physicist Eugene Wigner referred to as the "unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the physical sciences." In the last three decades astronomers and cosmologists have noticed another, seemingly unrelated, mystery. Contrary to all expectations, the laws of physics seem precisely "fine-tuned" for the existence of complex life. Could these two wonders actually be isolated pieces of a wider pattern? Both are prerequisites for science, yet what about the process of scientific discovery itself? What are its necessary conditions? Why is it even possible? For some reason our Earthly location is extraordinarily well suited to allow us to peer into the heavens and discover its secrets."
The Privileged Planet, co-authored by Dr. Guillermo Gonzalez and Dr. Jay Richards should be released in early March. It will definitely be on my reading list for this year.

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