Entertainment Weekly Bemoans Lack of Great Science Books

Bryan writes "A recent headline at Entertainment Weekly suggests that the '100 Best Reads' of the last 25 years do not include a single science book (not even a popular science book). In response, cosmologist Sean Carroll at Cosmic Variance has given an interesting analysis of EW's disappointing list, and Soul Physics is calling for suggestions on the Greatest Physics Books of the Last 25 Years. For all the great literature that science has produced in the last 25 years, EW's list seems to represent a major shortcoming in the field: it still isn't diffusing into popular culture." I'm not sure what Entertainment Weekly's standing to complain would come from. That aside, have science books ever in modern times been a driving force greater than ones intended as (mere) entertainment, religious instruction, etc? I'd put anything by Richard Feynman on this list, though.

Comments

I don't know about books...

[xtracto]

But Carl Sagan documentaires were *a must* when I was a kid.

Oh, and Isaac Asimov's non-SF books are great too (the book about Physics and the one about Maths are great).

Re:I don't know about books...

[Anonymous Coward]

Stephen Hawking's "A Brief History of Time" was, I think, a bestseller and was very good too.

Re:I don't know about books...

[syousef]

If you enjoyed Cosmos, you really should read:
Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan "The Demon-Haunted World: Science As A Candle In The Dark" (1996)
Carl Sagan "Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space" (1994)

Biographies on famous scientists are always interesting too. There are plenty to choose from. I've read about the lives of Sagan, Feynman, Newton and Einstein. Very entertaining and a wonderful insight into their work as well as their characters (and their character flaws! Did you know the rumour is that Einstein would try to seduce women by letting his robe fall open....oops)

GÃdel, Escher, Bach

[NJVil]

GÃdel, Escher, Bach has enough science in it (particularly cognition and neurology) to qualify as a "science book" (whatever that's supposed to mean).

Definitely a must-read for anyone interested in metacognition.

A Short History of Nearly Everything

[cetialphav]

I loved A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. It is more of a history of science book. If you want to know something like how it is that we know the age of the earth and all the prior theories and how they were concocted then this is the kind of book for you. It is a very entertaining read as he often takes side tracks into the personalities behind the discoveries.

Re:re

[Hatta]

I'd add anything and everything from Feynman. Even his biographical writings are full of information.

Also, I'm surprised to be the first to point out "The Road to Reality" by Roger Penrose. There's nothing new in the book really, but he's the first to put real mathematics in a book targeted towards a general audience. If want a deeper understanding than you can get from A Brief History of Time, but you're not prepared to read a graduate physics text, The Road to Reality is for you.