In its simplest form, the scientific method can be thought of as learning from our mistakes and trying to correct them. True scientists try to think rationally, never adopt dogmatic opinions and are always willing to listen to opposing views. They never claim to know the absolute truth but are relentless in their search for it.In this timely book, the author describes the fundamentals of critical scientific thinking. The book further examines the correct use of the scientific metho...

Concepts in Cereal Chemistry stimulates critical thinking by emphasizing the important concepts related to the science. Written by distinguished researcher and teacher Dr. Finlay MacRitchie, this compact and reader-friendly book focuses mainly on cereal chemistry, but also incorporates relevant theory from the basic sciences, such as physics and genetics.A Targeted Approach, Rather than an Exhaustive ReviewThe book discusses milling and som...

The book exposes many of the misunderstandings about the scientific method and its application to critical thinking. It argues for a better understanding of the scientific method and for nurturing critical thinking in the community. This knowledge helps the reader to analyze issues more objectively, and warns about the dangers of bias and propaganda. The principles are illustrated by considering several issues that are currently being debated. These include anthropogenic global warming (of...

Describing the philosophy of the scientific method and the training and professional characteristics needed for a successful career, Scientific Research as a Career is a comprehensive "how-to" guide for the aspiring scientist. Based on the author's experience both as a scientist in a research organization and as a university mentor, the book covers

**"This is science writing as wonder and as inspiration." —The Wall Street JournalWall Street JournalFrom one of the most influential scientists of our time, a dazzling exploration of the hidden laws that govern the life cycle of everything from plants and animals to the cities we live in.**Visionary physicist Geoffrey West is a pioneer in the field of complexity science, the science of emergent systems and networks. The term “complexity” can be mi...

Science is still the great intellectual adventure, but now it is also seen as an instrument of profit, power, and privilege. Wrongly used, it might yet make the 21st century our last.To make sense of all this, we need to let go of old ideas and assumptions.In the No-Nonsense Guide to Science, Jerome Ravetz introduces the “post-normal” way of thinking about science. We are to transcend the old simplistic ideas of perfect certainty and objectivity in science–they have failed...

It is widely recognised that the foreign aid system - which today involves every country in the world - is in need of drastic change. But there are conflicting opinions as to what is needed. Some call for dramatic increases in resources, to meet long-overdue commitments, and to scale up what is already being done around the world. Others point to the flaws in aid, and bang the drum for cutting it altogether - and argue that the fate of poor and vulnerable people be best placed in the hands...

The growth of technological and scientific knowledge in the past two centuries has been the overriding dynamic element in the economic and social history of the world. Its result is now often called the knowledge economy. But what are the historical origins of this revolution and what have been its mechanisms? In The Gifts of Athena, Joel Mokyr constructs an original framework to analyze the concept of "useful" knowledge. He argues that the growth explosion in the modern West in t...

Does the general public need to understand science? And if so, is it scientists' responsibility to communicate? Critics have argued that, despite the huge strides made in technology, we live in a "scientifically illiterate" society--one that thinks about the world and makes important decisions without taking scientific knowledge into account. But is the solution to this "illiteracy" to deluge the layman with scientific information? Or does science news need to be focused around specific is...

As a distinguished scientist, pacifist, and feminist, Ursula Franklin has been regularly invited by diverse groups to share her insights into the social and political impacts of science and technology.This collection contains twenty-two of Franklin's speeches and five interviews from 1986 to 2012 that have been retrieved and restored from audio and visual recordings with the help of her collaborator, Jane Freeman. These speeches and interviews, available here in print for the first...

This book discusses the ways in which science, the touchstone of reliable knowledge in modern society, changed dramatically in the second half of the 20th century, becoming less trustworthy through conflicts of interest and excessive competitiveness. Fraud became common enough that organized efforts to combat it now include a federal Office of Research Integrity. Competent minority opinions are sometimes thereby suppressed, with the result that policy makers, the media and the public are p...

The author offers a new science Environics, which is a study of the future development of social systems and the world. This is for intellectual people all over the world and, most especially, to leaders of states, parties, economic, and production systemsthose who think seriously of future reasonable arrangement of the world order on Earth.