The Canon: A Whirligig Tour of the Beautiful Basics of Science

With the intelligence and exuberance that rocketed Woman to international acclaim, best-selling science writer Natalie Angier distills the scientific canon to the absolute essentials in a work that is both entertaining and inspiring. Angier interviewed hosts of scientists, posing the simple question "What do you wish everyone knew about science?" The Canon provides their answers, covering the fundamentals of the hard sciences: scientific process, probability, calibration, physics, chemistry, evolutionary biology, cellular and molecular biology, geology, and astronomy. Angier proves a rabble-rousing, wisecracking, deeply committed tour guide to the basic concepts of each discipline, describing how they are relevant to us every day and striving "to make the invisible visible, the distant neighborly, the ineffable affable." Even the most science-phobic reader will find Angier's passion infectious as she delivers a one-stop education to rival Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything.