Mathematics Of Life: Unlocking The Secrets Of Existence

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Format:: Paperback
Pages:: 288
Publisher:: Profile Books Ltd
Publication Date:: 05 July 2012
Category:: Popular Science
ISBN:: 9781846682056

Description

In this title mathematicians and biologists confront nature's enigmas. A new partnership of biologists and mathematicians is picking apart the hidden complexity of animals and plants to throw fresh light on the behaviour of entire organisms, how they interact and how changes in biological diversity affect the planet's ecological balance. Mathematics offers new and sometimes startling perspectives on evolution and how patterns of inheritance and population work out over time-scales ranging from millions to hundreds of years - as well as what's going on to change us right now. Ian Stewart, in characteristically clear and entertaining fashion, explores these and whole range of pertinent issues, including how far genes control behaviour and the nature of life itself. He shows how far mathematicians and biologists are succeeding in tackling some of the most difficult scientific problems the human race has ever confronted and where their research is currently taking us.

Reader Reviews

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Biologists have long dismissed mathematics as being unable to meaningfully contribute to our understanding of living beings. Within the past ten years, however, mathematicians have proven that they hold the key to unlocking the mysteries of our world--and ourselves.In The Mathematics of Life, Ian Stewart provides a fascinating overview of the vital but little-recognized role mathematics has played in pulling back the curtain on the hidden complexities of the natural world--and how its contribution will be even more vital in the years ahead. In his characteristically clear and entertaining fashion, Stewart explains how mathematicians and biologists have come to work together on some of the most difficult scientific problems that the human race has ever tackled, including the nature and origin of life itself.

out of 5

SalemAthenaeum
Mathman Stewart offers a biology book, working in diverse mathematical concepts wherever he can. But biology still seems to me to be a quite non-mathematical science, and the preface's contention that "biology will be the great mathematical frontier of the twenty-first century" seemed as dubious after reading the book as it was before. I most liked the late chapters on artificial life and possible ET life.

out of 5

fpagan