A thought-provoking dispatch from the frontier of physics.
Medical scientist Lanza, with physicist Pavšič and science writer Berman, expands the argument for biocentrism in this new exploration of the subject.
The current scientific consensus is that life is a product of the universe—but these authors argue that it’s actually the other way around. Many of the unknowns in our current understanding of physics, assert the authors, begin to make sense if one allows that nature and its observer have effects on each other—in other words, that the living, conscious mind is necessary for laws of the universe to exist and function at all. This third book on biocentrism from Lanza and his co-authors seeks to move the topic out of the realm of speculation and prove that its ideas are based on hard science: “Did biocentrism more properly fall under the rubric of philosophy than of science? We certainly didn’t think so. Yet we acknowledged that it would be nice to be able to seal the case for biocentrism on the physics alone.” The authors outline the history and principles of the concept of biocentrism, including recent discoveries that have helped the theory gain greater traction. Augmented with this new research, they make the best case they can for their view on how the universe operates—attempting to establish, once and for all, the necessity of the observer. The book’s prose is aimed at the general reader, and the authors craft their arguments—even the most complex ones—in smooth, accessible language. For example, here, they discuss the reception of Einstein’s theory of relativity: “This connectedness between spatial dimensions and the temporal component threw most people for a loop. That’s because in daily life, time seems utterly distinct from the three spatial realms.” The arguments build in complexity as the work goes on but do so in a way that’s quite thrilling. Not all readers will be persuaded by the authors’ case, but its notions are exciting ones, and they do a sound job of linking them to observable, replicable experiments. Fans of revolutionary science—or just big, cerebral questions—will enjoy this ambitious work.
A thought-provoking dispatch from the frontier of physics.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-950665-40-2
Page Count: 280
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Oct. 19, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
A pleasingly unformulaic book of hard-won advice that never rings false.
The comic and television personality turns serious—semi-serious, anyway—in a combination memoir and self-help book.
Handler opens these generally short essays with a memory of childhood that closes with the exhortation to keep the child within us alive into adulthood: “Hold on to that child tightly, as if she were your own, because she is.” The memory soon veers into the comically absurd, with an account of a cocaine-fueled cross-country trip with a random companion who looked like another TV personality: “I don’t know if Dog the Bounty Hunter does copious amounts of cocaine, but he sure looks like he does.” Drugs and juice are seldom far from the proceedings, but therapy is close by, too, and clearly the latter has been of tremendous use, if “exhausting in the sense that every new development or idea led to a period of intense self-awareness followed by waves of acute self-consciousness coupled with endless self-recrimination.” As the anecdotes progress, that intense self-awareness becomes less fraught. Some of her life lessons are drawn from her experiences wrestling with the yips and setbacks of performing before audiences; some turn into knowing one-liners (“I knew if three men in a row told me not to do something, it was imperative that I do the opposite”). Most, even if tongue-in-cheek or rueful, are delivered with a disarming friendliness laced with her trademark archness: Her account of a dinner opposite Woody Allen and daughter/wife Soon-Yi is worth the price of admission alone. In the main, Handler is a cheerleader for everyone worthy of cheers, and especially women. As she writes, encouragingly, “You have misbehaved, and then corrected, and then misbehaved again, and then corrected some more”—and have grown and flourished.
A pleasingly unformulaic book of hard-won advice that never rings false.Pub Date: Feb. 25, 2025
ISBN: 9780593596579
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Dial Press
Review Posted Online: March 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2025
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