The Man Who Counted Infinity and Other Short Stories From Science, History and Philosophy by Dolenc, Saso -- Read -- Imperial Library of Trantor

Index

Title Page About the Book Table of Contents Introduction Numbers

A mathematical melodrama What is randomness? When our sense of probability deceives us The man who counted infinity The hermit of the Pyrenees Is marriage a mathematical operation? A mathematical intrigue at the Swedish court Worshippers of mathematical infinity The man who believed machines could think Chaos and the butterfly effect

Atoms

Searching for the beginning of time The priest who came up with the Big Bang How black holes are born The origins of continents and oceans In search of the perfect machine How to release the energy of atoms? What are quantum particles telling us? What can we know about the world of atoms?

Molecules

Cannibals, insomnia and mad cow disease EPO – The story about 2550 liters of powdered urine Cell police The Black Death pandemic When a new, unknown disease breaks out A deadly virus from the heart of Africa Malaria The child prodigy who became the father of cybernetics Statistics against poverty and disease The Pasteurization of heretical ideas

Life

What wiped out the dinosaurs? The afterlife of Henrietta Lacks A Russian Indiana Jones Creating a second paradise Alexander von Humboldt – adventurer and scientist Feral children The war of images Hobbits from the isle of Flores Lucy, more precious than diamonds Paracelsus – Martin Luther of medicine No more bananas? The bioethics of conception

Brain

How can I tell you're not a robot? The man with no memory She's blind, but she sees How babies learn languages Why people are exceptional readers Watching the birth of a new language Pseudo-patients in psychiatric hospitals Most submitted to authority Too much safety can be dangerous What does the peacock's tail say? Who really makes the decisions in our minds? Mirror neurons Brain plasticity The invention of permanent innovation Are rewards bad for innovation? Einstein and Freud: the meeting of two universes of knowledge Why dessert comes last

Acknowledgements A note on the author In praise of the book