![]() MORE AND DIFFERENT
Notes from a Thoughtful Curmudgeon
by P W Anderson (Princeton
University, USA)
452pp (approx.)
978-981-4350-13-6(pbk): US$38 / £25
US$26.60 /
£17.50
978-981-4350-12-9: US$78 / £51
US$54.60 / £35.70
"Philip W
Anderson is the doyen of
present-day condensed matter
physics, and has written widely
and provocatively on many subjects
both within and without the
discipline.This collection of his
essays is guaranteed to instruct,
amuse and in some cases annoy
readers irrespective of their
specialist backgrounds."
-- Anthony Leggett, Nobel Laureate
Philip Anderson
was educated at University High School
in Urbana, Illinois, at Harvard (BS
1943, PhD 1949), and further educated at
Bell Laboratories, where his career
(1949-1984) coincided with the greatest
period of that remarkable institution.
Starting in 1967, he shared his time
with Cambridge University (until 1975)
and then with Princeton, where he
continued full time as Joseph Henry
Professor until 1997. As an emeritus he
remains active in research, and at press
time he was involved in several
scientific controversies about high
profile subjects, in which his point of
view, though unpopular at the moment, is
likely to prevail eventually. His
colleagues have made him one of the two
physicists most often cited in the
scientific literature, for several
decades.
His work is
characterized by mathematical simplicity
combined with conceptual depth, and by
profound respect for experimental
findings. He has explored areas outside
his main discipline, the quantum theory
of condensed matter (for which he won
the 1977 Nobel Prize), on several
occasions: his paper on what is now
called the "Anderson-Higgs mechanism"
was a main source for Peter Higgs'
elucidation of the boson; a crucial
insight led to work on the dynamics of
neutron stars (pulsars); and his concept
of the spin glass led far afield, to
developments in practical computer
algorithms and neural nets, and
eventually to his involvement in the
early years of the Santa Fe Institute
and his co-leadership with Kenneth Arrow
of two influential workshops on
economics at that institution. His
writing career started with a
much-quoted article in Science titled
"More is Different" in 1971; he was an
occasional columnist for Physics Today
in the 1980s and 1990s. He was more
recently a reviewer of science- and
science-related books for the Times
(London) Higher Education Supplement
as well as an occasional contributor to
Science, Nature, and other journals.
Contents:
- Personal Reminiscences
- History
- Philosophy and Sociology
- Science Tactics and
Strategy
- Genius
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- Science Wars
- Politics and Sciences
- Futurology
- Complexity
- Popularization Attempts
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