There are many interpretations of the word 'classic' - in the context of science fiction many would assume this referred to the 'golden age' of the 40s and 50s, but Adam Roberts (who knows his stuff) has plumped for what might otherwise be regarded as proto-SF - science fiction-like stories that predate the concept. The earliest here is Micromégas by Voltaire from 1752 and the latest Stanley Weinbaum's 1934 A Martian Odyssey . Before we go any further, I ought to mention the physical book itself - when it arrived I felt a bit like someone who buys dolls' house furniture thinking it's the real thing. It looks like a big grown up book in its picture, but in reality it's tiny, less than 16cm in height. Admittedly not doll friendly, but uncomfortably small to hold (though it does fit in most pockets). I really want to give it both three stars and five stars, so the final outcome is something in between. As someone with an interest in the history of science ...

When I first saw The Bright Side (the subtitle doesn't help), I was worried it was a self-help manual, a format that rarely contains good science. In reality, Sumit Paul-Choudhury does not give us a checklist for becoming an optimist or anything similar - and there is a fair amount of science content. But to be honest, I didn't get on very well with this book. What Paul-Choudhury sets out to do is to both identify what optimism is and to assess its place in a world where we are beset with big problems such as climate change (which he goes into in some detail) that some activists position as an existential threat. This is all done in a friendly, approachable fashion. In that sense it's a classic pop-psychology title. For me, Paul-Choudhury certainly has it right about the lack of logic of extreme doom-mongers, such as Extinction Rebellion and teenage climate protestors, and his assessment of the nature of optimism seems very reasonable, if presented at a fairly overview leve...

TV nature programmes leave me cold, but I was quite interested in Walking with Dinosaurs , which arguably picked up on the impact of Jurassic Park to give us a vivid visual exploration of dino life. The main problem with it was that the makers made assertions as if fact that could not have been more than hypothesis about the details of dinosaur appearance and behaviour, so the subtitle of this book 'What they did and how we know ' (my italics) really caught my attention. To be honest, my first thoughts were not wholly positive when in the first page of chapter 1 I read 'Throughout this book I will refer to dinosaurs and Dinosauria as a paraphyletic group' - although David Hone goes on with 'therefore excluding both Mesozoic and modern birds unless explicitly stated otherwise' - most potential readers, like me probably still aren't really clear what paraphyletic means. This is sold as for the general public, but a more care with the editing might have ensure...

Rakhat-Bi Abdyssagin (born in 1999) is a distinguished composer, concert pianist, music theorist and researcher. Three of his piano CDs have been released in Germany. He started his undergraduate degree at the age of 13 in Kazakhstan, and having completed three musical doctorates in prominent Italian music institutions at the age of 20, he has mastered advanced composition techniques. In 2024 he completed a PhD in music at the University of St Andrews / Royal Conservatoire of Scotland (researching timbre-texture co-ordinate in avant- garde music), and was awarded The Silver Medal of The Worshipful Company of Musicians, London. He has held visiting affiliations at the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge and UCL, and has been lecturing and giving talks internationally since the age of 13. His latest book is Quantum Mechanics and Avant Garde Music . What links quantum physics and avant-garde music? The entire book is devoted to this question. To put it briefly, there are many different link...

After expressing some doubts about one of 'Professor Dave's videos it only seemed fair to take a look at his book - and I was pretty much sold on this 2021 publication by the title - but it turned out to be considerably more than I expected. I had assumed it would be a book poking fun at ignorant pseudoscientific ideas, but in reality the biggest parts of it are solid and entirely serious introductions to chemistry, biochemistry and energy (plus a touch of quantum physics). The reason for this eclectic mix is that Dave Farina feels that they provide the knowledge foundation required to counter much online woo, whether it's about things 'not containing chemicals', so-called alternative medicines or the random use of the word 'quantum' to try to make a treatment that is nothing more than a placebo seem more scientifically based. In between the basic science chapters we do get into the dodgy claims, also taking on, for example, that marketing term 'organic...

I was surprised recently by something Simon Singh put on X about Sabine Hossenfelder. I have huge admiration for Simon, but I also have a lot of respect for Sabine. She has written two excellent books and has been helpful to me with a number of physics queries - she also had a really interesting blog, and has now become particularly successful with her science videos. This is where I'm afraid she lost me as audience, as I find video a very unsatisfactory medium to take in information - but I know it has mass appeal. This meant I was concerned by Simon's tweet (or whatever we are supposed to call posts on X) saying 'The Problem With Sabine Hossenfelder: if you are a fan of SH... then this is worth watching.' He was referencing a video from 'Professor Dave Explains' - I'm not familiar with Professor Dave (aka Dave Farina, who apparently isn't a professor, which is perhaps a bit unfortunate for someone calling out fakes), but his videos are popular and he...