Science and the City - Laurie Winkless ****

A welcome trend over the past few years is the increased number of popular science books involving materials science, in part inspired (I suspect) by the success of Stuff Matters by Mark Miodownik.

Laurie Winkless, a physicist and writer who has had a place at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center and has worked at the National Physical Laboratory, has written her first book, looking at the science of how cities function. The book has as its foundation (pun intended) the creation of a skyscraper. This skyscraper acts as a guide throughout the book to illustrate the science of materials, the accomplishments and methods of engineering involved in building superstructures, a reference for the history of construction and its technological achievements and a starting point for explanations of the science at work in the world’s cities.

The book goes into depth into various areas of the commonplace around us: how cities provide and distribute energy, water, public transport, food production, logistics and how they deal with the enormous amounts of waste produced by their citizens. Winkless does an excellent job at revealing the fascinating science behind what most of us take for granted as we make our daily commutes. I found the intricacies and complex designs underlying a regular day in a metropolis endlessly fascinating.

While describing how cities have functioned and how they function now, the author also looks at the future, based on proposed projects that various cities around the world are planning and based on research into potential solutions for providing for the increased urban populations of the future. Winkless readily admits that many of the plans are very speculative and her candour is welcome and represents science done properly; that is that she is frank about the possibilities and the limitations of science that has not been verified by experiment.

One small complaint is that some of the coverage of scientific principles, such as the explanation of the electromagnetic spectrum, is slightly confusing and would benefit from diagrams or illustrations, but I’m being picky with this criticism.

If you are interested in learning more about how science affects our everyday lives, how it can be that fresh produce is available in food stores around the world throughout the year, why there is a rush of wind when the tube arrives (and why it is necessary), how it is possible to build buildings over half a kilometer tall and many other things, then this is an excellent book to read, particularly on your daily commute.

Hardback:

Kindle:

Using these links earns us commission at no cost to you

Review by Ian Bald

Comments

The Language of Mathematics - Raúl Rojas ***

One of the biggest developments in the history of maths was moving from describing relationships and functions with words to using symbols. This interesting little book traces the origins of a whole range of symbols from those familiar to all, to the more obscure squiggles used in logic and elsewhere. On the whole Raúl Rojas does a good job of filling in some historical detail, if in what is generally a fairly dry fashion. We get to trace what was often a bumpy path as different symbols were employed (particularly, for example, for division and multiplication, where several still remain in use), but usually, gradually, standards were adopted. This feels better as a reference, to dip into if you want to find out about a specific symbol, rather than an interesting end to end read. Rojas tells us the sections are designed to be read in any order, which means that there is some overlap of text - it feels more like a collection of short essays or blog posts that he couldn't be bothered ...

Target Earth – Govert Schilling *****

I was biased in favour of this great little book even before I started to read it, simply because it’s so short. I’m sure that a lot of people who buy popular science books just want an overview and taster of a subject that’s brand new to them – and that’s likely to work best if the author keeps it short and to the point. Of course, you may want to dig deeper in areas that really interest you, but that’s what Google is for. That basic principle aside, I’m still in awe at how much substance Govert Schilling has managed to cram into this tiny book. It’s essentially about all the things (natural things, I mean, not UFOs or space junk) that can end up on Earth after coming down from outer space. That ranges from the microscopically small particles of cosmic dust that accumulate in our gutters, all the way up to the ten kilometre wide asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs. Between these extremes are two topics that we’ve reviewed entire books about recently: meteorites ( The Meteorite Hunt...

The Decline and Fall of the Human Empire - Henry Gee ****

In his last book, Henry Gee impressed with his A (Very) Short History of Life on Earth - this time he zooms in on one very specific aspect of life on Earth - humans - and gives us not just a history, but a prediction of the future - our extinction. The book starts with an entertaining prologue, to an extent bemoaning our obsession with dinosaurs, a story that leads, inexorably towards extinction. This is a fate, Gee points out, that will occur for every species, including our own. We then cover three potential stages of the rise and fall of humanity (the book's title is purposely modelled on Gibbon) - Rise, Fall and Escape. Gee's speciality is palaeontology and in the first section he takes us back to explore as much as we can know from the extremely patchy fossil record of the origins of the human family, the genus Homo and the eventual dominance of Homo sapiens , pushing out any remaining members of other closely related species. As we move onto the Fall section, Gee gives ...

Search This Blog