Get out your credit card and get some...

Science Books



January 19, 2006

Parallel Worlds: A Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos
Michio Kaku (2006)
ISBN: 1400033721

We may not have to concern ourselves with the prospect right now, but it appears likely that humankind will eventually have to move from Earth in order to survive. But if you think this seems like a logistical nightmare, think upon the theoretical physics that Professor Michio Kaku's book, Visions, Beyond Einstein and Hyperspace, proposes; that humans will ultimately have to move to a different Universe to escape science's predicted "big freeze". Golly-Gee! What would you pack for such a journey? The idea may sound a little out of this world, but Kaku manages to make the concept of other universes a very real possibility. A consummate science writer - with Hyperspace winning the title of best book of the year by the New York Times - Kaku posits persuasive arguments regarding the still speculative M-theory. All theories grow from an initial idea, however, and since its shaky beginning, M-theory has attracted the endorsement of many physicists, with some predicting it to be Einstein's coveted "theory of everything." If M-theory were ever proven, it would resolve many issues in physics, such as an integrated understanding of the four forces of the Universe and what happened before the big bang. M-theory entertains the idea that our Universe resides within a "brane" and that other Universes in their own brane bump up against our own in hyperspace; which is apparently why we cannot currently detect them. To test his multiverse theory, Kaku is busying himself with some of today's most sensitive and sophisticated detection equipment. Wave detectors, gravity lenses, satellites, and telescopes are all trained on the heavens to find even the smallest hint of a clue that will finally help us open a gateway to another Universe. Don't start packing for the move just yet though; scientists roughly predict - give or take a year or so - that our Universe won't end for another trillion years.

Silent Steel: The Mysterious Death of the Nuclear Attack Sub USS Scorpion
Stephen Johnson (2006)
ISBN: 0471267376

When the nuclear attack submarine USS Scorpion failed to return to its homeport of Norfolk, Virginia with its 99 crewmen in 1968, nobody could have predicted that it would turn into one of history's biggest mysteries. Journalist Stephen Johnson was first attracted to the Scorpion's mysterious vanishing act when he wrote a series of articles for the Houston Chronicle from 1993 to 1995. Johnson is an expert on the disappearance of the Scorpion, and he is the first port of call for enquiring documentary makers and writers. Johnson writes that some months after the sub and all hands were officially classified as dead, the debris of the Scorpion was found beneath 10,000 feet of water. Johnson scours the submarine inside and out with a meticulous and strict adherence to technical detail in the hope of finding any clue that might explain the Scorpion's demise. "Stephen Johnson has crafted a forensic masterpiece that leads the reader back through time to unravel the gnawing enigma of the tragic 1968 loss of the nuclear attack submarine USS Scorpion," says Rear Admiral Thomas Evans, an analyst specializing in submarine history and operations, and former officer on the Scorpion. One of the most surprising things about Johnson's book is that neither the experts finding the submarine for the first time, nor today's forensic experts, can adequately explain the demise of the Scorpion. Not that there is a lack of theories floating about. Was the Scorpion attacked? Did poor maintenance lead to a breach in the subs hull, or explosion in its torpedo tubes? The fact that the sub went missing at the height of the Cold War should also not be discounted. Johnson addresses all such theories, but despite due diligence is left with no definitive conclusion. An utterly riveting mystery choc-a-block full of well researched technical specs and details.



[Back to the Main Books Page]

Top of page     Home page     Forums     About

The terms and conditions governing your use of this website.

© 1997 - 2016 McMurdo Media Pty Ltd and its licensors. All rights reserved.