100 books like Darwin's Plots

I read this book during my last year in college. I finished it in one day and figured there was no better personification for teaching in an unconventional way than the charismatic Richard Feynman.

I loved the story in one chapter about people attending his talks, being totally mesmerized, and then not being able to say what the lesson was about afterward. How we say something really is more important than what we say.

James Watson was a clever, pushy, and critical young American molecular biologist exposed to the scientific culture of Britain in the early 1950s.

The book is full of acerbic comments about “stuffy” Cambridge dons and the rules of etiquette that young Jim struggled with, all the while scheming to maintain the various fellowships that allowed him to remain in the UK and pursue his ambition: to understand the chemical nature of the genetic material, DNA.

The book provides a lively account of his collaboration with an older Brit, the brilliant Francis Crick, who was also trying to unscramble DNA. Much of the technical stuff will be incomprehensible to most, but the method the two followed is clear. The partnership was hugely fruitful and the book is a lively account of how science actually works.

Watson and Crick tried everything while coping with competitors and their criticisms as well as their… show more.

Ritchie was part of a team that attempted to replicate a famous study led by a prominent psychologist, Daryl Bem, claiming that people did better on a word memorization test if they studied the words after taking the test.

Ritchie and his co-authors attempted to replicate this study and found no evidence supporting Bem’s claim. This is but one example of a scientific crisis in that attempts to replicate influential studies published in top peer-reviewed journals fail nearly half the time. Ritchie explains and illustrates the reasons for the current replication crisis in science.

Experimental Medicine is a classic, a clear and simple account of physiological research, well-illustrated with comprehensible examples (no molecular biology needed).

It is well worth reading if only because so many of the principles that French physician Claude Bernard pioneered have been largely forgotten. Most important is his demand for certainty: “Science permits no exceptions,” an injunction now more often forgotten than obeyed. Bernard would have been appalled by, for example, a famous choice experiment in which 60% of a large group of subjects choose a less-profitable option.

The experimenters concluded that individual humans (not just groups) show risk aversion, ignoring the 40% who did not. In a similar situation, Bernard would always seek the conditions that yield a 100% result. He gives an example where he was able to resolve uncertainty concerning the sensitivity of spinal roots.

We’re still waiting for any serious effort to achieve a Bernardian certainty… show more.

Yara is a girl with a passion for science who is determined to make new discoveries. The book has educational back matter explaining the scientific method of making new discoveries and lays out each step in the process clearly that young readers can follow. It will inspire children to start experimenting on their own. Like every good scientist, Yara starts with a question, makes observations, and comes up with a hypothesis... but each time she starts an experiment, her dog, Renzo, ruins it! Yara sets a great example for young readers to pursue scientific studies. In this humorous story, there is clear evidence that scientific method works as well for dogs as for people. 

A book about pharmaceutical corruption and manipulative science can rarely make me laugh out loud, but Bad Science does just that.

Not only did the book make me a better advocate for my health by teaching me what red flags to look out for in research and shady science journalism, but it kept me consistently entertained to the point where I was disappointed when the book ended. It should be required reading in all high school science classes. 

“Why most published research findings are false” was a 2005 paper that kicked off a crisis in science about failures to replicate, creating gaping cracks in the bedrock of science. Science Fictions explains this replication crisis and prescribes remedies. The book is written in an entertaining style, which led to its inclusion in the shortlist of the Royal Society Science Book Prize for 2021. Psychology is the poster child for the replication crisis. One of the things I like about genetics is that its findings consistently replicate, beginning with the fundamental finding that about half of the differences between people on psychological traits can be explained by inherited DNA differences.

The best book of readings on the controversy between "intelligent design" creationism (which is more intellectually respectable than "young Earth" creationism, the adherents of which believe that every word of the book of Genesis is literally true), and secular thinkers. Essays cover the truth of Darwinist theories, the nature of parents' rights to choose what their children are taught, the Constitutional law of education, the epistemological stance of naturalism as an unchallengeable assumption in scientific method, and various other relevant topics. The essays are generally as clear and jargon-free as it is possible to be, given that their authors are scholars.

This is an excellent series of essays on the small things in life which please the author. Some are more obvious than others, but all are described stylishly and with typical French humour and elegance. I confess that after reading it, I did my own—inevitably inferior—version. But it was an enjoyment just going through the process.

This gem of a book presents the argument that parents should consider delaying giving their children smartphones until the child becomes an adult and has attained certain life skills. A mother of four, former nurse, and founder of ScreenStrong, author Melanie Hempe lived through digital addiction in her own family and is passionate about helping other families avoid her “mistakes”. At the same time she is well-versed in the current scientific literature across a broad array of tech-related topics, and she successfully “walks the talk”: her teens abstain from gaming/social media/smartphone use, but they are far from being socially ostracized - a common fear amongst parents.