What We Believe but Cannot Prove: Today's Leading Thinkers on Science in the Age of Certainty (Edge Question Series)

What a Great Book!109 well-known scientist/journalist/educator types were persuaded by Brockman to answer the question: "What do you believe but cannot prove?" I have read books by 17 of them and have heard of another 30 or 40. The average answer takes about a page and a fourth - inadequate space to develop a scientific thesis, so layman's language prevails, making this book accessible to anyone. Like themes seem to be arranged together. God issues first, SETI themes next, consciousness has a big section - but you can open it and start anywhere you want and not suffer loss of continuity. The topics covered were diverse: Prehistoric life was rife with cannibalism and slavery; passionate people (within reason) do better; we're in for climatic mayhem; radiation emitted by mobile phones is harmless; the laws of large numbers - probability theory - work and protect the individual; scientific results can't be proved. They can only be tested again and again until only a fool would refuse to believe them...Much damage has been done by those who are certain that there is a life - a better, more important life - elsewhere; religious experience and practice is generated largely by a few emotions that evolved for other reasons; hostility toward religion is an obstacle to progress in psychology; and this from Robert Sapolsky: "Mind you, it would be perfectly fine with me if there were a proof that there is no God. Some might view this as a potential health problem, given the number of people who would then run damagingly amok. But there's no shortage of folks running amok already, thanks to their belief in God, so it wouldn't be much of a problem"...Intelligent extraterrestrials exist and will be found to use the same math we know and love; five recent developments suggest the discovery of extraterrestrial life is not far off; life itself is a fundamental feature of our universe, along with dark matter, supernovae, and black holes; no known law of physics or chemistry favors the emergence of the living state over other states; Whether or not intelligent life has staying power, it is for sure that microbial life does; panspermia is how life was and is spread throughout the universe...String theory is a futile exercise in physics and will die on the vine; if there are subtle ways around the speed-of-light limit, we will discover and leverage them to great effect; electrons, neutrinos, and quarks are divisible; quantum mechanics is not a final theory; our history extends backwards before the Big Bang; time does not exist; the mechanism for the human perception of time will be discovered...Future human evolution will proceed at a much faster pace than its predecessor (ordinary natural selection) because it will be intelligently designed by us; The DNA in your body varies from part to part; every special trait of humans is a derivative of language; not all the properties of nature are mathematically expressible - there are aspects of nature we will never conquer with science; evolution has direction, that is, life increases in its complexity; Homo Florensia had a simplified language that still exists today; Neanderthals were furry...For every experience, thought, question, or solution there is an analog in the biophysical state of the brain; reality exists independent of its human and social constructions; consciousness and its contents are all that exists - spacetime, matter, fields all depend on consciousness for their very existence (the guy who wrote this teaches, you guessed it, philosophy); soon we will be able to construct robots that give every appearance of consciousness - systems that act like us in every way; advanced computers will never possess consciousness; human consciousness is a conjuring trick; acquiring a human language is a precondition for consciousness; cockroaches are conscious...It is possible to life happily and morally without believing in free will; a common human nature will eventually be supported by evidence as strong and convincing as the evidence that the earth is round - with this evidence, we will overcome our misconceptions of human differences; Deceit and self-deception play a disproportionate role in human-generated disasters; We will soon grasp in a deep way how collective human behavior works, whether it's action by small groups or by nations; meaning and purpose of life may not be a precondition for humanity as much as a by-product of it; people are getting better...From David Myers: "newborns are not so dumb, electroconvulsive therapy sometimes works for depression, America's economic growth has not improved our morale, the automatic unconscious mind dwarfs the conscious mind, traumatic experiences rarely get repressed, most folks don't suffer low self-esteem, sexual orientation is not a choice"...It's possible to change adult stem cells from one phenotype to another; today's children are unintended victims of economic and technological progress; most of the ideas taught today in Economics 101 will be proved false; there is a severe overestimation of knowledge in the "soft" sciences. Mostly, they fit a narrative that satisfies our desire for a story.There are a few duds, but overall it's fascinating to find out what these high achiever types are thinking about when they are not working. You will enjoy it.

Wonderful little book that can be picked up anytime one has a moment for somestimulating ideas. Should be in everyone's library. Good gift for an intellectual friend.

A fair amount of the unproven predictions in this book were, while in large part quite speculative, also quite positive. Each expert has their own mini bio that includes the work they've done, including books published, so this book can be a major gateway to further research/ reading of all sorts of topics ranging from consciousness/ neurobiology, to cosmology, psychology, philosophy, history, and evolution. Ideas can be so intriguing that it often seems that each expert is delivering a mini Ted talk to you personally. Luckily the topics flow from one to the next, and some of the experts will refer to those that made remarks previously. Definitely worth the read.

This is one of my favorite books of the past two decades. For anyone interested in science -- especially theoretical science -- here are provocative musings by some of the best thinkers on questions that are not yet settled -- eg, Lee Smolin -- a great theoretical physicist -- having thought long and hard about every leading version of quantum theory, suggesting that none of them make entire sense, so that quantum theory appears to be our best current approximations of a deeper, fundamental theory that we haven't yet discovered.The late John Brockman of the Edge Institute produced a series of these books, with experts responding to different questions or propositions (one was "This Will Change Everything"). I've read three or four of them, but "What We Believe But Cannot Prove" is far and away the best. I carry a copy in the car, for reading at coffee shops or restaurants.

Some interesting ideas on the concept and philosophy of"What we believe but Cannot Prove". Essays from top scientists on topics such as Consciousness (is there such a thing, does language bring it about?), quantum mechanics (is the electron composed of any smaller particles?), astronomy (is there more than one universe), time (is everything predetermined) just to name a few from memory. I had gotten this book because i enjoyed "What is your most dangerous idea" so much from the same "edge dot com" group/ editor. I wasn't as into this book I believe because "What is your most dangerous idea" was just more interesting and similar. Some topics overlap. For example this book may have the argument that they believe consciousness does not exist while "dangerous idea" will have the dangerous idea that the soul does not exist. (This book did come out before "what is your most dangerous idea"). Some great ideas in here regardless to ponder.

I was surprised by the brevity of almost all of the entries in this series. Several of the contributors seemed to instinctively "choke" on the word "belief", as if it is inherently incompatible with science. I'm not sure why that is--for example, I'm a mathematician, and I can't prove Goldbach's Conjecture, but I believe it. Why is that so hard to say?

I have been buying many copies of this book and giving them to all my friends. HIGHLY RECOMMEND.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book.The length of each author's contribution varies (some go the point very directly, and some others take the opportunity to be a little bit more poetic about their thoughts) and the way they approach the question also varies, whether they interpret it as a futuristic prediction or a more philosophical way of thinking about their respective fields remaining mysteries.

Ok

El lector como yo, claro. Se trata efectivamente de un libro donde se exponen las opiniones de científicos y filósofos básicamente, que exponen opiniones que no pueden ser demostradas hasta el día de hoy. Es predominante el tema de la existencia de vida extraterrestre, pero a mí me llamó más la atención el asunto de los "agujeros de gusano" que parece pueden transportarnos allá, nadie sabe donde, muy, muy lejos en el universo o quién sabe. Y claro, al leer estas cosas, así como que la velocidad de la luz puede variar, uno, que es un lego en esas materias, comprende que quizá no llega a entender lo que esos sabios quieren realmente expresar, ni lo que sus afirmaciones significan para ellos. Pero de todas maneras, es libro es casi siempre, sencillamente fascinante.

Arrived a week before I was expecting it. Bought as something that’s easy to read when ever, the short (1-2 page) “chapters?” Allows for quick 5 minute reads. Filled with some fascinating concepts and people. Great book for anyone interested in science, physics, technology, really anything. The topics vary from the belief in God to whether or not there’s intelligent life in the universe.

Superb interesting read without too much theory

Fascinating stuff and really makes you think. Not ideal bedtime reading in that respect. Some of the theories lost me I'm afraid, bit too much technical jargon. But others are very simply stated while raising all sorts of questions, particularly about what we expect from science and scientists in the way of 'proof. A lot of the ideas are quite similar but then I guess the same big questions occur to us all. I believe that there are lots of questions to which we will just never know the answer and that is probably how it should be, otherwise life would all be very boring.