Beyond Reason: Eight Great Problems That Reveal the Limits of Science

by A. K. Dewdney 
 

# ISBN: 0471013986
# ISBN-13: 9780471013983
# Pub. Date: April 2004
# Publisher: Wiley
# Pages: 240


A mind-bending excursion to the limits of science and mathematics.

Are some scientific problems insoluble? In Beyond Reason, internationally acclaimed math and science author A. K. Dewdney answers this question by examining eight insurmountable mathematical and scientific roadblocks that have stumped thinkers across the centuries, from ancient mathematical conundrums such as "squaring the circle," first attempted by the Pythagoreans, to Gödel's vexing theorem, from perpetual motion to the upredictable behavior of chaotic systems such as the weather.


Table of Contents
=================

Introduction: Where Reason Cannot Go.

Math in the Cosmos.

1. The Energy Drain: Impossible Machines.
2. The Cosmic Limit: Unreachable Speeds.
3. The Quantum Curtain: Unknowable Particles.
4. The Edge of Chaos: Unpredictable Systems.

Math in the Holos.

5. The Circular Crypt: Unconstructable Figures.
6. The Chains of Reason: Unprovable Theorems.
7. The Computer Treadmill: Impossible Programs.
8. The Big-O Bottleneck: Intractable Problems.

References.
Further Reading.
Index.


Author:
======
A.K. DEWDNEY, PH.D., is the author of several critically acclaimed math and science books, including A  Mathematical Mystery Tour; Yes, We have No Neutrons; and 200% of Nothing, all from Wiley.

He was a member of the computer science  department at the university of Western Ontario and at the university of Waterloo for a combined period of thirty years before retiring. In 1996, he became an adjunct professor of biology at UWO. For eight years, Dewdney was the  computer Recreations columnist  for Scientific American magazine.

 
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