Mind, Life, and Universe

Conversations with Great Scientists of Our Time

A Sciencewriters Book

Nearly forty of the world’s most esteemed scientists discuss the big questions that drive their illustrious careers. Coeditor Eduardo Punset—one of Spain’s most loved personages for his popularization of the sciences— interviews an impressive collection of characters, drawing out their seldom-seen personalities. In Mind, Life and Universe, they describe in their own words the most important and fascinating aspects of their research. Frank and often irreverent, these interviews will keep even the most casual reader of science books rapt for hours.

Can brain science explain feelings of happiness and despair? Is it true that chimpanzees are just like us when it comes to sexual innuendo? Is there any hard evidence that life exists anywhere other than on the Earth? Through Punset’s skillful questioning, readers meet one scientist who spends her waking hours assuring the freedom of African primates, another passionate about his idea that his wife's choice of husband was determined when she was a fetus, and another who explains the evidence for more than the standard four dimensions of length, width, height, and time.

In captivating conversations with such science luminaries as Richard Dawkins, Sheldon Glashow, Jane Goodall, James E. Lovelock, Lisa Randall, Robert Sapolski, Oliver Sacks, and E. O.Wilson, the editors reveal a unique, hidden world of intellectual interest, verve, and humor. Science enthusiasts and general readers alike will devour Mind, Life and Universe.

About the Authors

Lynn Margulis is Distinguished University Professor in the Department of Geosciences at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. She has been elected to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences and received the Presidential Medal of Science in 1999. Margulis lives in Amherst, Massachusetts.

Renowned Spanish science writer Eduardo Punset wrote El Viaje a la Felicidad (The Happiness Trip), a number- one bestseller in Spain (English translation published by Chelsea Green, see page 13). He lives in Barcelona.

David Suzuki, PhD, an award winning geneticist, author, environmentalist and educator created and directed over 150 science programs for the Canadian Broadcasting System for over 35 years. Most esteemed are his remarkable documentaries on "The Nature of Things". Suzuki (whose parents were banished to the countryside from their Vancouver home during WWII because of their Japanese origins) shares his curiosity and truly cosmic interests with millions of TV viewers and students. Although as a Professor at UBC he is still most at home in the glory of the mountains of the west coast of British Columbia he spent many years in Toronto interviewing scientists and other scholars. The parallels of his life with that of Eduardo Punset, whom he has never met, are remarkable. Although they live half-a-hemisphere away from each other, both are deeply attached to land and sea and committed to science as a way of knowing.

Sciencewriters Books Imprint

With the publication of Mind, Life and Universe Chelsea Green adds to the newly launched Sciencewriters Books, a new imprint to develop outstanding works of science for the general public. Sciencewriters Books is codirected by Lynn Margulis and Dorion Sagan, founders of Sciencewriters, an educational partnership devoted to advancing science through fantastic and informative books, videos, and other media (www.sciencewriters.org). Blending exciting writing with depth of knowledge and dedication to scientific integrity, Sciencewriters Books will publish new and established authors on cutting-edge topics that are key to our survival.