This classic Big Bang text neatly describes what happened after the bang. Yet, until recently, particle physicists and cosmologists were stuck on many questions that the Big Bang Theory still couldn't answer, primarily: If matter can neither be created nor destroyed, how could so much matter arise from nothing at all? Alan Guth's Inflationary Universe Theory answers these vexing questions. When NASA's Cosmic Background Explorer satellite measured the non-uniformities of the cosmic background radiation for the first time in 1992, the patterns agreed exquisitely with the theory's predictions.

From the Industrial Revolution to the age of artificial intelligence, The Technology Trap takes a sweeping look at the history of technological progress and how it has radically shifted the distribution of economic and political power among society’s members. As Carl Benedikt Frey shows, the Industrial Revolution created unprecedented wealth and prosperity over the long run, but the immediate consequences of mechanization were devastating for large swaths of the population. Middle-income jobs withered, wages stagnated, the labor share of income fell, profits surged, and economic inequality skyrocketed. These trends, Frey documents, broadly mirror those in our current age of automation, which began with the Computer Revolution.

Just as the Industrial Revolution eventually brought about extraordinary benefits for society, artificial intelligence systems have the potential to do the same. But Frey argues that this depends on how the short term is managed. In the nineteenth century, workers violently expressed their concerns over machines taking their jobs. The Luddite uprisings joined a long wave of machinery riots that swept across Europe and China. Today’s despairing middle class has not resorted to physical force, but their frustration has led to rising populism and the increasing fragmentation of society. As middle-class jobs continue to come under pressure, there’s no assurance that positive attitudes to technology will persist.

The Industrial Revolution was a defining moment in history, but few grasped its enormous consequences at the time. The Technology Trap demonstrates that in the midst of another technological revolution, the lessons of the past can help us to more effectively face the present.

Richard D. Duke, one of the founding fathers of the gaming discipline, once said: It works: that's all we have.' He is now one of the authors of this book that sets out to answer the questions: Why do games work and what is the active substance that makes them do what they do?

The three Dutch editors took the initiative and invited professionals and scientists from different fields, from different disciplines, and from all over the world to contribute their answers to this intriguing question. The book presents a state-of-the-art overview that will help us to understand simulation games. It contains contributions from theory, applications and practice. The set of applications covers psychodrama, culture, change, learning, narratives, military, communication, homo ludens, management and many more areas.

This book contains many contributions from professional gamers who share their insights concerning the active substance of simulation games. Therefore, it is of value to everyone who wants to understand why simulation games really work.

As the world around us increases in technological complexity, our understanding of it diminishes. Underlying this trend is a single idea: the belief that our existence is understandable through computation, and more data is enough to help us build a better world.

In reality, we are lost in a sea of information, increasingly divided by fundamentalism, simplistic narratives, conspiracy theories, and post-factual politics. Meanwhile, those in power use our lack of understanding to further their own interests. Despite the apparent accessibility of information, we’re living in a new Dark Age.

From rogue financial systems to shopping algorithms, from artificial intelligence to state secrecy, we no longer understand how our world is governed or presented to us. The media is filled with unverifiable speculation, much of it generated by anonymous software, while companies dominate their employees through surveillance and the threat of automation.

In his brilliant new work, leading artist and writer James Bridle surveys the history of art, technology, and information systems, and reveals the dark clouds that gather over our dreams of the digital sublime.

Human beings have to make plans and strategize for the future. As the pace of our lives becomes faster and faster, we have to do so more often and more quickly. But are our predictions any good? Is there hope for improvement? In this book the author examines the world of prediction, investigating how we can distinguish a true signal from a universe of noisy, ever-increasing data. Many predictions fail, often at great cost to society, because most of us have a poor understanding of probability and uncertainty. We are wired to detect a signal, and we mistake more confident predictions for more accurate ones. But overconfidence is often the reason for failure. If our appreciation of uncertainty improves, our predictions can get better too. This is the prediction paradox: the more humility we have about our ability to make predictions, and the more we are willing to learn from our mistakes, the more we can turn information into knowledge and data into foresight. The author examines both successes and failures to determine what more accurate forecasters have in common. In keeping with his own aim to seek truth from data, he visits innovative forecasters in a range of areas, from hurricanes to baseball, from the poker table to the stock market, from Capitol Hill to the NBA. Even when their innovations are modest, we can learn from their methods. How can we train ourselves to think probabilistically, as they do? How can the insights of an eighteenth-century Englishman unlock the twenty-first-century challenges of global warming and terrorism? How can being smarter about the future help us make better decisions in the present?

In How to Create a Mind, Ray Kurzweil offers a provocative exploration of the most important project in human-machine civilisation: reverse engineering the brain to understand precisely how it works and using that knowledge to create even more intelligent machines. Kurzweil explores how the brain functions, how the mind emerges from the brain, and the implications of vastly increasing the powers of our intelligence in addressing the world’s problems. He thoughtfully examines emotional and moral intelligence and the origins of consciousness and envisions the radical - arguably inevitable - future of our merging with the intelligent technology we are creating.

Linnen band. De band is niet origineel. Dikke hardback in goede staat. Enkele vouwtjes. Enkele plakbandresten. Met 2 losse gevouwen karten: Tafel A en Tafel B. Geillustreerd. Duitstalig.

Overzicht van belangrijke wetenschappelijke ontwikkelingen op het gebied van de natuurwetenschappen vanaf de achttiende eeuw.

Columns over allerlei aspecten van de wetenschap.

We maken ons allemaal wel eens zorgen over ons geheugen en ons verstand, zeker als we de vijftig gepasseerd zijn. Maar wat gebeurt er eigenlijk in ons hoofd als we ouder worden? Wanneer begint de achteruitgang? Hoe snel gaat het? En heeft een ouder brein ook voordelen?
In dit baanbrekende boek - het allereerste over dit onderwerp - laat Andre Aleman zien dat de achteruitgang vaak minder erg is dan we denken. Maar ook dat ons geheugen al rond ons twintigste begint te haperen. Het seniorenbrein is een verfrissend en informatief boek over stofjes en trainingen, plaques en de invloed van hormonen. Het vertelt volgens de nieuwste wetenschappelijke inzichten hoe je de voortekenen van alzheimer kunt herkennen, en wat je kunt doen om je hersenen scherp en gezond te houden.

In The Quantum Self, Danah Zohar argues that the insights of modem physics can illuminate our understanding of everyday life -- our relationships to ourselves, to others, and to the world at large. Guiding us through the strange and fascinating workings of the subatomic realm to create a new model of human consciousness, the author addresses enduring philosophical questions. Does the new physics provide a basis by which our consciousness might continue beyond death? How does the material world (for instance, ugly inner cities) impinge upon our sense of self? Is there a subatomic wellspring from which our creativity, our empathy with others, and our feelings of unity with the inanimate world originate?Most important, Zohar shows how the vitality of the new physics combats the alienation and fragmentation of twentieth-century life, and replaces it with a model of reality in which the universe itself may possess a type of consciousness, of which human consciousness is one expression.

Er zijn veel boeken die uitleggen wat we weten over het heelal. Dit boek beschrijft wat we nooit zullen weten, niet omdat we beperkt worden door kennis of techniek, maar omdat het onmogelijk is om te begrijpen. Vragen als: Wat was er vóór de tijd? Wat is er achter de ruimte? Waarom is oneindigheid een relatief begrip? En als iets oneindig groot is, waarom past daar dan nog iets bij? Of het nu op het gebied van taal of filosofie is, van natuurkunde of sterrenkunde: we lopen steeds op dezelfde manier vast in onze redenering. Zo loop je tegen de grenzen aan van wat een mens kan begrijpen, en kom je dichter bij het wezen van het menselijk bewustzijn. Dat wat we niet begrijpen, laat zien wie we zijn.

Beknopt overzicht van de evolutie van het heelal.

Verkenningen op het gebied van de natuurkunde op verschillende gebieden.

Wat is de kortste weg van A naar B als je niet weet wat B is of waar het ligt? In dit vervolg op 'Blikwisselingen' (2008) betoogt Robbert Dijkgraaf op overtuigende wijze hoe belangrijk verwondering, intuïtie, kunst en creativiteit zijn in de wetenschap. Met aanstekelijk enthousiasme laat hij zien hoe de zoektocht naar een antwoord op de schijnbaar nutteloze vraag hoe de wereld in elkaar zit, diezelfde wereld ingrijpend verandert en de moeite waard maakt. Van legoblokjes tot wondergetallen, van de oerknal tot de maanlanding, van de Groenlandse ijskap tot de Nederlandse politiek - in Dijkgraafs visie is wetenschap overal om ons heen, mateloos fascinerend en voor iedereen toegankelijk.

Wetenschappers op het gebied van de technologie geven hun mening over de ontwikkelingen van de komende twintig jaar naar aanleiding van een aantal concrete praktische problemen. Bevat voorspellingen voor 2026. 

Onderzoek naar de meest in het oog lopende gevallen van fraude in de wetenschap in Nederland.

37 voorbeelden van wetenschappelijk onderzoek

Portretten van 21 vooraanstaande Nederlandse wetenschapsbeoefenaars.

Originating from a Dagstuhl seminar, the collection of papers presented in this book constitutes on the one hand a representative state-of-the-art survey of embodied artificial intelligence, and on the other hand the papers identify the important research trends and directions in the field. Following an introductory overview, the 23 papers are organized into topical sections on - philosophical and conceptual issues - information, dynamics, and morphology - principles of embodiment for real-world applications - developmental approaches - artificial evolution and self-reconfiguration.

Grondlegger van de bacteriologie

Robert Koch geldt als de grondlegger van de moderne bacteriologie. In 1882 bewees hij dat 'bacillen die bij tuberculoselijders voorkomen geen bijverschijnselen van de ziekte zijn, maar de veroorzakers ervan. Deze ontdekking was van cruciaal belang, omdat in die tijd één op de zeven mensen overleed aan de ziekte. Vanaf 1883 wijdde Koch zich aan het onderzoek van de pest, cholera en Malaria. Ook daarvan wist hij de oorzaken aan te wijzen. In 1905 kreeg hij de Nobelprijs voor zijn baanbrekende werk.

From the beginnings of history through to the 21st century and the 26-kilometre underground particle accelerator, this work describes the way that the design and production of scientific instruments has extended the frontiers of science.