A New Kind of Science

Additional A New Kind of Science Information

Wolfram uses his approach to tackle a remarkable array of fundamental problems in science: from the origin of the Second Law of thermodynamics, to the development of complexity in biology, the computational limitations of mathematics, the possibility of a truly fundamental theory of physics, and the interplay between free will and determinism.

Written with exceptional clarity, and illustrated by more than a thousand original pictures, this seminal book allows scientists and non-scientists alike to participate in what promises to be a major intellectual revolution.

What Customers Say About A New Kind of Science:

Less than useless because I really wanted to check it, so I wasnt satisfied until I crawled until the end of it - therefore it also made me waste a lot of time, while teaching me essentially nil.This is not science - science demands references to what people did before you.The grandiose final belief of the author - that small programs are able to explain everything in the universe - is just partially right and much better explained by other authors, e.g. Chaitin.

I happily read the first couple hundred pages and found them fascinating. His "Science" led me nowhere although I had hoped that I could jump ahead to some insights on genetic evolution but. Kind.

New. The writing is more patronizing than "kind." Science. But alas, I found Wolfram's book neither New nor Kind.

not. not. The "discovery" that simple rules generate complexity is old science.

not. no.But then I am an anthropologist, not a physicist, nor a computer "scientist."

This book is great. Although it is big, it's easy to read. I really recommend it for computing students (like me).

But the core of the book, its seemingly endless pages of examples of simple rules leading to complex systems, has great merit. Where to begin. As a popularization of cellular automata, NKS is head and shoulders above any other resource. This book provoked a vast range of reactions when it came out 7 years ago, from wildly positive claims that this will change everything (see: Wired) to denunciations that Wolfram was fobbing off ridiculous pseudoscience.Those reactions were premature. True, many of the book's more grandiose claims have been disproven, while others are simply non-falsifiable; many of the results that Wolfram seems to claim as his own were already well-known by exports; and the book's influence on science since it came out has been negligible. It's an accessible, enjoyable read that even a child can open up and be mesmerized by.If you have any interest in computation or complexity theory, NKS is a must-read. But be sure to also look at some of the scientific reviews of the book, of which there are plenty, before mistaking Wolfram's kind of science for a theory of everything.

Not bad, but not all that it is made up to be. For example, the chapter on visual processing is devoid of all the knowledge that we have on the topic. Would have been well advised to have some co-authors.