The Half-Life of Facts: Why Everything We Know Has an Expiration Date
Sep 2012 · Penguin
4.1star
7 reviewsreport
Ebook
256
Pages
family_home
Eligible
info
reportRatings and reviews aren’t verified Learn More
About this ebook
New insights from the science of science
Facts change all the time. Smoking has gone from doctor recommended to deadly. We used to think the Earth was the center of the universe and that the brontosaurus was a real dinosaur. In short, what we know about the world is constantly changing.
Samuel Arbesman shows us how knowledge in most fields evolves systematically and predictably, and how this evolution unfolds in a fascinating way that can have a powerful impact on our lives.
He takes us through a wide variety of fields, including those that change quickly, over the course of a few years, or over the span of centuries.
Facts change all the time. Smoking has gone from doctor recommended to deadly. We used to think the Earth was the center of the universe and that the brontosaurus was a real dinosaur. In short, what we know about the world is constantly changing.
Samuel Arbesman shows us how knowledge in most fields evolves systematically and predictably, and how this evolution unfolds in a fascinating way that can have a powerful impact on our lives.
He takes us through a wide variety of fields, including those that change quickly, over the course of a few years, or over the span of centuries.
Ratings and reviews
4.1
7 reviews
prajwal shetty
- Flag inappropriate
July 6, 2014
repitative but delivers good message overall good
About the author
Samuel Arbesman is an applied mathematician and network scientist. He is a Senior Scholar at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation and a fellow at the Institute for Quantitative Social Science at Harvard University. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Atlantic, Wired, New Scientist and the Boston Globe. He lives in Kansas City.
Visit www.arbesman.net
Visit www.arbesman.net
Rate this ebook
Tell us what you think.
Reading information
Smartphones and tablets
Install the Google Play Books app for Android and iPad/iPhone. It syncs automatically with your account and allows you to read online or offline wherever you are.
Laptops and computers
You can listen to audiobooks purchased on Google Play using your computer's web browser.
eReaders and other devices
To read on e-ink devices like Kobo eReaders, you'll need to download a file and transfer it to your device. Follow the detailed Help Center instructions to transfer the files to supported eReaders.
