Reviews for Science of Forces Projects With Experiments With Forces And Machines

The average rating for Science of Forces Projects With Experiments With Forces And Machines based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2017-09-24 00:00:00 Mark Cross I put off reading this book for a long time, unsure whether I really wanted to read it or not. Every time I flipped through it, I thought, "Yeah, I want to read this" but still put it to the side. Once I started it, I was glad that I had decided to go for it. The book is written in a question and answer form like What If?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions. This is a good thing and a bad thing--in one way, it makes the book read quickly because you can blow through the sections, but in another, it doesn't leave much motivation to keep reading because each section wraps itself up. What makes Vergara's book ultimately successful, at least for me, is the author's writing style, which is fluid and clear. He makes science easy to understand, which is not an easy feat for a reader like English-major me. Vergara's book has funny moments, but mostly, it's clear, straightforward, informative writing. His voice is very engaging, and I would say that 85% of the questions written in to him by readers and then answered by him in this book were questions I would ask or have asked before. Therefore, most of the book was of interest to me. My only complaint about the book, knocking it down a star, is the organization. There was a good deal of repetition because some of the questions were similar, or their answers contained similar concepts. If the book were arranged thematically, even by section, rather than randomly (seemingly, anyway), this problem would have been avoided. Overall, I like this outdated science book and feel that most of Vergara's answers still apply today. Some are historical science, so the answers haven't changed, but even those questions asked about current (1985-ish) science apply now as historical. Some of his statistics and predictions are sad because they've come true or have worsened over time (referring mostly to pollution). I recommend this book to people curious about science in the observable world, people who have questions they want answers to from a book, not from Google, and people who don't mind an outdated science book as long as their questions are answered in a simple, easy-to-understand manner.

Review # 2 was written on 2013-10-08 00:00:00 Brad Mccurdy An interesting lecture and history lesson on what can happen when there is too much reliance on one person for scientific advice. Snow wants to point out the dangers of too much reliance from non-scientist policy makers on a single scientist, and, in general, how secret decisions are made by governments inevitably by a small number of people. Snow uses a parable of Sir Henry Tizard and Lord Cherwell (Lindemann), where Tizard showed good instincts and judgments on how to allocate resources during WWII and Lindemann generally did not. The parable works fairly well, and is an interesting story in itself. It focuses on radar and strategic bombing. Snow then explains the lessons, which are modest but I think the best that can be taken. Don't put too much faith in one expert. He also points out that because of science's increasing importance for policy decisions, it would be better to have more scientists or at the very least scientifically literate people in the government. This always sounds good in theory, but I am never as sure scientists would generally be good at policy, but Snow puts in the proper caveat that having more scientists would not necessarily lead to improvement, just that it may lead to more long-term thinking. Again, I'd agree that more scientific literacy is good, but I think it always just comes down to personalities and individual abilities. Indeed, this is another conclusion that Snow makes. This was a good, quick read that lays out the problem for consideration and then examines some tentative answers. I'd recommend it to anyone who thinks about the proper relationship between government and science on policy, with especial regard to its handling of secret ("closed politics") research decisions.