Book Review: "The Beginning of Infinity"
"The Beginning of Infinity: Explanations that Transform the World" by David Deutsch is a fascinating book! It should be said upfront that David is an expert on Quantum Physics at Oxford University, and the book relies heavily on explaining the nature of physics. The book attempts to document the evolution of human understanding, or explanations, essentially, and how we can create good explanations that last the test of time. In that sense, the book is incredible, and really inspires the individual to pursue purposeful knowledge creation. Although at times the book can be a little hard to follow, as it tends to create long winded tangential examples in making a point. It also goes far beyond this evolutionary story though, in discussing universal systems, objective truth, and comparing static and future dynamic societies. Overall, I give the book 7/10 stars because it's a fascinating philosophical and historical look at science in general, however it can be a little tangential in it's own explanations, which seems ironic in a book about eloquent explanations. The following are the chapters of the book, in my usual fashion, so you can get a slightly better insight into what this book proposes:
Chapter 1: The Reach of Explanations
Chapter 2: Closer to Reality
Chapter 3: The Spark
Chapter 4: Creation
Chapter 5: The Reality of Abstractions
Chapter 6: The Jump to Universality
Chapter 7: Artificial Creativity
Chapter 8: A Window on Infinity
Chapter 9: Optimism
Chapter 10: A Dream of Socrates
Chapter 11: The Multiverse
Chapter 12: A Physicist’s History of Bad Philosophy
Chapter 13: Choices
Chapter 14: Why are Flowers Beautiful?
Chapter 15: The Evolution of Culture
Chapter 16: The Evolution of Creativity
Chapter 17: Unsustainable
Chapter 18: The Beginning
Absolutely my favorite chapter is Chapter 15, which talks extensively about Memes, or replicators of ideas through society. Memes vs genes is a huge theme of the book, which really hearkens back to nature vs nurture in the evolutionary debate. Further, the book really gets you thinking about objective truth, or the core of issues and understanding, vs conjecture or cheaper definitions. David even goes as far as to say there is objective beauty, as to say that beauty can be defined in mathematics and definition. Its a pretty wild book, that really uncovers a lot of revelations and direction of the 21st century, highlighting this time of rapid change and progress. The book also talks a lot about creativity and this being a distinguishing characteristic in the evolution and abilities of human kind, something I didn't recognize till it was pointed out in this way. David hints that understanding and being able to define this creative trait may be the key to unlocking true artificial intelligence. Finally, I really like that Mr. Deutsch emphasizes that science in general is a process of working theories subject to change. Check out the following talk featuring David to get a better understanding for the way he explains his thoughts:
Chapter 1: The Reach of Explanations
Chapter 2: Closer to Reality
Chapter 3: The Spark
Chapter 4: Creation
Chapter 5: The Reality of Abstractions
Chapter 6: The Jump to Universality
Chapter 7: Artificial Creativity
Chapter 8: A Window on Infinity
Chapter 9: Optimism
Chapter 10: A Dream of Socrates
Chapter 11: The Multiverse
Chapter 12: A Physicist’s History of Bad Philosophy
Chapter 13: Choices
Chapter 14: Why are Flowers Beautiful?
Chapter 15: The Evolution of Culture
Chapter 16: The Evolution of Creativity
Chapter 17: Unsustainable
Chapter 18: The Beginning
Absolutely my favorite chapter is Chapter 15, which talks extensively about Memes, or replicators of ideas through society. Memes vs genes is a huge theme of the book, which really hearkens back to nature vs nurture in the evolutionary debate. Further, the book really gets you thinking about objective truth, or the core of issues and understanding, vs conjecture or cheaper definitions. David even goes as far as to say there is objective beauty, as to say that beauty can be defined in mathematics and definition. Its a pretty wild book, that really uncovers a lot of revelations and direction of the 21st century, highlighting this time of rapid change and progress. The book also talks a lot about creativity and this being a distinguishing characteristic in the evolution and abilities of human kind, something I didn't recognize till it was pointed out in this way. David hints that understanding and being able to define this creative trait may be the key to unlocking true artificial intelligence. Finally, I really like that Mr. Deutsch emphasizes that science in general is a process of working theories subject to change. Check out the following talk featuring David to get a better understanding for the way he explains his thoughts:
