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Ten Emerging Technologies That'll Improve and/or Ruin Everything
by Kelly Weinersmith, Zach Weinersmith
From a top scientist and the creator of the hugely popular web comic Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, a hilariously illustrated investigation into future technologies - from how to fling a ship into deep space on the cheap to 3D organ printing.
What will the world of tomorrow be like? How does progress happen? And why do we not have a lunar colony already? What is the hold-up?
In this smart and funny book, celebrated cartoonist Zach Weinersmith and noted researcher Dr. Kelly Weinersmith give us a snapshot of what's coming next - from robot swarms to nuclear fusion powered-toasters. By weaving their own research, interviews with the scientists who are making these advances happen, and Zach's trademark comics, the Weinersmiths investigate why these technologies are needed, how they would work, and what is standing in their way.
New technologies are almost never the work of isolated geniuses with a neat idea. A given future technology may need any number of intermediate technologies to develop first, and many of these critical advances may appear to be irrelevant when they are first discovered. The journey to progress is full of strange detours and blind alleys that tell us so much about the human mind and the march of civilization.
To this end, Soonish investigates ten different emerging fields, from programmable matter to augmented reality, from space elevators to robotic construction, to show us the amazing world we will have, you know, soonish.
"Starred Review. The Weinersmiths deliver a fascinating look at the most provocative and promising research going on today and how it could alter the way we work and live." - Publishers Weekly
"Despite unrelenting whimsy, the authors provide solid, well-thought-out, useful information on cutting-edge technology." - Kikrus
"An excellent survey of nearly ready technology for science lovers who don't want to embarrass themselves when speculating about areas outside their own scientific interests." - Library Journal
"Space elevators, gold asteroids, and fusion-powered toasters - who knew science could be so much fun? And who knew fun could be so scientific? Soonish is hilarious, provocative, and shamelessly informative." – Tim Harford, author of Messy and The Undercover Economist
"Basically, I think this book is a masterpiece, and something I wish I'd written myself." – Scott Aaronson, David J. Bruton Centennial Professor of Computer Science at the University of Texas at Austin and author of Quantum Computing Since Democritus
"Playful, yet deep." – Dr. George Church, Harvard University
"I love this book so much I 3D printed myself a second heart so I could love it more." – Dr. Phil Plait, astronomer, author, writer of the Bad Astronomy Blog
"Kelly and Zach promised me a crystal ball, but what I got is both more insightful and far more entertaining than staring into a dumb glass orb. Soonish will make you laugh and - without you even realizing it - give you insight into the most ambitious technological feats of our time. You should read this book, sooner than soonish." - Alexis Ohanian, Cofounder of Reddit
This information about Soonish was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Dr. Kelly Weinersmith received her PhD in Ecology at the University of California Davis, and is an adjunct faculty member in the BioSciences Department at Rice University. Kelly studies parasites that manipulate the behavior of their hosts, and her research has been featured in The Atlantic, National Geographic, BBC World, Science, and Nature. When she isn't studying Nature's creepiest wonders, Kelly is writing books with her husband, Zach Weinersmith (creator of Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal Comics). Their first book, Soonish: Ten Emerging Technologies That'll Improve and/or Ruin Everything, was a New York Times Bestseller.
Link to Kelly Weinersmith, Zach Weinersmith's Website
Name Pronunciation
Kelly Weinersmith, Zach Weinersmith: WEE-ner-smith
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It is among the commonplaces of education that we often first cut off the living root and then try to replace its ...
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