The Quark
and the Jaguar

A quark inside an atom. A jaguar circling his jungle territory. What does one have to do with the other?

What are the connections between nature at its most basic and natural selection, archaeology, linguistics, child development, computers, and other complex adaptive systems? Find out in The Quark and the Jaguar, Nobel laureate Murray Gell-Mann's unique personal vision of the emerging sciences of simplicity and complexity.

"A stimulating, provocative, and uncommon cut across compartments of human knowledge that are usually hermetically sealed. It is always a pleasure to see a first-class mind grappling with the greatest mysteries, and at the same time resisting mysticism."

--Carl Sagan

"A book about how the wonderful diversity of the universe can arise out of a set of fairly simple basic laws. It is written by an expert in both the fundamental laws and the complex structures they can produce."

--Stephen W. Hawking

"An exhilarating voyage of learning. Not a sparrow takes wing, not an idea rises, not a quark quivers that does not inspire Murray Gell-Mann. He has made his life an adventuresome quest along the frontiers of knowledge."

--Bill Movers

"A book every bit as interesting as its author. Gell-Mann weaves together such seemingly disparate elements as chimpanzee behavior, avalanche mechanics, superstring theory, and Shakespeare. Extraordinary!"

--Mark J. Plotkin, author of Tales of a Shaman Apprentice

"A grand tour of one of the most powerful and richly structured complex adaptive systems of our time: the mind of Murray Gell-Mann. The tour is very much worth taking."

--Science

"A most important book." --The Washington Post

|Contact| |Front page| |Contents| |Books|

Copyright © 1996-2018 Alexander Bogomolny

71547370