New Books in Science

Why we must rethink our residency on the planet to understand the connected challenges of tribalism, inequity, climate justice, and democracy. How can we respond to the current planetary ecological emergency? In To Know the World: A New Vision for Environmental Learning (MIT Press, 2020), Mitchell Thomashow proposes that we revitalize, revisit, and reinvigorate how we think about our residency on...

The first book to combine exquisite cartographical charts of the Moon with a thorough exploration of the Moon’s role in popular culture, science, and myth. President John F. Kennedy’s rousing “We will go to the Moon” speech in 1961 before the US Congress catalyzed the celebrated Apollo program, spurring the US Geological Survey’s scientists to map the Moon. Over the next eleven years a team of twe...

Mice are used as model organisms across a wide range of fields in science today--but it is far from obvious how studying a mouse in a maze can help us understand human problems like alcoholism or anxiety. How do scientists convince funders, fellow scientists, the general public, and even themselves that animal experiments are a good way of producing knowledge about the genetics of human behavior?...

Ages before the dawn of modern medicine, wild animals were harnessing the power of nature’s pharmacy to heal themselves. In Doctors by Nature (Princeton UP, 2025), Dr. Jaap de Roode argues that we have underestimated the healing potential of nature for too long and shows how the study of self-medicating animals could impact the practice of human medicine. Drawing on illuminating interviews with le...

Back in 2021, John and Elizabeth sat down with Brandeis string theorist Albion Lawrence to discuss cooperation versus solitary study across disciplines. They sink their teeth into the question, “Why do scientists seem to do collaboration and teamwork better than other kinds of scholars and academics?” The conversation ranges from the merits of collective biography to the influence of place and geo...

The recent coronavirus pandemic proved that the time-old notion seems now truer than ever: that science and politics represent a clash of cultures. But why should scientists simply “stick to the facts” and leave politics to the politicians when the world seems to be falling down around us? Drawing on his experience as both a research scientist and an expert advisor at the centre of government, Ian...

In Flight Paths (HarperCollins, 2023), Rebecca Heisman illuminates the stories and methods of the scientists who unlocked the secrets of bird migration. How and why birds navigate the skies has continually fascinated the human imagination, but only recently have we been able to fully understand these amazing journeys. Flight Paths is the never-before-told saga of how a group of passionate scientis...

Today I’m speaking with Ciara Greene, co-author with Gillian Murphy of the new book, Memory Lane: The Perfectly Imperfect Ways We Remember (Princeton UP, 2025). Ciara is associate professor in the School of Psychology at University College Dublin, where she leads the Attention and Memory Laboratory. The scientific study of human memory has become even more relevant in an age where we have every te...

Models of the Mind: How Physics, Engineering and Mathematics Have Shaped Our Understanding of the Brain (Bloomsbury, 2021) provides a multifaceted and approachable introduction to theoretical neuroscience. It discusses some major topics of the field, including both the milestones from their history and the currently open questions. It's accessible for a general audience, not expecting any previous...

What is our immune system, and how does it work? A vast array of cells, proteins and chemicals spring into action whenever our bodies are damaged, but immunity is not something you can see, touch, or feel. It can fight off malicious bacteria and viruses, locate cancerous growths, and even rewire our brains--but sometimes our own tissues can get caught in its crossfire, with catastrophic consequenc...

“Almost every storyline we’re familiar with suggests that we should banish [darkness] as quickly as possible—because darkness is often presented as a void of doom rather than a force of nature that nourishes lives, including our own.” According to Dark Sky International, 99% of people in the US live under the influence of skyglow. With each artificial light we install, we grow more unfamiliar with...

In this episode, I talk to Eliot Schrefer about his book Queer Ducks (and Other Animals): The Natural World of Animal Sexuality (Katherine Tegen Books, 2022). A quiet revolution has been underway in recent years, with study after study revealing substantial same-sex sexual behavior in animals. Join celebrated author Eliot Schrefer on an exploration of queer behavior in the animal world—from albatr...

Today I talked to Marcia Bjornerud about Turning to Stone: Discovering the Subtle Wisdom of Rocks (Flatiron Books, 2024). Rocks are the record of our creative planet reinventing itself for four billion years. Nothing is ever lost, just transformed. Marcia Bjornerud’s life as a geologist has coincided with an extraordinary period of discovery. From an insular girlhood in rural Wisconsin, she found...

Dr. Dasgupta is a geneticist and internationally recognized anti-racism educator. In this book, she provides a powerful, science-based rebuttal to common fallacies about human difference. Well-meaning physicians, parents, and even scientists today often spread misinformation about what biology can and can’t tell us about our bodies, minds, and identities. In this accessible, myth-busting book, Dr....

Often stereotyped as the land of unflaggingly perfect weather, California has a world-renowned reputation for sunny blue skies and infinitely even-keeled temperatures. But the real story of the Golden State's weather is vastly more complex. From the scorching heat of Death Valley to the coastal redwoods' dripping in dew, California is home to a dizzying array of landscapes and bespoke weather patt...

One of the twentieth century's great paleontologists and science writers, Stephen Jay Gould was, for Bruce S. Lieberman and Niles Eldredge, also a close colleague and friend. In Macroevolutionaries: Reflections on Natural History, Paleontology, and Stephen Jay Gould (Columbia UP, 2024), they take up the tradition of Gould's acclaimed essays on natural history, offering a series of wry and insightf...

When he was six years old, Roger Penrose discovered a sundial in a clearing near his house. Through that machine made of light, shadow, and time, Roger glimpsed a “world behind the world” of transcendently beautiful geometry. It spurred him on a journey to become one of the world’s most influential mathematicians, philosophers, and physicists. Penrose would prove the limitations of general relativ...

Do dogs belong with humans? Scientific accounts of dogs' 'species story,' in which contemporary dog-human relations are naturalised with reference to dogs' evolutionary becoming, suggest that they do. Dog Politics: Species Stories and the Animal Sciences (Manchester UP, 2024) by Dr. Mariam Motamedi Fraser dissects this story. This book offers a rich empirical analysis and critique of the developme...

There are many routes to mental well-being. In this groundbreaking book, neuroscientist Camilla Nord offers a fascinating tour of the scientific developments that are revolutionising the way we think about mental health, showing why and how events--and treatments--can affect people in such different ways. In The Balanced Brain: The Science of Mental Health (Princeton UP, 2024), Nord explains how o...

Climate change is among the most significant challenges facing modern society, and it impacts everyone across the world. How do people in different socio-cultural contexts perceive the climate crisis, and how willing are they to engage in climate-related action? In this episode, we will compare perceptions about climate change and willingness for climate action in South Korea and Finland, two coun...

Beyond the Sea: The Hidden Life in Lakes, Streams, and Wetlands (Johns Hopkins UP, 2024) is an exciting foray into Earth's inland waters, the remarkable species they contain, and the conservation challenges of protecting them. In Beyond the Sea, he introduces readers to the world's most remarkable and varied inland waters, including massive lakes that fill only once a century, groundwaters miles b...

Many people believe that, at its core, biological sex is a fundamental, diverging force in human development. According to this overly familiar story, differences between the sexes are shaped by past evolutionary pressures―women are more cautious and parenting-focused, while men seek status to attract more mates. In each succeeding generation, sex hormones and male and female brains are thought to...

Peter Godfrey-Smith knows his cephalopods. Once of CUNY and now a professor of history and philosophy of science at University of Sydney, his truly capacious career includes books such as Theory and Reality (2003; 2nd edition in 2020), Darwinian Populations and Natural Selection (2009) and most recently Metazoa. RtB--including two Brandeis undergraduates as guest hosts, Izzy Dupré and Miriam Fisch...

Over 4.5 billion years, Earth's climate has transformed tremendously. Before our more temperate recent past, the planet swung from one extreme to another--from a greenhouse world of sweltering temperatures and high sea levels to a "snowball earth" in which glaciers reached the equator. During this history, we now know, living things and the climate have always influenced and even shaped each other...

Recent social and political psychological research indicates that increased access to ancestry testing has strengthened the notion of genetic essentialism among some groups, or the idea that our biology ties us to particular ethnic identities. This can boost a sense of cultural pride and prosocial behaviors among communities that are perceived to be similar. In the worst-case scenarios, however, t...