What do you think?
Rate this book
第三种文化：洞察世界的新途径
所谓“第三种文化”，简单说就是人文、科学之外的另一种文化，第三种文化是打破纯粹人文和科学分野的文化，是用新的方式沟通两种文化的努力。倡导和实践“第三种文化”的人，是一批非典型的科学家和思想家，涉猎范围非常广泛，跨学科跨领域，具有特别的思维风格，更具包容性，他们的研究和写作更加贴近真实的世界和大众，代表这种新文化的一些科学家和思想家，正在逐步取代传统知识分子的地位，通过自己的工作和阐释性写作，向人们揭示”人生的意义“、”我们是谁”、“我们是什么”这些常识层面的问题。他们给公众指出了一种洞察世界的新途径。
305 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1995
16 people are currently reading
792 people want to read
About the author
John Brockman
68 books615 followersJohn Brockman is an American literary agent and author specializing in scientific literature. He established the Edge Foundation, an organization that brings together leading edge thinkers across a broad range of scientific and technical fields.
He is author and editor of several books, including: The Third Culture (1995); The Greatest Inventions of the Past 2000 Years (2000); The Next Fifty Years (2002) and The New Humanists (2003).
He has the distinction of being the only person to have been profiled on Page One of the "Science Times" (1997) and the "Arts & Leisure" (1966), both supplements of The New York Times.
He is author and editor of several books, including: The Third Culture (1995); The Greatest Inventions of the Past 2000 Years (2000); The Next Fifty Years (2002) and The New Humanists (2003).
He has the distinction of being the only person to have been profiled on Page One of the "Science Times" (1997) and the "Arts & Leisure" (1966), both supplements of The New York Times.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
June 17, 2017
While my academic career has focused on the humanities, this book changed my mind about the "STEM" fields. From evolutionary biology to physics to philosophy to math to computer science, Brockman compiles the latest and greatest contributors to share their ideas with the public in an approachable way. This is very useful for interdisciplinary studies!
June 12, 2021
Full of amazing ideas, but lousily written. Many of the once controversial concepts in the book became a household norm (I was so shocked that Life Science were not considered as precise science in the first half of the 20th century!). If there is any grand scientific concept changing, it's that new scientific findings are almost always group discovery now, not by some big names who could magically come up with new ideas from nowhere. If this book could be rewritten as a 21st century edition, it should not be organized by those leading scientists, but by the topic itself. The book's structure is a mess. All ideas are scattered everywhere.
March 17, 2010
Brockman is an interesting man and a good editor for this anthology. The premise of Third Culture is unique: taking its title and approach from C.P. Snow's famed essay "The Two Cultures", which concerned the divide between liberal arts/social sciences knowledge fields and knowledge of the hard and life sciences in society, Brockman has brought together essays from leading scientists such as Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, and Lynn Margulis about their specific areas of science and geared towards a lay readership, thus explaining cutting-edge research (at the time of publication, around 1996, at least) in a way people can understand its importance.
In general, it's a good collection, but it's heavy on the biosciences and I would have liked to have seen more on the so-called hard sciences (physics, chemistry, astronomy) and also some inclusion of various aspects of applied engineering. Someone who is an engineer or scientist yet involved in national policy like Dr. Janet Fender (optics expert and USAF scientist) would have been great in this volume. Moreover, there is not enough bringing together the various essays . . . Brockman himself could have, and should have, written more supportive material to make clear how what, say, Dennett writes of is associated with another author's content. It feels too thrown-together in places, and yet if you know how bright and detail-oriented Brockman is, you'd expect him to have a fine-tailored effort without nearly a comma out of place. That said, it's a rare anthology and contains some great writing.
In general, it's a good collection, but it's heavy on the biosciences and I would have liked to have seen more on the so-called hard sciences (physics, chemistry, astronomy) and also some inclusion of various aspects of applied engineering. Someone who is an engineer or scientist yet involved in national policy like Dr. Janet Fender (optics expert and USAF scientist) would have been great in this volume. Moreover, there is not enough bringing together the various essays . . . Brockman himself could have, and should have, written more supportive material to make clear how what, say, Dennett writes of is associated with another author's content. It feels too thrown-together in places, and yet if you know how bright and detail-oriented Brockman is, you'd expect him to have a fine-tailored effort without nearly a comma out of place. That said, it's a rare anthology and contains some great writing.
July 23, 2013
I love the idea of scientists displacing "public intellectuals", though I think Brockman's idea is strained. What does language being an instinct (Steven Pinker) have to do with the earth being an integrated living system (Lynn Margulus) have to do with machine intelligence (Marvin Minsky)? The difficulty is having this constellation of edge-of-science ideas organized into a coherent theme, while saying something more than just "yay science!"
To me the most amazing (though thoroughly unsupported by scientific evidence) theory encountered in this book is that natural selection operates not just on life forms, but universes. If (if!!!) black holes generate universes which generate black holes which generate universes, perhaps there is selective pressure for universe to be born when produce the maximum number of black holes.
The the most schadenfreudely satisfying experience was seeing Roger Penrose's theory on consciousness followed by an avalanche of criticism. Penrose thinks the brain is non-computational because hey Godel, and because quantum mechanics. I was glad to see me sea-sicknesses echoed by others.
To me the most amazing (though thoroughly unsupported by scientific evidence) theory encountered in this book is that natural selection operates not just on life forms, but universes. If (if!!!) black holes generate universes which generate black holes which generate universes, perhaps there is selective pressure for universe to be born when produce the maximum number of black holes.
The the most schadenfreudely satisfying experience was seeing Roger Penrose's theory on consciousness followed by an avalanche of criticism. Penrose thinks the brain is non-computational because hey Godel, and because quantum mechanics. I was glad to see me sea-sicknesses echoed by others.
December 7, 2018
Brockman's discusses C.P Snow's seminal essay: Two Cultures where Snow describes two polar groups who don't talk to each other: the scientists and the literary intellectuals "who incidentally while no one was looking took to referring to themselves as 'intellectuals' as though there were no others".
Brockman then introduces the: third culture: scientists and other thinkers in the empirical world who, through their work and expository writing, are taking the place of the traditional intellectual. (Think popular scientists like Richard Dawkins and Steven Pinker.)
He presents essays from various scientists from a range of fields who are also known for their writing ability.
My problem with this book is there isn't a discernable thread running through the selection of essays, and many weren't of any interest to me.
Brockman then introduces the: third culture: scientists and other thinkers in the empirical world who, through their work and expository writing, are taking the place of the traditional intellectual. (Think popular scientists like Richard Dawkins and Steven Pinker.)
He presents essays from various scientists from a range of fields who are also known for their writing ability.
My problem with this book is there isn't a discernable thread running through the selection of essays, and many weren't of any interest to me.
January 16, 2008
this book is an excellent summary / introduction for non-scientifically inclined friends to read science as if it's literature...
and even tho i'm well versed in most of the authors, it's still a pleasure to read, the clarity, lucidy, and scale of the subject matter... timeless.
fabulous. read it now if you've not.
and even tho i'm well versed in most of the authors, it's still a pleasure to read, the clarity, lucidy, and scale of the subject matter... timeless.
fabulous. read it now if you've not.
September 6, 2014
I picked up this book 20 years after publication. The essays have not passed the test of time.
September 1, 2025
中譯本：第三種文化。簡單說，第三種文化，指的就是科普工作者，包含作家和翻譯者之類。科普的契機則是科學研究拓展到演化、複雜理論後，開始與人文學科傳統的論述場域多有重疊。諸如：宇宙、生命、疾病、遺傳、大腦、心智、生態、人工智能等。道金斯說：「我自己的書，既是把科學家熟知的資料大眾化，也是原創的著作，雖然沒在科學期刊上發表，也沒用上一堆難懂的行話，卻改變了同行科學家的思考方式。我使用的語言，任何一個聰明人都能了解。我希望更多的人這麼做。」我欣喜接受這文化，並敬佩之！
December 20, 2019
(Read all except part 3)
September 17, 2015
The preface of this book sets out to debunk the place of literary intellectuals with the very heavy hand that such intellectuals are jargonistic, anti-realist, arrogant pricks who would usurp the place of the real intellectuals, humble scientists whose work has been long misunderstood. Or something like that. The introduction is kind of off putting, with the claim that literature isn't applicable to anything whereas science is. This position isn't very interesting, although it's been present as a debate between these two sides for too long.
The essays in this book however, are far more interesting and don't have anything to do with the frame of the introduction. Much of the work of these scientists is theoretical, yet they speak in clear mostly unambiguous terms. Brockman seeks to create an intercourse with the public and these scientists who work, often, in the fringes of their communities. That's what he means by third culture. And to some extent it's kind of successful, I think. There's plenty to pick from, and lots of different ideas to choose from. Frankly, it's a little overwhelming. But this is a good introductory text. It's difficult sometimes to make the claim that science is only useful if it yields a useful application. But useful is such a subjective term. And theoretical works are more about reframing issues so as to create new relationships in familiar areas which may be dismissed by traditional methods of inquiry.
So really, this book is exploratory, as theorists tend to be. Interesting reading but it's truly undecidable. Food for thought, really.
The essays in this book however, are far more interesting and don't have anything to do with the frame of the introduction. Much of the work of these scientists is theoretical, yet they speak in clear mostly unambiguous terms. Brockman seeks to create an intercourse with the public and these scientists who work, often, in the fringes of their communities. That's what he means by third culture. And to some extent it's kind of successful, I think. There's plenty to pick from, and lots of different ideas to choose from. Frankly, it's a little overwhelming. But this is a good introductory text. It's difficult sometimes to make the claim that science is only useful if it yields a useful application. But useful is such a subjective term. And theoretical works are more about reframing issues so as to create new relationships in familiar areas which may be dismissed by traditional methods of inquiry.
So really, this book is exploratory, as theorists tend to be. Interesting reading but it's truly undecidable. Food for thought, really.
October 28, 2012
Skvělá kniha esejů. Čtenář by měl ale počítat s tím, kniha ve vás prohloubí dojem, že současné humanitní vědy se živí komentářemi ke komentářům komentářů a že zajímavá témata se dají najít jen v přírodních vědách. Žádná třetí kultura, která by byla syntézou poznatků humanitních a přírodních věd, se nekoná, třetí kulturu v knize zastupují jen eseje přírodovědců, fyziků, astronomů...
October 20, 2019
Na první pohled zajímavé téma píšících vědců, kteří popisují svou práci a své myšlenky, což trochu sráží výběr lidí velmi alternativních a následně komentáře kolegů a konkurentů, kteří často nemají slitování. Velmi zajímavý je doslov, který ukazuje limity současné populární vědecké publicistiky, kdy dotyční neodkáží správně používat terminologii či píší totálním balábile.
Want to read
May 8, 2009This sounds pretty great. I'm very interested in the whole idea of synthesizing the humanities, the social sciences and natural sciences (which is essentially the idea behind "the third culture").
Want to read
January 26, 2008
September 5, 2008
Do you want to know scientists? Read this, you will learn other things to read. Also, Dawkins and Gould were very catty.
Want to read
March 14, 2010Really fascinating essays on the cutting edge of scientific understanding, each followed by criticism and analysis by experts in the field.
to-keep-reference
March 2, 2016 Visión de Paralaje Pág.321 toma el artículo de Nicholas Humphrey que aparece en este libro.
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews