Book Description

Using game theory and examples of actual games people play, Nobel laureate Manfred Eigen and Ruthild Winkler show how the elements of chance and rules underlie all that happens in the universe, from genetic behavior through economic growth to the composition of music.

To illustrate their argument, the authors turn to classic games--backgammon, bridge, and chess--and relate them to physical, biological, and social applications of probability theory and number theory. Further, they have invented, and present here, more than a dozen playable games derived from scientific models for equilibrium, selection, growth, and even the composition of RNA.

Customer Reviews (2)

Do yourself a favor and read this
This book changed my view of things by supplying a logical basis for the relation among particles and giving me a new view of randomness and order. This is one of the most important books I ever read.Read it slowly.Don't worry if you have to read a sentence several times.It is worth it.

5 for Content, 3 for Readability
The content is fantastic, and I'm incredibly glad I purchased this book (actually, it was a gift). I'm only about halfway through, but already have ideas for a few dozen applications I want to implement based on the information contained there. Always a dabbler in game theory, it's nice to have my understanding of it expanded beyond _The Evolution of Cooperation_.

My only complaint is that it is very difficult to read. Translated from the German, it lost something along the way. I find myself rereading sections again and again- and not just because it's a little above my level of expertise but also because the translation is a bit opaque.

That complaint though is minor. Excellent work, and I'm ready to start applying this to software projects. ... Read more

Book Description
This fascinating work, co-authored by a Nobel Prize winning scientist, extends Darwin's ideas on natural selection back into evolutionary time and applies them to the molecular "fossil record" that preceded the origin of life.Using the techniques of molecular biology, the book demonstrates
that life on Earth is the inevitable result of certain chance events that took place in the unique history of our planet.Further, we can not only precisely formulate the laws governing the emergence of life, but we can test them under controlled laboratory conditions.In fact, the authors show
how it is perfectly possible to construct evolutionary accelerators--machines which optimize the conditions for certain events and which can be used to demonstrate their theoretical conclusions in laboratory experiments. The book is organized in three sections.The first 10 chapters form the main
text.Each is introduced by quotations from Thomas Mann's classic novel The Magic Mountain, a work that is deeply concerned with the themes presented here in scientific form.In the second part, important biological ideas form the themes of 15 colorfully illustrated 'vignettes," which can be read
separately or as elaborations on the main text.The final section summarizes key events in the history of molecular biology and includes an extensive glossary of technical terms.Written for a wide audience, and already highly successful in the original German edition, this book brings fresh
insight to the search for evolutionary origins.In addition to general readers, who will find it clear andaccessible, the book will interest students and scientists in biochemistry, molecular biology, microbiology, and evolution. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Origin of life: how simple molecules started to replicate
This is a short book, but full of facts and insights. Eigen presents his ideas about the origin of life, i.e. how "inorganic" molecules started to replicate and fill the earth.The book is full of ingenious new concepts, backed in almost every case by biochemical experimental results (this is something Stuart Kauffman seldoms does: At Home in the Universe is about the same chemical/biochemical processes, but only about consepts, no data to back the ideas). Eigen's book is concise, even too terse. Some knowledge of (bio)chemistry is absolutely required, as the arguments in the book are not just hand waving but show equations and sequences (for those with more verbal approach to evolution, Claus Emmeche book "The Garden in the Machine" gives a good discussion on the relationship between the real life and the artificial model systems used to study it.) ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

The Hypercycle : A Principle of Natural Self Organization
This is a much-overlooked work which provides not only biochemical but mathematical and formal methods for describing self-organization. It presents, in graph theoretical terms, a toplogical analysis of what ittakes for a process to be robustly self-organizing. Should be read bycomputer scientists, as well as biochemists. A key reference for hierarchytheory and autopoiesis. ... Read more

Product Description
A 1985 report of the proceedings of this scientific panel, featuring many top scientists of the time. ... Read more

Book Description
This book focuses on a new aspect of RNA virology: the highly dynamic, heterogeneous and plastic nature of RNA viruses which comprise more than 75% of the viruses that have been recognized as disease agents. It is the first attempt to bridge the gap from the basic, theoretical formulations underlying error-prone replications and generation of quasispecies, to their impact on how RNA viruses adapt and cause disease. ... Read more