Scientific and Ordinary Action: Ethnomethodology and Social Studies of Science

  • Michael Lynch
Cambridge University Press, £14.95, $21.95

An empirical approach to the sociology of scientific knowledge that attempts to avoid the pitfalls of ‘scientism’ and ‘foundationalism’.

Science, Nonscience, and Nonsense: Approaching Environmental Literacy

  • Michael Zimmerman
Johns Hopkins University Press, $14.95, £12.50

“Zimmerman's account of [the battle between creationists and Darwinian evolutionists] is fascinating and at times frightening”, John Adams, Nature 381, 125 (1996).

Krakatau: The Destruction and Reassembly of an Island Ecosystem

  • Ian Thornton
Harvard University Press, $18.95, £12.50

“Exciting, information-rich⃛ will provide hours of truly pleasurable reading and also clear and deep insights into the fascinating biology of islands, the struggle to construct comprehensive theories for difficult processes and the techniques for preserving species diversity”, Lawrence B. Slobodkin, Nature 381, 205 (1996).

The Snow Leopard

  • Peter Matthiessen
Vintage, £5.99

Matthiessen recounts his 1973 trip with the field biologist George Schaller to the Himalayas in search of the rare snow leopard, and tells of the inner spiritual journey that it engendered.

Higher Superstition: The Academic Left and Its Quarrels with Science

  • Paul R. Gross &
  • Norman Levitt
Johns Hopkins University Press, $16.95, £14

Since its publication in 1994, this book has been at the centre of the ‘science wars’. “Convincing, and therefore frightening⃛. This is a conversation that needs many participants — including, most especially, those who have chosen to ignore or shrug off what has become an embarrassment to serious scholarship”, Donald Kennedy, Nature, 368, 409 (1994).

Hunting Down the Universe: The Missing Mass, Primordial Black Holes and Other Dark Matters

  • Michael Hawkins
Abacus, £7.99

“A good yarn. But I think the actual situation is more prosaic and less polarized⃛. In due course, as more data on quasar fluctuations accumulate, [the author's] hypothesis is very likely to be disproved to the satisfaction of any sapient individual”, William H. Press, Nature 388, 138 (1997).