Closer To Truth : Science, Meaning, and the Future

"Closer to Truth" explores the latest scientific research, philosophical thinking, and expressions of human creativity.

Some of the world's most esteemed experts - Nobel laureates, best-selling authors, and renowned scholars - engage in conversations that combine hard facts with an inspiring - and breathtaking - look into our future.

Based on the U.S. television programme of the same name, this book features distinguished specialists who forcefully debate provocative subjects such as: who gets to validate alternative medicine?

How does basic science support national security? Can we believe in both religion and science? At the heart is the question: how will scientific advances and the philosophical issues they create affect the individual as well as humanity as a whole?

Whether the subject is the meaning of human consciousness, the ethics of testing experimental drugs on sick people, scientific thinking versus religious beliefs, or how music may help mental development, "Closer to Truth" uncovers exciting new lines of inquiry and offers fresh perspectives. Participants include Nobel laureates Murray Gell-Mann and David Baltimore; authors Michael Crichton, Octavia Butler and David Brin; astrophysicists Alan Guth and Neil deGrasse Tyson; planetary scientist Bruce Murray; physicist Steven Koonin; quantum theorist Seth Lloyd; molecular biologist Lucy Shapiro; neuroscientists Nancy Andreasen, Terry Sejnowski and Christof Koch; psychiatrist Leslie Brothers; "Psychology Today's" Robert Epstein; musicologists Jeanne Bamberger and Robert Freeman; ethicist Alexander Capron; skeptic Michael Shermer; theologian Nancey Murphy; and Islamic scientist Muzaffar Iqbal.

Debates include numerous controversial issues, such as alternative medicine, autism, and religion.

Contributors include many well-known figures, including Michael Crichton and two Nobel Prize winners.