Telmo Pievani's Books

Serendipity

The Unexpected in Science

By: Telmo Pievani

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Serendipity

The Unexpected in Science

By: Telmo Pievani

From the bestselling author of Imperfection, a theory of uncertainty as the very core of the scientific method—and the essence of its wonder. How many times have we looked for something and found something else? A partner, a job, an object? The same thing often happens to scientists: they design an experiment and discover the unexpected, which usually turns out to be very important. This fascinating phenomenon is called serendipity, which takes its name from the mythical Serendip, a place from which, according to a Persian fable, three princes set off to explore the world, making chance discoveries along the way. In Serendipity, the award-winning author of Imperfection Telmo Pievani returns to weave a compelling story about the unexpected in science and its fascinating role in our understanding of the world. Going far beyond the usual examples of penicillin, X-rays, the microwave oven, and Christopher Columbus, Pievani shows that the most surprising stories of serendipity in the history of science reveal profound aspects of the logic of scientific discovery. In this book, he presents for the first time: an archaeology of the idea; a taxonomy of serendipitous discoveries; an “ecology of serendipity” (the surrounding conditions and factors that can promote it); and lastly, a theory of serendipity (why it occurs so frequently in so many sciences). From Zadig to Sherlock Holmes, Pievani shows that such great discoveries are not just the product of luck. Instead, serendipity comes from a mix of cunning, curiosity, sagacity, imagination, and accidents caught on the fly. Serendipity illuminates how much we don’t know and how much we don’t even know we don’t know. Above all, Pievani reminds us that the human brain is of a piece with the world it is investigating—a world so much bigger than our knowledge—and it has also evolved within that world, adapting as it has to.

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Page Count

215

Publisher

MIT Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0262049155

ISBN 13

9780262049153

Architectural Exaptation

When Function Follows Form

By: Alessandro Melis,Telmo Pievani,Jose Antonio Lara-Hernandez

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Architectural Exaptation

When Function Follows Form

By: Alessandro Melis,Telmo Pievani,Jose Antonio Lara-Hernandez

Architectural Exaptation: When Function Follows Form focuses on the significance and the originality of the study of exaptation. It presents exaptation as an opportunity to extend architectural design towards more sustainable approaches aimed at enforcing urban resilience. The use of exaptation’s definition in architecture supports the heuristic value of cross-disciplinary studies on biology and architecture, which seem even more relevant in times of global environmental crises. This book aims to make a critique of the pre-existing and extensive paternalistic literature. Exaptation will be described as a functional shift of a structure that already had a prior, but different, function. In architecture, a functional shift of a structure that already had a function may apply to forms of decorative elements embedded in architectural components, and to both change of function of tectonic elements and the change of use of an architectural space. The book is illustrated with examples from around the globe, including China, Italy, Mexico, New Zealand, the USA and the UK, and looks at different civilizations and diverse historical periods, ranging from the urban to the architectural scale. Such examples highlight the potential and latent human creative capacity to change the use and functions, something that cities and buildings could consider when facing disturbances. Exaptation is shown as an alternative narrative to the simplifications of evolutionary puritanism. It also offers an innovative perspective and presents an opportunity to re-think the manner in which we design and redesign our cities. This book will be of interest to architecture, planning, urban design and biology researchers and students.

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Page Count

209

Publisher

Taylor & Francis

Published Date

ISBN 10

100385026X

ISBN 13

9781003850267

Serendipity

The Unexpected in Science

By: Telmo Pievani

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Serendipity

The Unexpected in Science

By: Telmo Pievani

Average ratings

N/A

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Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

215

Publisher

MIT Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0262049155

ISBN 13

9780262049153

Imperfection

A Natural History

By: Telmo Pievani

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Imperfection

A Natural History

By: Telmo Pievani

In praise of imperfection: how life on our planet is a catalog of imperfections, errors, alternatives, and anomalies. In the beginning, there was imperfection, which became the source of all things. Anomalies and asymmetries caused planets to take shape from the bubbling void and sent light into darkness. Life on earth is a catalog of accidents, alternatives, and errors that turned out to work quite well. In this book, Telmo Pievani shows that life on our planet has flourished and survived not because of its perfection but despite (and perhaps because of) its imperfection. He begins his story with the disruption-filled birth of the universe and proceeds through the random DNA copying errors that fuel evolution, the transformations of advantages into handicaps by natural selection, the anatomical and functional jumble that is the human brain, and our many bodily mismatches. Along the way, Pievani tells readers about the Irish elk (incidentally, neither Irish nor elk), whose enormous antlers serve to illustrate the first two laws of imperfection; the widespread dissemination of costly or useless traits; and the neuroimperfection of the human brain—“a frozen accident of evolution that was not designed from scratch,” as Pievani calls it. He sizes up the alleged perfection of the human body, asking, for example, if everything in our bodies serves a purpose, why do we have appendixes? Why bipedalism, with the inevitable back pain that results? In this fascinating account, Pievani offers the first comprehensive explanatory theory for the ubiquity of imperfection.

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Page Count

177

Publisher

MIT Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0262548356

ISBN 13

9780262548359

Architectural Exaptation

When Function Follows Form

By: Alessandro Melis,Telmo Pievani,Jose Antonio Lara-Hernandez

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Architectural Exaptation

When Function Follows Form

By: Alessandro Melis,Telmo Pievani,Jose Antonio Lara-Hernandez

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N/A

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Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

209

Publisher

Taylor & Francis

Published Date

ISBN 10

100385026X

ISBN 13

9781003850267

Book's by Telmo Pievani

Serendipity

Serendipity

Architectural Exaptation

Architectural Exaptation

Serendipity

Serendipity

Imperfection

Imperfection

Architectural Exaptation

Architectural Exaptation

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