Rating: 
Summary: Opens up thought, inspiring, many possibilities with it
Review: One of the best books perhaps ever written in science as it reveals that patterns in universal systems are probably not random but simple and that they can be accomplished with simple mathematical formulas on a computer leaving open the possibilities that one can improvise on a formula and find its likeness in nature. Or, that one can create something new in any theory. The photos, tables, and pictures are wonderful--the snowflakes, seashells, etc. It is well written in that he leaves many open ended discussions including well established main theories (since they could be incorrect such as some recently disproven by other scientists). Choppey in the sense that he leaves out much regarding Chemistry--atomic structure theory, yet a chemist could probably improvise on the formulas. It is simply written and covers many areas of the sciences and some humanities areas. As a non-scientist, I would easily say that his book seems to restate what Einstein said something to that many do not see what can be, just what is... In Wolfram's notes, he mentions how many complex formulas have not been investigated eventhough at least one yielded a better fuel system for cars--high octane or whatever. This, leaving open possibilities that many environmentally correct ways may be found by looking at the complexities. Amazing book!
Rating: 
Summary: On the Principle of Computational Equivalency
Review: This book builds up to the last chapter in which the author presents his hypothesis: the Principle of Computational Equivalency (PCE). The principle states that there cannot exist a process on the universe that can compute something that cannot be computed by a Turing machine (or a cellular automata, or any other universal computational device). The fact that every machine is Turing-equivalent is not news to computer scientists. The PCE extends Turing-equivalency by hypothesizing that human beings, quantum mechanics, complex systems, etc. are all also Turing machines. Of course, this hypothesis can't be proven, nor easily disproven, so the contributions in this book remain merely inspirational.In general, the book seems to me to be a big dissapointment. However, it does have a lot of pretty pictures!
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Summary: A Pied Piper of Hamelin in Modern Dress
Review: For me there is nothing new about Wolfram's primary ideas. I have toyed with such notions for a quarter of a century, and so have a great many other people. Such ideas have power, but it is a very different question whether they have physical plausibility at the most fundamental level, and a necessity that goes beyond redundancy in offering more than do scores of other competing 'explanations' of the physical world, at the tiniest, intermediate, and largest scales. A passage in Montaigne's Essays (book One, Chapter 50: "On Democritus and Heraclitus") is pertinent: "Things in themselves perhaps have their own weights, measures, and states; but inwardly, when they enter into us, the mind cuts them to its own conceptions." I think the mind of Wolfram cuts them short! Moreover, I feel that, for the moment at least, the attractions of cellular automata - like a carnival that snags eye, ear, and leg through its tricks, bustle, and strangeness - are meretricious. But my greatest objection to cellular automata lies in my belief that little of what is thought essential to them is, and what is is not peculiar to them. In short, they are merely little mirrors of a much greater idea, or a deeper and more comprehensive truth; one which, to begin with, is neither cellular nor automatic, and which is discrete (or 'binary') only as a process of transformation, when it is discrete at all. As a neuroscientist, I have seen, over 30 years, not dissimilar errors - errors, for example, of misplaced emphasis, extrinsic formalization, and naively truncated research into physical detail and parallel mechanisms - plague abortive theories of the brain. .................. I am anxious that this excessively clever fellow not be allowed to become, through an initial absence of penetrating criticism of his ideas, and his megalomanical and almost autistic obsessions, another Pied Piper of Hamelin, in an age which is already blurring the distinction between the real (and natural) and the artificial (and fanciful), to a degree that could soon become pathological. Incidentally, in Browning's homonymous poem, which he wrote in 1824, the Pied Piper of Hamelin "is a musician who, according to an old German legend, came, in 1284, fantastically dressed, to Hamelin in Prussia, and offered for a sum of money to rid Hamelin of its rats. He charmed the rats by his piping into the river Weser, where they drowned." So at first the Piper was a heroic figure. Later, however, "as the reward was withheld, he in revenge by his magic piping drew the one hundred and thirty children of the town to a cavern in a hill, which closed after them forever." In real life, most heroes ARE piebald figures. At bottom, I find Wolfram's youthful but embarrassingly perseverative love affair with cellular automata deeply amusing: Two decades ago, to caution the ardor of a friend of mine, Prof. Edward Fredkin - whose pioneering work upon, and advocacy of, cellular automata, in fact later led to Wolfram's own bewitchment - I constructed an instructive list of "250 Single Things People Have Tried To Reduce All of Nature To". Some of the more conventional rival candidates have been matter, mass, energy, time, space, number or mathematics, points, lines, spirit, mind, ideas, God, machines, motion, vortices, nothing, and life (biology), apart from the 233 OTHER 'sole fundamental entities' I was able to recall on the spur of a moment - while confronting a Plenum of ulterior possibilities. The monoideistic advocates of these '1-substance' metaphysics (or cosmologies) were often just as bright, confident, and fanatical as their latest fashionable successor, or avatar, S. Wolfram. The latter's faith in his own uniqueness, at least, is anything BUT unique!
Rating:
Summary: Pioneers of the "New Science"
Review: There are many complaints about this book's lack of proper credit assignment to the true pioneers of the "new science."
In 1967, Konrad Zuse himself (who built the first programmable computers 1935-1941) also was the first to propose that the physical universe is computed on a cellular automaton. He called this "Rechnender Raum" or "Computing Space." Zuse's book came out in 1969; he didn't try a marketing blitz though. You can find a pdf scan of his 1967 paper on the web.
Ed Fredkin published similar ideas (also on the web).
And here is the well-known simple algorithm for computing all universes, including ours, if it is computable indeed:
-- Order all programs lexicographically. The first is run for one instruction every second step, the next for one instruction every second of the remaining steps, and so on.--
A bit of thought shows that the method even has the optimal order of complexity. For example, it outputs our universe history as quickly as the history's fastest program, save for a (possibly huge) constant that does not depend on output size.
The algorithm was taken from page 1 of a 1997 publication (also on the web): J. Schmidhuber. A computer scientist's view of life, the universe, and everything. In C. Freksa, M. Jantzen, and R. Valk, editors, Foundations of Computer Science: Potential - Theory - Cognition, volume 1337, pages 201--208. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer, Berlin, 1997. The best book on randomness, simplicity, and complexity is Li and Vitanyi's textbook on Kolmogorov complexity, 1997.
If you'd like to learn more about the origins of the "new science," you might want to check out the thousands of messages in Wei Dai's searchable everything mailing list archive (also on the web).
Wolfram's book has nice pictures though.
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Summary: this subject matter will be textbooked in 50 years or less
Review: I'm about a quarter of the way through this massive beast, and I can't stop reading! Wolfram talks about complexity very simply and clearly. His notions are absolutely in the face of many scientific branches, continuing to give me pause and take my breath page after page. And judging by the reviewers here who are slammming him and his ideas, his theories will be wildly successful--all great ideas fall on hard times and criticism from the mediocre before they reach acceptance. I just may live to see his science change the world. If not, my children certainly will.
Rating: 
Summary: Wolfram Is Not as Revolutionary as I am
Review: Stephen Wolfram is making a lot of noise about his "new kind of science," and the revolutionary impact it will have. But Wolfram is wrong, because his theories are not as revolutionary as my own. If you really want to know about the "new kind of science" you will find it in my work, not his. Let me explain why I can so confidently make this statement. First, the issue of computers. While Stephen is right that computers will play an important role in the new kind of science, he failed to realize that his computer is not as good as mine. He has a pathetic, outdated model manufactured more than two months ago, while I buy a new computer each time a new breakthrough is made in micrprocessor speed and memory. Thus, my computer models are better than Wolfram's. Also, Wolfram does not and cannot account for the amazing scientific discoveries made by ME using MY computers. I am a recognized pioneer in the field of quantum mitosis, and my studies of the statistical entropic confabulations of subcognitive querktons have become benchmarks in modern science. But I don't remember Wolfram ever calling ME to discuss these important breakthroughs. Looks like it's back to the drawing board, Steve. Your supposedly all-encompassing new science may draw admiring glances for a week or two, but MY ideas are better. Right now, I'm even working on a grand unified theory of cognitive assonance which will allow me to objectively determine the degree to which Wolfram's ideas are inferior to my own, and finally get the crab grass out of my lawn. Who's your daddy, Wolfy?
Rating:
Summary: Here's the trouble:
Review: In theory, Wolfram is handing us the cellular automata version of Godel Escher Bach, Fermat's last theorem, complexity, and a Brief History of Time. Only his ego is very much in the way. As with other projects of this magnitude, the author can't help but feel that the opportunities for applying the new method and the new way of thinking will change e v e r y t h i n g. But at the same time he is obsessed with having the last word on the subject. And in order to do that he had to include all the
footnotes and full regalia. Trying to split the middle (between popular science and full
length articles for scientists) didn't work.
Rating: 
Summary: Pretty patterns
Review: The mathematics aren't new and the science isn't really revolutionary, but as an artist friend of mine has pointed out, the pictures are excellent as inspiration for new patterns in knitting, weaving or modern art.
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Summary: A book to keep you thinking
Review: This is the kind of book wich will have, on one side, a very strong opposition and on the other some support from the scientific community. The main problem why it will get bad reviews will be the author's way of not giving credit to others, writting in first person with little politeness, being very direct and clear on what he thinks -- and other style matters (he is aware of this, and it's mentioned in one of the first notes). So far, so good. I was amazed he bravely only mentioned Einsten, Newton, Von Newmann and others a few times (altough there are more mentions on the notes). A work of this magnitude shouldn't be judge by the author style or desire for credit or (even) megalomania. The thruth is that he brings a lot of topics, old and new, to be reviewed, he brings lots of questions on them, and gives ideas and analysis on such topics. Among other things, he expresses his views on the 2nd law of thermodynamics being wrong, in the many interpretations of chaos, randomness, QED and others, and answering in a rethoric way 'this hasn't been *clearly* answered for centuries' goes ahead with his view. I think that affirmations are honest (and time will tell whether his theories are right or completely wrong). But at least he bring the topics and restated the all-time questions. This book will make you think on many topics, that's for sure. It's not only cellular automata, it's lots of other things that are around the world, most of them very interesting and that requiere a re-thinking from time to time.
Rating:
Summary: STEAL THIS BOOK
Review: Bottom line: Nothing in this book is new, exciting, or thought provoking. This book is hardly worth the paper it is printed on. The author continually aludes to the idea of "a new kind of science" that is "developed" in this book. After reading the book all the way through, and the first 3 chapters twice more, I for the life of me can not find any clear statement of what this "new science" is. However, as a science undergraduate (mathematics) I found it instructive to read the book. Wolfram's deplorable organization (for instance, no thesis statements) and terrible grammar make me appreciate the criticism of my own writings all the more.
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