permaculture

[Lawrence London <lfljvenaura@gmail.com>]

Toby Hemenway: What do you think of this book? It looks to be an important 
work.
...maybe not much of a stretch to say that it should reinforce one's
beliefs in the Gaia concept.

The Rainbow And The Worm
http://www.i-sis.org.uk/rnbwwrm.php

"Probably the most important book for the paradigm change" now
reprinted with CDs featuring stunning video images of live organisms.
Buy now at the ISIS online store.
Third Edition Available Now
The Rainbow And The Worm
The Physics of Organisms
by Mae-Wan Ho
Director, Institute of Science in Society

<>

About the Author
After obtaining her PhD in Biochemistry, Hong Kong University, Mae-Wan
Ho embarked on a distinguished research career that included a
postdoctoral fellowship in Neurosciences, University of California at
San Diego, Fellowship of the National Genetics Foundation, USA. Senior
Research Fellow in Biochemistry, University of London, Lecturer in
Genetics then Reader in Biology, Open University. Her research evolved
through biochemistry to molecular genetics, non-Darwinian evolution,
and since 1988, the physics of living organization, defining a new
field with the present book, widely acclaimed by serious scientists
across the disciplines and by non-scientists alike.

A serious, in-depth enquiry into Schrödinger's question, "What is
Life?" and at the same time, a celebration of life itself

A voyage of discovery through many areas of contemporary physics from
non-equilibrium thermodynamics to quantum optics in order to
understand the problem of life

A rare and exquisite view of the organism, giving novel insights, not
only into the physics, but also "the poetry and meaning of being
alive"

Contents:

    What is It to be Alive?
    Do Organisms Contravene the Second Law?
    Can the Second Law Cope with Organized Complexity?
    Energy Flow and Living Cycles
    How to Catch a Falling Electron
    Towards a Thermodynamics of Organized Complexity
    Sustainable Systems as Organisms
    The Seventy-Three Octaves of Nature’s Music
    The Coherent Excitation of the Body Electric
    The Solid State Cell
    “Life is a Little Electric Current”
    How Coherent is the Organism? The Heartbeat of Health
    How Coherent is the Organism? Sensitivity to Weak Electromagnetic Fields
    Life is All the Colours of the Rainbow in a Worm
    The Liquid Crystalline Organism
    Crystal Consciousness
    Liquid Crystalline Water
    Quantum Entanglement and Coherence
    The Ignorance of the External Observer
    Time and Freewill

Readership: General

<>

Reviews and Quotes

"A very original survey of how biology may be linked to physics
through the concepts of coherence and of coupled processes. Although
deeply serious, the writing has a pleasant touch of gaiety, due to the
author’s sense of excitement in the central problem: What constitutes
‘being alive’?"

K.G. Denbigh, Emeritus Professor of Physical Chemistry, Queen
Elizabeth College, and distinguished author of many books on
non-equilibrium thermodynamics

"The layman may not understand half of this book, but he will
understand more than he expects to or may feel he has any right to.
The author, whether discussing ‘quantum en-entanglement’ or
‘energy-flow’, ‘dynamic order’ or life as ‘collective response to weak
signals’, has the gift of making the reader dream."

P.N. Furbank, Emeritus Professor of English, Open University and
author of many scholarly books and biographies

"..an excellent introduction to the more physically motivated
approaches to understanding biological complexity. And there’s not a
gel in sight."

Douglas B. Kell, Trends in Biochemical Sciences

"It is high time a good book was available to not only teach
biologists some physics, particularly bioenergetics, but make them sit
up and think a bit more deeply about it. This little volume is more
readable than other drier and much weightier books on the subject."

Cell Biology International

"The book is the coming together of many highly exciting ideas of
contemporary physics…one that draws on a range of experiment and
theory, and illuminates Ho’s definition of life as a ‘process of being
an organizing whole’."

American Scientist

"…’what is life?’ Mae-Wan Ho presents an interconnected system of
proposals, experimental results and conjectures which go a large way
towards proving an entirely new answer to this question. It is based
on research which is mainstream in its theoretical physical
foundations, though innovatory in some of its techniques. This makes
the book highly important, and if she is right it would be
revolutionary."

Network

"…a fascinating excursion towards and beyond the limits of physical
science fifty year on from Schrödinger’s classic."

David Llyod, Binary-Computing in Microbiology

"…a truly stimulating and beautifully written book, full of new
perspectives and researchable ideas."

Ervin Laszlo, author of many books including The Whispering Pond

"..a remarkably eclectic work, joyously written and a joy to read. I
certainly learned a lot from it."

Geoffrey Sewell, Professor of Physics, and author of Quantum Physics
of Collective Phenomena

"…the author clearly understands the "whys" of the world at a depth
and breadth which no one else approaches ….clinical medicine requires
this kind of insight."

Walter Bortz, MD, author of Dare to be 100

"The book is recommended to all scientists who are interested in
understanding life….Fifty years after Schrödinger’s "What is Life?",
this book is a worthy instalment, since it intensifies the original
matter of Schrödinger."

Fritz-Albert Popp, International Institute of Biophysics, Germany