Science Matters

• Achieving Scientific Literacy
• By: Robert M. Hazen, James Trefil
• Narrated by: Fred Sanders

18 insightful essays on chemistry, physics, geology, astronomy, and biology will help listeners understand today’s science news.

The book is very simple, especially in the early chapters, and builds on that foundation to culminate in today’s controversial topics in the last few chapters.

For the young earth versus evolution versus intelligent design, the author uses several lines of evidence to convince the reader that a young earth theorist must accept that a creator needs to insert much information hinting at the long past at that time of creation. He pretty much refutes smart design by claiming that ID advocates haven’t come up with a workable theory (how would they?) He tackles the problem by stating progress. Chemistry versus ID should be taught in a classroom outside of the science department.

The previous chapter on climate change was shorter than I expected and ended with a question rather than a conclusion. Before that, he offered several renewable energy solutions but did not spend time discussing the practicality of each solution. I found it interesting that he did not mention renewable (carbon neutral) in the potential cellulose recycling mentioned in the previous chapter. Did I miss something or did he skip the nuclear power option entirely in the last chapter? These are minor critiques and I think he wrote a well-balanced summary of where we are in science, even highlighting the difference between satellite data versus surface data.

Each chapter summarizes the volume of information in an organized and efficient manner. There are times when you wish the author would take a topic to the next level but it’s unrealistic in a book. Overall, well done and keeps things interesting in a field that would otherwise be boring to many.

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