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On Mon, 22 May 2006, F.V.Tkachov wrote:
> The primitive instinct is to run with the crowd. Humans, of course,
> bla-bla-bla about why they follow the crowd, but the truth is, it's simply
> the lemming instinct.
This is the 2nd time lemmings come up in this discussion with
respect to their alleged instincts to follow some unreasonable behavior
like for example commiting suicide. Let me draw your attention to
a book by the "renaissance man" Professor Dennis Chitty: "Do Lemmings
Commit Suicide? Beautiful Hypotheses and Ugly Facts", Oxford University
Press 1996. The book offers "an autobiographical account of a life's work
in scientific research", with many quotations from noted physicists
such as Schrodinger, Dirac, or Pauli. Many a physicist can learn
from this book how to perform experimental research, and also
how *not* to do it. The book is witty, engaging, authoritative,
humorous, and also highly controversial.
The book is available on line from the following link:
http://www.us.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/LifeSciences/HistoryPhilosophyofBiology/?view=usa&ci=9780195097863&view=usa
An acidic criticism of the book can be found here:
http://www.esajournals.org/esaonline/?request=get-document&issn=0012-9658&volume=078&issue=06&page=1934
The departamental note on Professor Chitty's book can be found here:
http://www.zoo.utoronto.ca/zfa/Newsletter-htm/apr-04/chitty.htm
When reading Professor Citty's book I was constantly laughing, not to the
least extend because I could see many similarities between what he
described and my certain collegaues in physics. Hope you will find this
book interesting.
W.
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Received on Mon May 22 2006 - 22:57:52 UTC