Sync: How Order Emerges From Chaos In the Universe, Nature, and Daily Life

✍️ Steven H. Strogatz

Tags: steven-h-strogatz , maths , physics , science , lang-en

This is a very well written book. I knew Steven Strogatz from his “Joy of X” podcast and his style of writing is pretty much the same: a very good conversation. I also knew him indirectly from Duncan Watts book Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age as he was Duncan’s PhD advisor. “Sync” is about how synchronicity is more pervasive in life than we perceive.

Strogatz guides the reader through fireflies, coupled oscillators, circadian rhythm, menstrual cycles, quantum physics, small-world networks, fads, herd behavior and even touches briefly on consciousness. He mixes tales from his own research with an overview of seminal works from other leading researchers in the field. There are also some funny anecdotes peppered around the book. One strong point of the book is the simple language and good analogies used by the author to explain the concepts. This simplicity, however, is also a weaknesss. I think in a couple of examples an equation or two would have helped the reader more than an analogy. The quantum physics part was a bit hard to visualize and understand with just words.

Overall this book deserves a solid 4 out 5.