Doubt and Certainty: The Celebrated Academy: Debates on Science, Mysticism, Reality, in General on the Knowable and Unknowable, with Partic

The subtitle of Doubt and Certainty provides a good example of why overly clever writing doesn't necessarily make for a good subtitle--nor for a first-rate book. Rothman (A Physicist on Madison Avenue) and Sudarshan, former director of the Center for Particle Theory at the University of Texas-Austin, express two goals here: to reconnect science with our broader culture and to reclaim ideas such as quantum field theory from Deepak Chopra and other like writers. Is all science truly relative, as the authors claim? What constitutes certainty and uncertainty? Do seemingly outlandish theories that have captured the public's imagination--the existence of multiple universes, for instance--enjoy widespread acceptance by scientists? The authors pack a great deal of interesting information into their book, and, at their best, they clarify murky topics such as string theory in an exemplary way. But too often their writing reads like note cards cobbled together, and the book's structure--which Rothman and Sudarshan imagine as a cross between Plato's Republic and 1001 Nights--makes the prose maddeningly slow to get through in places. Whimsy and humor are tricky in fiction, let alone difficult scientific topics, unless you're Edwin Abbott or Lewis Carroll. But despite these flaws, the book may fly with popular science readers, because of the wide variety of topics covered and the welcoming, lighthearted approach. Illus. by Shannon K. Comins. (Dec.)