In a Flight of Starlings: The Wonder of Complex Systems

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La matematica e la fisica, e tutta la scienza, non si poggiano solo sulla natura degli oggetti/enti, ma sulle loro interazioni/relazioni The world is shaped by complexity. In this enlightening book, Nobel Prize winner Giorgio Parisi guides us through his unorthodox yet exhilarating work to show us how. It all starts with investigating the principles of physics by observing the sophisticated flight patterns of starlings. Studying the movements of these birds, he has realized, proves an illuminating way into understanding complex systems of all kinds - collections of everything from atoms to planets to other animals like ourselves. An interesting collection of essays reflecting on Parisi's long career in science . . . The scientific explanations are admirably lucid The Wall Street Journal The man who looked at birds and grasped the secrets of the universe [...] Read this, and you will get at least a frisson of what a top-flight career in physics might feel like" This was completely unexpected. It’s a bit like what happens on crowded buses, where frequently the crush is greatest near the doors, where passengers who have just got on accumulate, together with those who are about to get off and others still who want to continue their journey.

From the 2021 Nobel Prize winner in Physics, a remarkable journey into the practice of groundbreaking science Giorgio Parisi is renowned for his scientific creativity, originality, and power. In this exhilarating little book, he shows his human side, too. By its end, readers will feel they've made a charming, witty new friend." Alternately admiring and critical, unvarnished, and a closely detailed account of a troubled innovator. In this delightful and deeply thoughtful book, Giorgio Parisi weaves a tapestry of experiences and ideas that connects disciplines and prepares us to appreciate the beauty, importance, and cultural value of science" Much of this intuition is unconscious and, while still grounded in physical brain processes, remains murky and hard to reconstruct. And for whatever reason, that vagueness makes scientists uncomfortable. “In almost all texts written by scientists,” Parisi notes, “these themes are taboo.” So it’s refreshing to see a scientist, especially one of Parisi’s stature, honestly discuss the fuzzy side of scientific thinking, and not just during the early, groping stages but in the technical phases of a project, too. “The physicist sometimes uses mathematics ungrammatically,” he admits, “a license that we grant to poets” as well.La scienza deve essere difesa non solo per i suoi aspetti pratici, ma anche per il suo valore culturale. […] bisogna rendere la popolazione consapevole di cos’è la scienza, di come la scienza e la cultura si intreccino l’una con l’altra, sia nel loro sviluppo storico sia nella pratica dei nostri giorni. Bisogna spiegare in maniera non magica cosa fanno gli scienziati viventi, quali sono le sfide attuali. Non è facile, specialmente per le scienze dure dove la matematica ha un ruolo essenziale; tuttavia con un certo sforzo si possono ottenere ottimi risultati." How to catch my eye: a recent Nobel Prize winner looks at murmurations, the great clouds of starlings that sweep through the sky as one otherworldly being. And that as merely the introduction to a book on such complex systems. In a Flight of Starlings by physicist Giorgio Parisi held great promise. Sadly, I spent the whole time looking for it to begin. Bello, scorrevole e simpatico soprattutto nella seconda parte che spiega anche l'amore di Parisi per ciò che studia: This is very much an attempt to emulate Carlo Rovelli's success with short books containing seven or eight essays, beginning with Seven Brief Lessons in Physics. In this case, Italian Nobel Prize winning physicist Giorgio Parisi gives us a set of eight unconnected essays, some solidly scientific, such as the opening one on how his team studied starling murmurations, others more philosophical or memoir-like, such as his account of ‘physics in Rome around fifty years ago’. In between, there are chapters on Italian physicists he knows, his own history, which began in university in the keystone year of 1968, which he explains in detail, and anecdotes about other physicists and school in Italy.

Along the way, he reflects on the lessons he has taken from a life in pursuit of scientific the importance of serendipity to the discovery of new ideas, the surprising kinship between physics and other disciplines, and the value of science to a thriving society. In so doing, he removes the practice of science from the confines of the laboratory and brings it into the real world. That was a completely strange thing, because the idea was not mine. I saw a post on Facebook and I just shared it, thinking it was an interesting idea, but I never actually tried it. There were so many discussions about it, and it was amusing that everybody was saying that Parisi was saying this. But maybe it works. I don’t expect there’s a big difference [between this and more conventional methods]. You’d have to do a blind experiment to test it. Una pubblicazione in fin dei conti trascurabile, frutto di un collage tra stralci di articoli e conferenze (come confermato nelle note di chiusura), che altrimenti avrebbe difficilmente trovato spazio nei cataloghi editoriali generalisti se non fosse stato per il premio Nobel assegnato all'autore. In a Flight of Starlings offers a glimpse into scientific discovery ... a forceful argument for the value of scientific literacy at a time when it's increasingly being challenged by misinformation ... Parisi's book is a step toward making physics feel more accessible Andrew DeMillo, Independent La scienza è come il sesso, ha anche delle conseguenze pratiche, ma non è questo il motivo per cui la facciamo» diceva Richard Feynman, uno dei più grandi fisici del Novecento e forse il più simpatico.”

A questo è dedicato il primo capitolo de In un volo di storni, che raccoglie anche e soprattutto i passi fatti nella sua formazione, gli inizi a Roma a La Sapienza , l’ingresso nel mondo della ricerca, la tesi sulle particelle elementari, il calcolo combinatorio, le fluttuazioni, e il "Je ne regrette rien " sul premio Nobel mancato a venticinque anni (ma vinto quest’anno) Enlightenment that some stuff can be asymptotes (whatever the blazes they are) makes me wonder it this is all spiel. Il comune storno, piccolino, con un’apertura alare di poche decine di centimetri, e dal peso inferiore ai cento grammi, gira per il cielo con gli altri, di giorno alla ricerca di cibo e la sera di un luogo in cui riposare Part elegant scientific treatise, part thrilling intellectual journey, In a Flight of Starlings is an invitation to find wonder in the world around us. But there are some lovely takeaways few and far between such as the marriage of Science with metaphor.

Parisi tells of his adventures in thinking in this alarmingly brilliant, witty and brief book Robert Fox, Evening Standard I was very happy but I didn’t have time to feel too much. I was busy running the Accademia dei Lincei, I had my work at the university, and the day after I had to do 20 interviews over Zoom and so on. So it took some time to be acquainted with it. stato otto mesi col naso all'insù ad ammirarne le evoluzioni, filmando ogni momento, scattando duecentomila foto per interpretarne i movimenti alla luce di leggi fisiche Si perde di vista la presenza del singolo uccello, ma quello che emerge è un comportamento collettivo. Da quest’immagine parte Giorgio Parisi, premio Nobel per la Fisica il 5 ottobre 2021, per parlare di sistemi complessi e da lì di scienza e ricerca. Io i sistemi complessi non so davvero cosa sono ma me li posso immaginare da quello che ho visto. In this delightful and deeply thoughtful book, Giorgio Parisi weaves a tapestry of experiences and ideas that connects disciplines and prepares us to appreciate the beauty, importance, and cultural value of science.” —Frances Arnold, winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry From the PublisherOrnitologi, biologi e fisici hanno dedicato i loro studi sui collettivi di storni, compreso Giorgio Parisi, che ha svolto le sue ricerche sulla base dei suoi modelli computerizzati, insieme a molti collaboratori e coinvolgendo centri di ricerca di cinque diversi paesi. In this delightful and deeply thoughtful book, Giorgio Parisi weaves a tapestry of experiences and ideas that connects disciplines and prepares us to appreciate the beauty, importance, and cultural value of science Frances Arnold, winner of the Nobel Prize

Mi ha fatto sorridere il suo racconto dei piani alti di Fisica a La Sapienza: questo “sancta sanctorum” c’è anche a Matematica a Lecce e a Padova (a Padova in modo più accentuato). An interesting collection of essays reflecting on Parisi's long career in science [...] The scientific explanations are admirably lucid" How can we promote this trust? Clearly it is not enough for scientists themselves to simply say “trust us.” It is also not enough to write scholarly articles about how science works. We must, as the saying goes, show our work: demonstrate in an engaging way how scientists toil, doubt, succeed, and fail. It is important to understand how scientific consensus is achieved, how individual discoveries become validated by the scientific community. Along the way, he reflects on the lessons he's taken from a life in pursuit of scientific truth: the importance of serendipity to the discovery of new ideas, the surprising kinship between physics and other disciplines, and the value of science to a thriving society. In so doing, he removes the practice of science from the confines of the laboratory and into the real world. stata una bellissima scoperta: una lettura che mi ha entusiasmata sia dal punto di vista scientifico sia da quello letterario sia da quello umano.

Nella prima parte del libro viene spiegato un po' più approfonditamente uno degli esperimenti fatti sugli storni per capirne le dinamiche a livello di sistema complesso, poi Parisi si addentra nel mondo delle transizioni di fase e arriva a parlarci dei "vetri di spin", con qualche dettaglio tecnico ma accessibile a chiunque. Giorgio Parisi is renowned for his scientific creativity, originality, and power. In this exhilarating little book, he shows his human side, too. By its end, readers will feel they've made a charming, witty new friend' - Frank Wilczek L’enfasi sulle ricadute immediate della ricerca è una follia. È famosa la risposta di Faraday al ministro britannico che gli chiedeva a cosa servissero i suoi esperimenti sull’elettromagnetismo: «Al momento non saprei» disse, «ma è assai probabile che in futuro ci metterete una tassa sopra». Giorgio Parisi is renowned for his scientific creativity, originality, and power. In this exhilarating little book, he shows his human side, too. By its end, readers will feel they’ve made a charming, witty new friend.” —Frank Wilczek, winner of the Nobel Prize and author of Fundamentals