Short Reviews

appeal to find meaning in a universe seeminglydevoid of it. If there is meaning, then human beings may be impelled to find and understand it. If no meaning inheres in the cosmos, then it may be a human imperative to formulate meaning for ourselves. Art and science are means by which human meaning, at least provisionally, can be projected onto a meaninglessworld. It ismeaning, whether inherent or devised, that often provides the impetus or momentum experienced by artists or scientists. Alexander Eliot in Myths (McGrawHill , 1976) remarks that all human cosmologies, from ancient to modern, share a basic feature of the passage from darkness to light. It has even been proposed that in certain ways the description of the birth of the universe in some manner parallels the changes in perception by the fetus immediately prior to the moment of birth. Are the current cosmological theories then nothing more than projections of the human experience at its very primal condition? The AP, at the very least, may be a myth-in the modern sense of myth, that is: “Myth ...is striving for a total world view, for an interpretation or meaning of all that is significant” (Myths, Dreams, and Religion, J. Campbell, ed., Dutton, 1970,p. 51). Although Wheeler admits that the evidence and arguments for the validity of the AP are not entirely conclusive, he stresses that the idea of the AP is illustrative of how “theory, concepts, and methods of measurement are born into the world, by a single creative act, in inseparable union”. In art, too, I would suggest, its variously identifiable constituents are all integrated into a single creative impulse. Although neither an artist or a cosmologist,I haveendeavored to suggest here the possible relationships that might interest artists and other readers of Leonardo in a book that promises to become a definitive and indispensable reference. Short Reviews LE COURRIER DU CNRS: SPECIAL ISSUE ON SCIENTIFIC IMAGING Veronique Brossollet-Conde, ed. Le Courrier du CNRS, 17 Rue George Bouzerait, 92120 Montrouge, France, 1987. Paper, 40 FF. ISBN: 2-222-04092. This special issueof the publication of the French Centre National de Recherche Scientifique addresses scientific imaging in a broad context. Topics covered include computer graphics, image processing , scientific visualization, remote sensing, computer modeling and animation . Different techniques for converting data into a visual form that is sensed in other parts of the electromagnetic spectrum or in other sensory modes are discussed, with striking examples from researchers in astronomy, artificial intelligence, holography, robotics, music, olfactory nerves and medicine. This special issue is an invaluable over-view to the topic of scientific imaging and visualization. MINDWAVES Colin Blakemore and Susan Greenfield, eds. Basil Blackwell, Oxford, U.K., 1987. 536 pp., illus. Trade, E19.50. ISBN: 0-631-14622-9. Are mind and brain the same or different entities? We think we know what we mean when we talk of ‘mind’,or when we consign ‘brain’ to a physio-chemical sphere. Sub-titled Thoughts on Zntelligence , Identity and Consciousness, Mindwavespresentsourcurrent knowledge of brains and minds, animal and human, livingand artificial. Leaders in the fieldof psychology, brain research, psychiatry, physics, computer science,linguistics and philosophy have contributed 30 original articles to argue lucidly and persuasively, from their varied points of view, about what it is that enables us to perceive and to know. BETWEEN by VictorBurgin. BasilBlackwell,Oxford, U.K., 1986. 190pp., illus. Paper, E10.95. ISBN: 0-631-15235-0. Victor Burgin is a skilled communicator in both word and. photograph. In challenging the many assumptions underlying contemporary ideas about representation , he has woven a dexterous tapestry using strands from many fields: feminism, semiotics, psychoanalysis. The radical influence of Burgin’s ideas and photography can be seen in many of the visual arts. In Between the adroit juxtaposition of image and commentary lends emphasis to its dual purpose: to collect Burgin’s work of the past 15years and to present a personal account of it. THE DIVIDED CIRCLE by J.A. Bennett. Phaidon-Christie’s, Oxford, U.K., 1987.224pp., illus. Trade, E45.00. ISBN: 0-7148-8038-8. This “History of Instruments for Astronomy ,NavigationandSurveying”presents the synthesis of art, technology and science that went into the design...