THE BIOCHEMISTS’ SONGBOOK Cassette Tape. Harold Baum. Pergamon Press, Elmsford NY, 1983. $11. Songbook. Pergamon Press, 1982. 62 pp. $6.50. In the UK, Taylor & Francis, Rankine Road, Basingstoke, Hants RG24 OPR. There’s no doubt about it; Harold Baum is a phenomenon of modem day biology and biochemistry education. He authored the original Biochemists’ Songbook, which was published in 1982 with a charming introduction by Sir Hans Krebs. Then in 1984 Biorhythms 1 and Biorhyth

Biophysicist Harold Morowitz spent his last sabbatical pondering the cosmic mysteries aboard a yacht anchored off the West Maui mountains in Hawaii. The result of his musings can be found in Cosmic Joy and Local Pain: Musings of a Mystic Scientist (Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1987). [For a review of the book, see THE SCIENTIST, September 21, 1987, p. 20]. The first possession he packed for his trip was Lawrence Henderson’s book The Fitness of the Environment. In this excerpt, Morowitz

To judge from the writings of C.R Snow, entropy and the second law of thermodynamics were once indelicate subjects. Now things have changed, and on the cocktail party circuit we hear of entropy in art, entropy in economics, entropy in urban decay, and other erudite-sounding applications. A most difficult concept in physics is being applied to confused areas in the social sciences, with the impression being conveyed that this increases our comprehension. I have before me a letter from Jeremy Rifk