George Johnson is an American journalist and science writer. He is the author of a number of books, including The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments (2008) and Strange Beauty: Murray Gell-Mann and the Revolution in 20th-Century Physics (1999), and writes for a number of publications, including The New York Times.

He is one of the co-hosts (with science writer John Horgan

John Horgan (American journalist)

John Horgan is an American science journalist best known for his 1996 book The End of Science. He has written for many publications, including Scientific American, The New York Times, Time, Newsweek, and IEEE Spectrum...

) of "Science Saturday", a weekly discussion on the website Bloggingheads.tv

Bloggingheads.tv

Bloggingheads.tv is a political, world events, philosophy, and science video blog discussion site in which the participants take part in an active back and forth conversation via webcam which is then broadcast online to viewers...

, related to topics in science. Several prominent scientists, philosophers, and bloggers have been interviewed for the site.

Colbert Report

On Thursday, May 7, 2008, Johnson appeared on the Stephen Colbert

Stephen Colbert

Stephen Tyrone Colbert is an American political satirist, writer, comedian, television host, and actor. He is the host of Comedy Central's The Colbert Report, a satirical news show in which Colbert portrays a caricatured version of conservative political pundits.Colbert originally studied to be an...

 show to promote his new book, entitled "The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments". During his appearance, Johnson convinced Colbert to touch the spark produced by one of the electricity experiments. Colbert shocked his hand yelling obscenities that were bleeped out but appeared to be fine after the incident.

Works

• The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments. Knopf, 2008.
• Miss Leavitt's Stars: The Untold Story of the Woman Who Discovered How to Measure the Universe. James Atlas Books/Norton, 2005.
• A Shortcut Through Time: The Path to the Quantum Computer. Knopf, 2003.
• Strange Beauty: Murray Gell-Mann and the Revolution in 20th-Century Physics. Knopf, 1999. Vintage paperback, 2000.
• Fire in the Mind: Science, Faith, and the Search for Order. Knopf, 1995. Vintage paperback, 1996.
• In the Palaces of Memory: How We Build the Worlds Inside Our Heads. Knopf, 1991. Vintage paperback, 1992.
• Machinery of the Mind: Inside the New Science of Artificial Intelligence. Times Books, 1986. Tempus / Microsoft paperback, 1987.
• Architects of Fear: Conspiracy Theories and Paranoia in American Politics. Tarcher/Houghton Mifflin, 1984.

External links

• George Johnson's home page
• Interviews/Discussions on Bloggingheads.tv
• New York Times author index page