John Brockman (literary agent)

John Brockman (born February 16, 1941 in Boston, Massachusetts) is a literary agent and author specializing in scientific literature. He founded the Edge Foundation, an organization aimed to bring together people working at the edge of a broad range of scientific and technical fields. Referencing C.P. Snow's "two cultures", he introduced the "third culture" consisting of "those scientists and other thinkers in the empirical world who, through their work and expository writing, are taking the place of the traditional intellectual in rendering visible the deeper meanings of our lives, redefining who and what we are."

Quotes

"Traditional American intellectuals are, in a sense, increasingly reactionary, and quite often proudly (and perversely) ignorant of many of the truly significant intellectual accomplishments of our time." [1]
"Throughout history, only a small number of people have done the serious thinking for everybody." [2]

Bibliography

(1969) By the Late John Brockman
(1970) 37
(1988) Doing Science: The Reality Club
(1995) The Third Culture: Beyond the Scientific Revolution. ISBN 0-684-82344-6
(1996) Digerati: Encounters with the Cyber Elite
(1996) How Things Are: A Science Tool-Kit for the Mind (edited by John Brockman and Katinka Matson), Harper Perennial. ISBN 978-0-688-14951-2
(2002) The Next Fifty Years: Science in the First Half of the Twenty-First Century. ISBN 0-375-71342-5
(2003) The New Humanists: Science at the Edge ISBN 0-7607-4529-3
(2004) Curious minds : how a child becomes a scientist (edited by John Brockman), New York : Pantheon Books. ISBN 0-375-42291-9
(2006) What We Believe but Cannot Prove: Today's Leading Thinkers on Science in the Age of Certainty. ISBN 0-06-084181-8
(2006) Intelligent Thought: Science Versus the Intelligent Design Movement. ISBN 0-307-27722-4
(2007) What Is Your Dangerous Idea?: Today's Leading Thinkers on the Unthinkable. ISBN 0-06-121495-7
(2007) What Are You Optimistic About?: Today's Leading Thinkers on Why Things Are Good and Getting Better ISBN 0-06-143693-3
(2009) What Have You Changed Your Mind About?: Today's Leading Minds Rethink Everything. 150 high-powered thinkers discuss their most telling missteps and reconsiderations with Alan Alda, Brian Eno, Ray Kurzweil, Irene Pepperberg, Steven Pinker, Lisa Randall etc. ISBN 978-0-06-168654-2^[1]
(2009) This Will Change Everything: Ideas That Will Shape the Future (with Patrick Bateson, Oliver Morton, Stephen Schneider, Stewart Brand, Brian Eno, K. Eric Drexler, among others). ISBN 978-0-06-189967-6
(2011) Culture: Leading Scientists Explore Societies, Art, Power, and Technology. ISBN 978-0-06-202313-1