Popular Science
Coming Soon
By: Adam Kucharski(Author)
360 pages, b/w illustrations
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About this book
How do we establish what we believe? And how can we be certain that what we believe is true? And, assuming we are certain that what we believe is true, how do we convince other people that it is true? For over two thousand years, from the Medieval Arabic world to the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, scientific progress has relied on different methods of establishing fact from fiction. Achieve logical perfection and be rewarded with ultimate, universal truth.
But there is far more to proof than axioms, theories and laws: when demonstrating that a new medical treatment works, persuading a jury of someone's guilt, or deciding whether you trust a self-driving car or a financial transaction, the weighing up of evidence is far from simple.
To navigate proof, we must reach into a thicket of errors and biases, embrace uncertainty, to discern between truth and falsehood – never more so than when previously relied-upon methods fail. In Proof, bestselling author, statistician and epidemiologist Adam Kucharski spans science, politics, philosophy and economics, to explore how truth emerges – and why it falters.
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Biography
Adam Kucharski is an associate professor at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. A mathematician by training, his work on global outbreaks has included Ebola, Zika and COVID-19, and he has produced real-time analysis for multiple governments and health agencies. He is a TED senior fellow and winner of the 2016 Rosalind Franklin Award Lecture and the 2012 Wellcome Trust Science Writing Prize. The author of The Rules of Contagion, his writing has appeared in the Observer, Financial Times, Wired, and New Statesman.
Popular Science
Coming Soon
By: Adam Kucharski(Author)
360 pages, b/w illustrations
"Adam Kucharski explains how certainty, even in math, can be an illusion"
– New York Times
"Adam Kucharski has a knack of making complex problems sound simple – and exciting. A book that made me smile and feel clever"
– Peter Frankopan
"Adam Kucharski is that rarest of beasts: a true mathematical expert who can also write beautiful accessible, human prose. Proof is a profound and utterly absorbing exploration of the limits and power of proof and truth, both in mathematics and in life itself. It's about the relationship between mathematics, logic, and the quest for certainty that we find ourselves on, whether we're running the country or trying to decide on what to do with a medical test result. Kucharski elegantly explores how proof is not just a mathematical concept but a vital tool in decision-making, justice, and survival – it's brilliant."
– Chris van Tulleken, author of Ultra Processed People
"Excellent [...] Proof is a great guide to embracing this complexity in truth-seeking"
– New Scientist
"A fascinating tour of the history of what has counted as proof [...] we enter a wild realm where intuitions break down completely"
– Wall Street Journal
"Illuminating [...] This is a serious book by a serious person. It's full of gnarly theorems and concepts. But it's also a virtuosic look at the varied and sometimes amusing ways human beings have over the centuries used their intelligence to make sense of the world"
– Leaf Arbuthnot, Daily Mail
"The case for better evidence in post-evidence times [...] a slice of the history of mathematics demonstrating that even logic can't deliver absolute truth"
– Diane Coyle, Financial Times
"Shows how proof is more elusive than we realise, whether in law, science, policy or math"
– Bloomberg
"In his brilliant new book Proof, Adam tells the story of how nineteenth-century thinkers began to challenge Euclid's self-evident truths – and how this shaped the history of mathematics. It's a great read that covers many fields, including history, politics, statistics, computer science and epidemiology"
– Alex Bellos
"In an increasingly complex world, where we're beset by information, misinformation, and endlessly required to make decisions about it all, Kucharski shines a brilliant and clarifying light through the muddle. Proof is a puzzle-solver's delight; the essential guide we need to make sense of what and who to trust, and the risks therein"
– Gaia Vince
"A vivid, intelligent and wide-ranging book about how we know what we know. Adam Kucharski is a brilliant and entertaining guide"
– Tim Harford
"Kucharski explains why getting at the truth of just about anything is incredibly hard. There's fascinating technical detail here, and a moral: the more we appreciate how hard proof is to come by, the better we can bridge the widening gulf between experts and sceptics"
– Simon Ings, New Scientist
"It's a difficult task to know anything for sure, but in Proof, Adam Kucharski explores what it even means to know, to believe and to convince. It's fascinating, it's insightful and, best of all, it's accessible."
– The Best Science and Technology Reads of 2025 (So Far), B&N Reads
