George Johnson (writer)

George Johnson
Born	(1952-01-20) January 20, 1952 (age 73) Fayetteville, Arkansas, U.S.
Education	American University (MA) University of New Mexico (BA)
Occupation(s)	Science writer, journalist
Notable credit(s)	Writer for The New York Times; author of several books
Website	http://talaya.net

George Johnson (born January 20, 1952) is an American journalist and science writer.^[1]

Johnson is the author of nine books, including The Cancer Chronicles (2013), 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 a two-time winner of the science journalism award from the American Association for the Advancement of Science. His books have been short-listed three times for the Royal Society science book prize. His column, "Raw Data", appeared in The New York Times.^[2]

Johnson is one of the co-hosts (with science writer John Horgan) of "Science Faction", a weekly discussion on the website Bloggingheads.tv, related to topics in science. Several prominent scientists, philosophers, and bloggers have been interviewed for the site.

His ninth book The Cancer Chronicles: Unlocking Medicine's Deepest Mystery was on the shortlist for the 2014 Royal Society Prize for Science Books.^[3]

Previously shortlisted for the prize were Strange Beauty: Murray Gell-Mann and the Revolution in 20th-Century Physics (2001)^[4] and Fire in the Mind: Science, Faith, and the Search for Order (1995).^[5]

In 2014 three of his pieces for The New York Times about the science of cancer won the AAAS Science Journalism Award.^[6] He won the award in 2000 for three articles about complexity and high-energy physics.

• The Cancer Chronicles: Unlocking Medicine's Deepest Mystery. Knopf, 2013.
• 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, about Henrietta Leavitt
• 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, about Murray Gell-Mann
• 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.

Wikiquote has quotations related to George Johnson (writer).

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