What does a quark inside an atom have to do with a jaguar circling his jungle territory? What can the study of particle physics add to our understanding of natural selection, linguistics, child development, economics, and computers? Find out with Nobel laureate Murray Gell-Mann's personal account of his search for the connections between the universe's fundamental laws and nature at its most complex. 40 illustrations.

From one of the architects of the new science of simplicity and complexity comes an explanation of the connections between nature at its most basic level and natural selection, archaeology, linguistics, child development, computers, and other complex adaptive systems. Nobel laureate Murray Gell-Mann offers a uniquely personal and unifying vision of the relationship between the fundamental laws of physics and the complexity and diversity of the natural world.