ABSTRACT The Physics of Aesthetics conference in Barcelona introduced the paradigms of the liveliest aspects of physics. One hundred years after Einstein's annus mirabilis , physics continues making progress, and the authors participated with internationally well-known scientists in drawing the outline of its more attractive face. Universal questions naturally arose, relating to the limits of our perception, the design of matter and the narrative of the complexity surrounding us. Local non-scientist personalities helped to distill aesthetics from the contemporary tendencies of this scientific discipline.

ABSTRACT Scientific understanding of natural phenomena should be a legitimate part of aesthetic theory, as this understanding involves the beauty of insight into the inner workings of nature. This insight is not always easy to communicate. Despite the huge progress made during the 20th century, fundamental physics now faces puzzles and paradoxes involving the infinitely small (the frontier of high energies) and the infinitely large (the overall structure of the observed universe). Working in basic science is fascinating but difficult. Discoveries happen not in a linear manner but just as they do in the creation of a work of art.

ABSTRACT Complex systems pervade our real world, from social systems to genome dynamics. All these systems are characterized by the presence of emergent phenomena: New properties emerge from the interactions of simpler units and are not reducible to the properties of the latter. The natural description of complex systems involves a network view, where each system is represented by means of a web. Such graphs have been shown to share surprisingly universal patterns of organization, indicating that fundamental laws of organization also pervade complexity at multiple scales.

ABSTRACT Inspired by the increasing complexity of statistical models for turbulence and stock markets, the author presents some reflections on the very notion of a model and illustrates some relations between physics and aesthetics. He argues that aesthetic emotions arise from a delicate balance between regularity and surprise.

ABSTRACT Imagine that one could arrange atoms in any form one wanted: What would one create? What kind of mind would it take to change the world through this metamorphosis of rearrangement and design? The ultimate endgame of our current technological capability to make material things is determined by our own creativity. The author examines how technological interfaces join the human mind to objects of experience from the nanometric to the planetary scale and theorizes the impact this perceptual condition will have on the personal and collective psyche.