Customer Reviews (3)

A great history of 20th century Space and Astronomy

When I picked up this book and started to read it I immediately thought: "This would make a great high school textbook for a course about space science". Sometime later I turned the book over and found that was the idea!

A very readable book that hits the highlights of the space and astronomy advances during the last century. Not only is the book very readable it has a extensive list of additional reading materials to provide more depth.

I am a retired aerospace worker and took part in the Apollo and Shuttle programs and the book provided a good review of the many events which occurred. In the day to day activitiesof the workplace it is easy to lose sight of the big picture and the book provided a good review. The astronomical side was mostly new material to me and was very informative. If you want a good history of this period I highly recommend this book.

A brilliant invitation to explore space from your armchair
Dyson's background as a NASA flight controller and winner of the AIP Science Writing Award and the Golden Kite award guarantees that her science and her writing are accurate as well as clear. But I was still delighted and surprised by both the depth and sparkle of this book.Just picking it up, I was captivated by her use of graphics: ultra clear and engaging.Read from beginning to end, this bookis an education in itself.

I'd love to see this book widely adopted for high school and beginning college science courses.It's also first rate as a history of science text.It gives accurate facts and presents them in a way that the most uninitiated can understand and yet the more sophisticated reader can appreciate and profit from.The clarity of the textual material and graphics just pulls the reader into the history of the space program and the recent history of astronomy.Topics include how stars evolve, the exploration of the moon and Mars, the significance of the Hubble telescope, the search for extrasolar planets and extraterrestrial life, the International Space Station, and much much more.

I think it would also make a great gift for a child with an interest in science.Dyson has a genius for explaining complex space discoveries without complex math. Another potential audience is anybody who likes science fiction or wants to learn to write science fiction. Follow the facts in this book and you won't make stupid mistakes about space travel.

Its usefulness would not be limited to children.As an adult, I find this book a source of wonder and fascination with our world in the context of space.

When I was eight, my forward-thinking grandmother bought me the twelve volume The Book of Knowledge.Although the information in that book is now very much outdated, it changed my life.I became interested in the aurora borealis, the planets, the stars, and science in general, an interest that has enriched my life to this day.This single volume will do the same for a child or a curious adult today.

Insightful history of space
This book is a very readable, insightful history of the development of astronomy and space through the course of the twentieth century, a century in which our knowledge of the universe changed rapidly, and our ability to explore space moved from the Wright Brothers' hops to the voyages to the moon.Dyson, a former spaceflight controller at the NASA Johnson Space Center, chronicles this development, showing how we got where we are and who did it, in an interesting format, with diagrams and pictures to illustrate the key points.She profiles a "scientist of the decade" for each decade between 1900 and the millennium, and puts everything together into a coherent story of the great adventure of the twentieth century: the human search outward into the universe, and its growing understanding of our home planet and our place in the solar system and in the universe. ... Read more

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Study on Tantrasangraha, astronomical text by Kerala astronomer Nilakantha Somayaji, 1444-1545; contributed seminar articles. ... Read more

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Originally published in 1899.This volume from the Cornell University Library's print collections was scanned on an APT BookScan and converted to JPG 2000 format by Kirtas Technologies.All titles scanned cover to cover and pages may include marks notations and other marginalia present in the original volume. ... Read more

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The 18th century was a wealth of knowledge, exploration and rapidly growing technology and expanding record-keeping made possible by advances in the printing press. In its determination to preserve the century of revolution, Gale initiated a revolution of its own: digitization of epic proportions to preserve these invaluable works in the largest archive of its kind. Now for the first time these high-quality digital copies of original 18th century manuscripts are available in print, making them highly accessible to libraries, undergraduate students, and independent scholars.
Medical theory and practice of the 1700s developed rapidly, as is evidenced by the extensive collection, which includes descriptions of diseases, their conditions, and treatments. Books on science and technology, agriculture, military technology, natural philosophy, even cookbooks, are all contained here.
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The below data was compiled from various identification fields in the bibliographic record of this title. This data is provided as an additional tool in helping to insure edition identification:
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British Library

T108626

With an index.

Exeter : printed and sold by B. Thorn: Mess. Richardson and Urquhart; Messrs. Rivington and Sons; and B. Law, London, 1778. [4],xxvi,159,[27]p. ; 12° ... Read more

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Offers core astronomy information linked to the curriculum. This title explains the workings of our solar system and how we learn about and explore space. ... Read more

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A Detailed Account Of The Establishment Of The Theory Of Gravitation By Newton, And Its Development By His Successors. With An Exposition Of The Progress Of Research On All The Other Subjects Of Celestial Physics. ... Read more

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Science in the Age of Enlightenment. History of science, History of astronomy, History of chemistry, Age of Enlightenment, Scientific method ... Read more

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This scarce antiquarian book is a selection from Kessinger Publishing's Legacy Reprint Series. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment to protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature. Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone! ... Read more

Product Description
Originally published in 1886.This volume from the Cornell University Library's print collections was scanned on an APT BookScan and converted to JPG 2000 format by Kirtas Technologies.All titles scanned cover to cover and pages may include marks notations and other marginalia present in the original volume. ... Read more

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Designed for the amateur astronomy enthusiast, this study of the history of astronomy contains numerous anecdotes by the astronomer and television presenter Patrick Moore. The volume also charts recent developments, such as the Hubble telescope, Halley's Comet and recent space missions. ... Read more

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Why start at 1890? That year marked one of the most significant dates in the history of the multidimensional story that is the history of astronomy. It was the year in which the Draper Memorial Catalogue of Stellar spectra was published - a publication that provided essential data for an understanding of stellar spectra well into the twentieth century. It's also slightly over a hundred years ago. This is a long enough span of time for any one book on this subject to cover, but sufficient to chart the progress of astronomy from a time when Newtonian physics reigned supreme, photography was in its infancy, and radio astronomy was decades in the future. Paradoxically, the theories of Einstein, Planck and Heisenberg, along with modern radio, X-ray, and space-borne telescopes mean that the cosmos seems to hold more mysteries today than it did a hundred years ago. Any reader with a basic knowledge of astronomy will find this book quite fascinating. Academics, historians, and others who need a definitive history of the major events and characters that influenced the growth of astronomy. ... Read more