false 12668 329336 0140296476 9780140296471 150 <![CDATA[Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1215342894m/329336.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1215342894s/329336.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/329336.Zero_The_Biography_of_a_Dangerous_Idea 3.80 783
The Babylonians invented it, the Greeks banned it, the Hindus worshiped it, and the Church used it to fend off heretics. Now, as Y2K fever rages, it threatens a technological apocalypse. For centuries the power of zero savored of the demonic; once harnessed, it became the most important tool in mathematics. For zero, infinity's twin, is not like other numbers. It is both nothing and everything.

In Zero science journalist Charles Seife follows this innocent-looking number from its birth as an Eastern philosophical concept to its struggle for acceptance in Europe, its rise and transcendence in the West, and its ever-present threat to modern physics. Here are the legendary thinkers--from Pythagoras to Newton to Heisenberg, from the Kabalists to today's astrophysicists--who have tried to understand it and whose clashes shook the foundations of philosophy, science, mathematics, and religion. Zero has pitted East against West and faith against reason, and its intransigence persists in the dark core of a black hole and the brilliant flash of the Big Bang. Today, zero lies at the heart of one of the biggest scientific controversies of all time, the quest for a theory of everything.

Readers of Fermat's Enigma, The Man Who Loved Only Numbers, Seeing and Believing, and Longitudewill find the revealingly illustrated Zero freshly informative, easy to understand, and--infinitely--fascinating.]]> 12668 3.82 1086 209 2000 116623 0143038397 9780143038399 9 <![CDATA[Decoding the Universe: How the New Science of Information Is Explaining Everything in the Cosmos, from Our Brains to Black Holes]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1171725745m/116623.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1171725745s/116623.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/116623.Decoding_the_Universe_How_the_New_Science_of_Information_Is_Explaining_Everything_in_the_Cosmos_from_Our_Brains_to_Black_Holes 4.05 77 The author of Zero explains the scientific revolution that is transforming the way we understand our world

Previously the domain of philosophers and linguists, information theory has now moved beyond the province of code breakers to become the crucial science of our time. In Decoding the Universe, Charles Seife draws on his gift for making cutting-edge science accessible to explain how this new tool is deciphering everything from the purpose of our DNA to the parallel universes of our Byzantine cosmos. The result is an exhilarating adventure that deftly combines cryptology, physics, biology, and mathematics to cast light on the new understanding of the laws that govern life and the universe.

]]> 12668 3.82 1086 209 2006 64838 0142004464 9780142004463 5 <![CDATA[Alpha and Omega: The Search for the Beginning and End of the Universe]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1170624818m/64838.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1170624818s/64838.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/64838.Alpha_and_Omega_The_Search_for_the_Beginning_and_End_of_the_Universe 3.79 57 Alpha & Omega, Charles Seife takes us to the front lines of the cosmological revolution to synthesize the discoveries of scientists at observatories and laboratories around the world who are actually peering into both the cradle of the universe and its grave. The cast of characters includes galaxy hunters and microwave eavesdroppers, gravity theorists and atom smashers, all of whom are on the trail of dark matter, dark energy, and the growing inhabitants of the particle zoo. Seife's lucid explanations of scientific theories and current research make cutting-edge science both crystal clear and wonderfully exciting.]]> 12668 3.82 1086 209 2003 3024263 0670020338 9780670020331 14 <![CDATA[Sun in a Bottle: The Strange History of Fusion and the Science of Wishful Thinking]]> http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-111x148.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-60x80.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3024263.Sun_in_a_Bottle_The_Strange_History_of_Fusion_and_the_Science_of_Wishful_Thinking 3.74 31 The author of Zero looks at the messy history of the struggle to harness fusion energy .

When weapons builders detonated the first hydrogen bomb in 1952, they tapped into the vastest source of energy in our solar system--the very same phenomenon that makes the sun shine. Nuclear fusion was a virtually unlimited source of power that became the center of a tragic and comic quest that has left scores of scientists battered and disgraced. For the past half-century, governments and research teams have tried to bottle the sun with lasers, magnets, sound waves, particle beams, and chunks of meta. (The latest venture, a giant, multi-billion-dollar, international fusion project called ITER, is just now getting underway.) Again and again, they have failed, disgracing generations of scientists. Throughout this fascinating journey Charles Seife introduces us to the daring geniuses, villains, and victims of fusion science: the brilliant and tortured Andrei Sakharov; the monomaniacal and Strangelovean Edward Teller; Ronald Richter, the secretive physicist whose lies embarrassed an entire country; and Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann, the two chemists behind the greatest scientific fiasco of the past hundred years. Sun in a Bottle is the first major book to trace the story of fusion from its beginnings into the 21st century, of how scientists have gotten burned by trying to harness the power of the sun.]]> 12668 3.82 1086 209 2008 5025004 3464802019 9783464802014 0 <![CDATA[Tinto. Arbeitsheft Sprache.]]> http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-111x148.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-60x80.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5025004.Tinto_Arbeitsheft_Sprache_ 0.0 0 12668 3.82 1086 209 2004 7048844 0143116347 9780143116349 0 <![CDATA[Sun in a Bottle]]> http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-111x148.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-60x80.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7048844-sun-in-a-bottle 0.0 0 12668 3.82 1086 209 2009 7002114 0641873816 9780641873812 0 <![CDATA[Decoding the Universe]]> http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-111x148.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-60x80.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7002114-decoding-the-universe 0.0 0 12668 3.82 1086 209 2006 7284014 1101052848 9781101052846 0 <![CDATA[Zero]]> http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-111x148.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-60x80.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7284014-zero 0.0 0 12668 3.82 1086 209 2000 7093038 2012791921 9782012791923 0 <![CDATA[Zéro : La biographie d'une idée dangereuse]]> http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-111x148.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-60x80.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7093038-z-ro 0.0 0 12668 3.82 1086 209 70313 0.0 0 0 2004