Cosmic Imagery

* Certain key imagesembody our understanding of lifeand the universe we inhabit. Some, like Robert Hooke's firstmicroscopicviews of the natural world, or the stunning images taken by theHubble Space Telescope, were made possible by our new technical capabilities. * Others, like thefirst graph, were breathtakingly simple but perennially useful. Vesalius's haunting pictures of thehuman anatomywere nothing less than works of art, while the simple diagram now known as Pythagoras' Theorem - proved by the ancient Babylonians, Chinese, Indians and Egyptians long before the Greeks themselves - lay the foundations for modern mathematics. * Many of these images haveshattered our preconceptions about the limits and nature of existence: the first breathtaking pictures of theEarth from spacestimulated an environmental consciousness that has grown ever since; themushroom cloudfrom atomic and nuclear explosions became the ultimate symbol of death and destruction; theflying saucercame to represent the possibility of extraterrestrial life; while Mercator's flatmap of the Earthcoordinated an entire world-view. *Cosmic Imagerytakes us on a tour through the mostinfluentialimages in science. Each holds an important place in the growth of human understanding and carries with ita story that illuminates its origin and meaning. Together they reveal something of the beauty and truth of the universe, and why, so often, a picture is better than a thousand words.

John D. Barrow is Professor of Mathematical Sciences and Director of the Millennium Mathematics Project at Cambridge University, Fellow of Clare Hall, Cambridge, a Fellow of the Royal Society, and the current Gresham Professor of Geometry at Gresham College, London. His principal area of scientific research is cosmology, and he is the author of many highly acclaimed books about the nature and significance of modern developments in physics, astronomy, and mathematics, includingThe Left Hand of Creation;The Origin of the Universe;The Universe that Discovered Itself;The Infinite Book, The Artful Universe Expanded, New Theories of Everythingand, most recently,100 Essential Things You Didn't Know You Didn't Know.He is also the author of the award-winning playInfinities.

In this lavishly illustrated book one of the UK's most distinguished scientists tells

the story of science through 200 of the subject's key images.