One Two Three . . . Infinity: Facts and Speculations of Science (original 1947; edition 1988)

Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford, has chosen to discuss George Gamow’s "One, Two, Three…Infinity: Facts and Speculations of Science ", on FiveBooks (http://five-books.com) as one of the top five on his subject - the Beauty of Maths, saying that:

"...Gamow was a physicist first of all: mathematics is the language of physics and you can see that through this book. It was where I read for the first time that there could be different sorts of infinity and that was just mind-blowing, I thought infinity was something you just couldn’t understand.."

The full interview is available here:http://thebrowser.com/books/interviews/marcus-du-sautoy ( )

One Two Three . . . Infinity: Facts and Speculations of Science by George Gamow (1988)

Despite being over fifty years old, written in a pre double-helix, pre string-theory age, this book still manages to be both relevant and inspiring, as well as humourous and easy to digest. Gamow covers various interlinked scientific topics, working through the scales of magnitude: the microscopic, the visible, the cosmic, and the infinite. Also, despite presupposing no real scientific knowledge, it doesn't make the reader feel an idiot like some popular science does, and deals with some moderately advanced concepts. ( )

I first read this book in 1955 when I was a senior in highschool. Then it was stimulation but I was not able to comprehend much of it. At my latest reading, my understaning is better but some of it still elusive. Much is out dated but still a good scienc read. ( )