Hide this

Results from Google Books

Click on a thumbnail to go to Google Books.

The Infinite Book: A Short Guide to the Boundless, Timeless and Endless by John D. Barrow
Loading...

The Infinite Book: A Short Guide to the Boundless, Timeless and Endless

by John D. Barrow

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingConversations
200229,056 (3.58)1
Info:

Pantheon (2005), Hardcover, 352 pages

Member:RichardGawne
Collections:Your libraryRating:
Tags:None
Loading...
won't like will probably not like will probably like will like will love

Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book.

Showing 2 of 2
Disappointingly lacks the usual meatiness of a Barrow book, and makes way too much respectful reference to religion. The only kind of writing about religion I can abide is illustrated by the essay contributed by Sam Harris to one of the huge compendia of writings at www.edge.org -- answers to "What is your dangerous idea?"
  fpagan | Sep 30, 2006 |
Loved this. Made my brain hurt at first but you soon get used to it. One of those books where you read something a couple of times and then you understand it. Not in a way that you can put into words, but you understand it with a different type of understanding. (I know what I mean!:))
  Kate_JJM | Mar 28, 2006 |
Showing 2 of 2
no reviews | add a review
You must log in to edit Common Knowledge data.
For more help see the Common Knowledge help page.
Series (with order)
Canonical Title
Original publication date
People/Characters
Important places
Important events
Related movies
Awards and honors
Epigraph
Dedication
To Luca Ronconi for his boundless imagination
First words
This is a book about the biggest subject of all. (Preface)
There is something about infinity and books.
Quotations
Last words
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)
Disambiguation notice
Publisher's editors
Blurbers

References to this work on external resources.

Wikipedia in English

None

Book description

Amazon.com Product Description (ISBN 0099443724, Paperback)

A Short Guide to the Boundless, Timeless and Endless.

Everything you might want to know about infinity — in history, and all the way to today’s cutting-edge science.
Throughout history, the Infinite has been a dangerous idea. Men have lost their lives, their careers, or their freedom for talking about it. Where did the idea come from, and what is it telling us about the universe? Can there actually be infinities, or is infinity just a label for something that is never reached? Can you do an infinite number of things in a finite amount of time? Is the universe infinite? Will it exist forever?

All manner of paradoxes and fantasies characterize an infinite universe. If our universe is infinite, then an infinite number of exact copies of you are at this very moment reading an identical sentence on an identical planet somewhere else in the universe. So what is it like to live in a universe where nothing is original, where you can live forever, where anything that can be done, is done, over and over again?

These are some of the deep questions that the idea of the infinite pushes us to ask. The Infinite Book will explore these provocative questions and the strange answers that scientists, mathematicians, philosophers and theologians have come up with to deal with its threats to our sanity.

(retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:58:02 -0400)

(see all 2 descriptions)

The first test round has been closed. Visit the Open Shelves Classification group for details.

Quick Links

Ebooks Audio Swap
1 pay2/21

Popular covers

 

Help/FAQs | About | Privacy/Terms | Blog | Contact | LibraryThing.com | APIs | WikiThing | Common Knowledge | 46,905,822 books!