The Red Limit: The Search for the Edge of the Universe
by Timothy Ferris
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For centuries, it was assumed that our universe was static. In the late 1920s, astronomers defeated this assumption with a startling new discovery. From Earth, the light of distant galaxies appeared to be red, meaning that those galaxies were receding from us. This led to the revolutionary realization that the universe is expanding. The Red Limit is the tale of this discovery, its ramifications, and the passionately competitive astronomers who charted the past, present, and future of the cosmos.Tags
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Any cosmology book that has not been written *very* recently will be hopelessly outdated. This "second edition" is really a 1983, not a 2002, update of a 1977 book. It doesn't mention even such an essential idea as inflation theory (1980), let alone such a new and stunning discovery as accelerating expansion (1998). Ferris is a very good author, but I think this kind of republishing is inexcusable.
A detailed chronology of finding the answers of how old and big is the Universe! A perfect history book for the science of cosmology (or a branch thereof).
Somewhat technical, but good read. Ferris is a good
writer of popular science.
writer of popular science.
OK, outdated, but useful if read with a group of similar books.
For centuries, it was assumed that our universe was static. In the late 1920s, astronomers defeated this assumption with a startling new discovery. From Earth, the light of distant galaxies appeared to be red, meaning that those galaxies were receding from us. This led to the revolutionary realization that the universe is expanding. The Red Limit is the tale of this discovery, its ramifications, and the passionately competitive astronomers who charted the past, present, and future of the cosmos.
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23+ Works 6,779 Members
Timothy Ferris was born on August 29, 1944, in Miami, Florida. He graduated from Northwestern University with a B.A. in 1966 and did graduate work from 1966-1967. Ferris is the author of Coming of Age in the Milky Way, for which he was awarded the American Institute of Physics Prize and nominated for a Pulitzer Prize; The Red Limit; The Whole show more Shebang: A State of the Universe(s) Report; Galaxies; The Mind's Sky; The Science of Liberty: Democracy, Reason, and the Laws of Nature, and other popular books on astronomy and physics. He has received the American Institute of Physics Prize, the American Association for the Advancement of Science Prize, the Klumpke-Roberts Prize, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Books by Ferris have been nominated for the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize. His PBS special, The Creation of the Universe, won an Emmy nomination in 1986. In addition to his books, Ferris is a former editor of Rolling Stone magazine and has authored more than 100 articles, essays, and reviews in such publications as Esquire, Nature, The New Republic, The New York Times Book Review, and Reader's Digest. He is a regular contributor to The New Yorker, writes a column for Scientific American, has served as an essayist for The MacNeil-Lehrer News Hour, and is a commentator for National Public Radio's All Things Considered. Ferris produced the Voyager phonograph record, an artifact of human civilization containing music, the sounds of Earth, and encoded photographs, that was launched aboard the Voyager spacecraft. He serves as a consultant to NASA on long-term space exploration policy. A polymath scholar, Ferris has taught in five disciplines at four universities including City University of New York and University of Southern California. Professor Ferris lives with his wife and family in San Francisco and teaches at the University of California, Berkeley, in the departments of journalism and astronomy, where he is an emeritus professor. (Bowker Author Biography) Timothy Ferris, author of seven books on astronomy, regularly contributes to such publications as The New Yorker, Life, Nature, Esquire, & The New York Times Magazine. He wrote & narrated the award-winning PBS television special "The Creation of the Universe." He lives in San Francisco, California. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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Common Knowledge
- Canonical title*
- Mot universums gränser : den moderna astronomins och kosmologins historia
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- ASINs
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