A thick tome on the
sun, I thought, as I chosen up the package from the post, and in fact, it is a
book that is all about the sun, turning the central star of our solar system.
It is inconsistently the most misunderstood today star we know and the
reference star is still for many astronomical state variables such as mass or
luminosity.
If you expect good
information about them - it's really about time that once again a book on the
current results and findings of solar research is published - will be
disappointed by the book,
because the physics of the sun, despite the title not
the issue here. Rather it is the world's various views on the sun, which the
author - not a scientist but a five-time British fencing master, who has since
taken the career in journalism and founded a publishing house named after him -
has met on his travels.
In the beginning, a
little disappointed, you need a certain time to read in this book, but then it
gets interesting, because so varied the lost and surviving cultures in the
world are, so are their ideas about the sun. Some of them seem to quite modern,
others are characterized by mysticism and astrology. One goes with the author
in a way scientific and spiritual journey to our home star, with first starts
"pre-scientific considerations" and the first scientific
considerations, their effect on the earth and its inhabitants, the use of
calendars and navigation, and with the Sun symbolism of the depiction, in film
and television, with classic writers and ideas for the future of the Sun ends.
Who can build the
frequent intermingling of astronomy with more humanistic ideas will read this
book with great profit, however, who expects a treatment of current scientific
knowledge, should rather not even bother.
No comments:
Post a Comment