The Infinite Book

Oct 6, 2024 8:27 AM

Author:John D. Barrow

The Infinite Book

‘A delight. Popular science doesn’t come much better than this’ Independent

Everything you might want to know about infinity - in history and all the way to today's cutting-edge science.

Infinity is surely the strangest idea that humans have ever had. Where did it come from and what is it telling us about our Universe? Can there actually be infinities? Can you do an infinite number of things in a finite amount of time? Is the Universe infinite?

Infinity is also the place where things happen that don't. 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. Throughout history, the infinite has been a dangerous concept. Many have lost their lives, their careers, or their freedom for talking about it.

The Infinite Book will take you on a tour of these dangerous questions and the strange answers that scientists, mathematicians, philosophers and theologians have come up with to deal with its threats to our sanity.

Reviews

A delight. Popular science doesn't come much better than this

—— Independent

Barrow brings his charm and wit to provide an account that is highly engaging

—— Nature

Science writing at its best. A cutting-edge scientist and a proven writer tackles a subject of infinite fascination. As page-turning as a detective story

—— Good Book Guide

If you enjoy a good intellectual wrestle, this book is for you

—— Daily Mail

Remarkably insightful and entertaining, with Clare proving himself to be the most enthusiastic, open-minded, intelligent and incorrigibly romantic of travellers

—— Mail on Sunday

Clare has produced an enthusiastic, often elegiac, chronicle of his encounters with the swallows

—— Brian Schofield , The Sunday Times

His eye for detail and his elegant pen give flavour of each country he crosses: great veldt and high plateaux, Congo's "green vastness", the "sandy seas" of the Sahel and, finally, the fertile plain of the north African coast

—— The Economist

The resulting book, travel writing at its very best, is enthralling, passionate, hair-raising, quirky, hilarious, informative, occasionally mad and utterly, utterly brilliant... irresistible stuff.

—— Val Hennessy , Daily Mail

Horatio Clare pays tribute to the extraordinary migratory journeys of the swallow...a book that combines travel with natural history

—— Metro

It's graphically done, making me feel I was with him all the way

—— The Sunday Telegraph, Seven Magazine

Clare is engaging and makes a convincing case for the futility of borders

—— Philip Womack , Daily Telegraph

An exciting book, and often very moving

—— Susan Hill , The Lady

This is a book of rare lyrical beauty

—— Brian Maye , Irish Times

His descriptive prose is faultlessly evocative

—— Daily Mail

A curiously thrilling read, written with an elegance heightened by its clarity and economy

—— Elizabeth Day , Observer

A valuable and unflinching account, since it so clearly tells the truth

—— Christopher Hart , The Sunday Times

This book is mesmerising

—— William Leith , Scotsman

Her description of the struggle to remain individual and hence moral is her real achievement. This, to me, is what female writing has to do, and she does it with style and humour and beauty

—— Rachel Cusk

Richard Dawkin's new book... gives the fact-rejecters their just deserts

—— Daily Telegraph

The book is full of evidence, some familiar and some new. Its case is presented in a manner succinct, clear and sometimes vivid

—— Daily Telegraph

No other book currently available approaches Dawkin's comprehensive yet accessible treatment of the extraordinarily diverse and massive body of data that drives ineluctably to the same conclusion

—— National Center for Science Education

The Greatest Show on Earth is a lucid, thorough and often exciting survey of evolution and takes in rats' teeth, dogs, bacteria, the so-called missing link, crustaceans, giraffe anatomy, hummingbirds, chimpanzees, enzymes - you name it. It is informed in nearly every paragraph by Mr. Dawkins's irrepressible enthusiasm

—— Sarah Lyall , New York Times

The Greatest Show on Earth... is essential reading. I would currently rate it... as the best overall book on the evidence for Evolution

—— Marc E. Miquel , SCOPE

This is a magnificent book of wonderstanding: Richard Dawkins combines an artist's wonder at the virtuosity of nature with a scientist's understanding of how it comes to be

—— Matt Ridley, author of "Nature via Nurture"

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