"Entertaining and informative... I am happy to report that nothing is full of interesting reading."
--New Scientist
"Convincing...authoritative...tells the story persuasively."
--Nature
"Barrow's efforts to relate scientific developments to wider cultural themes must be applauded."
--Los Angeles Times Book Review
"Stuffed with wonderful stories....A feast of clear thinking and fine writing."
--BookPage
Publisher Web Site, January, 2004
Summary
What conceptual blind spot kept the ancient Greeks (unlike the Indians and Maya) from developing a concept of
zero? Why did St. Augustine equate nothingness with the Devil? What tortuous means did 17th-century scientists
employ in their attempts to create a vacuum? And why do contemporary quantum physicists believe that the void is
actually seething with subatomic activity? You�ll find the answers in this dizzyingly erudite and elegantly explained
book by the English cosmologist John D. Barrow.
Ranging through mathematics, theology, philosophy, literature, particle physics, and cosmology, The Book of Nothing
explores the enduring hold that vacuity has exercised on the human imagination. Combining high-wire speculation
with a wealth of reference that takes in Freddy Mercury and Shakespeare alongside Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein,
and Stephen Hawking, the result is a fascinating excursion to the vanishing point of our knowledge.
