| Description |
293 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm |
| Contents |
Why Is the Sky Dark at Night? -- The Riddle Begins -- Three Rival Systems -- Celestial Light -- The Starry Message -- The Riddle Develops -- The Cartesian System -- Newton's Needles and Halley's Shells -- A Forest of Stars -- The Misty Forest -- Worlds on Worlds -- Revelations of Chaos -- The Riddle Continues -- The Fractal Universe -- The Visible Universe -- The Golden Walls of Edgar Allan Poe -- Lord Kelvin Sees the Light -- Ether Voids, Curved Space, and a Midnight Sun -- The Expanding Universe -- The Cosmic Redshift -- Energy in the Universe -- Epilogue -- Proposed Solutions to the Riddle of Darkness at Night -- Appendixes: Digges on the Infinity of the Universe -- Halley on the Infinity of the Sphere of Stars -- Chéseaux Explains the Riddle of Darkness -- Olbers Revives the Riddle of Darkness -- Kelvin on an Old and Celebrated Hypothesis |
| Summary |
Why is the sky dark at night? The answer to this ancient and celebrated riddle, says Edward Harrison, seems relatively simple: the sun has set and is now shining on the other side of the earth. But suppose we were space travelers and far from any star. Out in the depths of space the heavens would be dark, even darker than the sky seen from the earth on cloudless and moonless nights. For more than four centuries, astronomers and other investigators have pondered the enigma of a dark sky and proposed many provocative but incorrect answers. Darkness at Night eloquently describes the misleading trails of inquiry and strange ideas that have abounded in the quest for a solution. In tracing this story of discovery - one of the most intriguing in the history of science--the astronomer and physicist Edward Harrison explores the concept of infinite space, the structure and age of the universe, the nature of light, and other subjects that once were so perplexing. He introduces a range of stellar intellects, from Democritus in the ancient world to Digges in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, followed by Kepler, Newton, Halley, Chéseaux, Olbers, Poe, Kelvin, and Bondi. Harrison's style is engaging, incisive yet poetic, and his strong grasp of history - from the Greeks to the twentieth century - adds perspective, depth, and scope to the narrative. Richly illustrated and annotated, this book will delight and enlighten both the casual reader and the serious inquirer |
| Analysis |
Astronomy Theories, to 1980 |
| Notes |
Includes index |
| Bibliography |
Bibliography: pages 265-288 |
| Subject |
Astronomy -- History.
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Astrophysics -- History.
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Cosmology -- History.
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Olbers' paradox.
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Astronomy.
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Optical Illusions.
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| LC no. |
86032701 |
| ISBN |
0674192702 |
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