A Short History of Nearly Everything: Special Illustrated EditionThis new edition of the acclaimed bestseller is lavishly illustrated to convey, in pictures as in words, Bill Bryson’s exciting, informative journey into the world of science. In A Short History of Nearly Everything, the bestselling author of A Walk in the Woods and The Body, confronts his greatest challenge yet: to understand—and, if possible, answer—the oldest, biggest questions we have posed about the universe and ourselves. Taking as his territory everything from the Big Bang to the rise of civilization, Bryson seeks to understand how we got from there being nothing at all to there being us. The result is a sometimes profound, sometimes funny, and always supremely clear and entertaining adventure in the realms of human knowledge, as only Bill Bryson can render it. Now, in this handsome new edition, Bill Bryson’s words are supplemented by full-color artwork that explains in visual terms the concepts and wonder of science, at the same time giving face to the major players in the world of scientific study. Eloquently and entertainingly described, as well as richly illustrated, science has never been more involving or entertaining. |
From inside the book
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... known, or thought we've known, for long. Even the notion of the Big Bang is quite a recent one. The idea had been kicking around since the 1920s when Georges Lemaître, a Belgian priest-scholar, first tentatively proposed it, but it didn ...
... known, or thought we've known, for long. Even the notion of the Big Bang is quite a recent one. The idea had been kicking around since the 1920s when Georges Lemaître, a Belgian priest-scholar, first tentatively proposed it, but it didn ...
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... known as the Kuiper belt. As for Pluto itself, nobody is quite sure how big it is, what it is made of, what kind of atmosphere it has, or even what it really is. A lot of astronomers believe it isn't a planet at all, but merely the ...
... known as the Kuiper belt. As for Pluto itself, nobody is quite sure how big it is, what it is made of, what kind of atmosphere it has, or even what it really is. A lot of astronomers believe it isn't a planet at all, but merely the ...
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... known as long-period comets, pass through the inner solar system. Just occasionally these stray visitors smack into something solid, like Earth. That's why we've come out here now—because the comet we have come to see has just begun a ...
... known as long-period comets, pass through the inner solar system. Just occasionally these stray visitors smack into something solid, like Earth. That's why we've come out here now—because the comet we have come to see has just begun a ...
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... known to astronomy as NGC1365. (NGC stands for New General Catalogue, where these things are recorded. Once it was a heavy book on someone's desk in Dublin; today, needless to say, it's a database.) For sixty million years, the light ...
... known to astronomy as NGC1365. (NGC stands for New General Catalogue, where these things are recorded. Once it was a heavy book on someone's desk in Dublin; today, needless to say, it's a database.) For sixty million years, the light ...
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... known as Orion's belt. Directly above the belt is Betelgeuse, a red supergiant with an actual luminosity 13,000 times that of our own Sun. Such massive stars are comparatively short-lived and Betelgeuse is destined to become a supernova ...
... known as Orion's belt. Directly above the belt is Betelgeuse, a red supergiant with an actual luminosity 13,000 times that of our own Sun. Such massive stars are comparatively short-lived and Betelgeuse is destined to become a supernova ...
Contents
The StoneBreakers | |
Science Red in Tooth and Claw | |
Elemental Matters | |
The Rise of Life | |
Small World | |
Life Goes | |
Goodbye to All That | |
The Richness of Being | |
Cells | |
Darwins Singular Notion | |
The Stuff of Life | |
Einsteins Universe | |
The Mighty Atom | |
Getting the Lead | |
Muster Marks Quarks | |
The Earth Moves | |
Bang | |
The Fire Below | |
Dangerous Beauty | |
Lonely Planet | |
Into the Troposphere | |
The Bounding Main | |
Ice Time | |
The Mysterious Biped | |
The Restless | |
Goodbye | |
DEDICATION ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS | |
NOTES | |
BIBLIOGRAPHY | |
ILLUSTRATIONS | |
INDEX | |
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Common terms and phrases
Africa American ancient animals asteroid astronomer atmosphere atoms Australia australopithecines bacteria bacterium became bones called Cambrian carbon Cavendish cells Celsius cent century chemical cloud comet crater creatures Darwin dinosaurs discovered discovery Earth Einstein electron elements event existence extinction fact Fortey fossil galaxies genes genetic Geological geologist GO TO NOTE Gould Haldane happened hominid Homo erectus Hubble hundred ice ages idea kilometres known least living look Lyell measure metres million years ago modern humans molecules Museum named National Natural History Neandertals nearly neutron never no-one Nobel NOTE REFERENCE ocean once organisms oxygen palaeontologist particles perhaps physicist physics planet Pluto produced proteins protons REFERENCE IN TEXT Richard Fortey rocks Sagan scientific scientists solar system space species specimens stars suggested supernova surface T. H. Huxley Tattersall theory things thought thousand tiny trillion trilobites types universe volcano Yellowstone