Don't Know Much About The Universe: Everything You Need to Know About the Cosmos but Never Learned [Hardcover]

Kenneth C. Davis (Author)

Book Description

Series: Don't Know Much About... | Publication Date: September 4, 2001

From the ancients who charted the stars, to Jules Verne and Flash Gordon, to The X-Files, Apollo 13, and Armageddon, subjects engaging the heavens and outer space have intrigued people through the ages. And yet so many of us look up at the night sky and have to admit that we are totally in the dark when it comes to the most basic facts about the heavens.

Into the void steps Kenneth C. Davis with the latest addition to his bestselling and critically acclaimed DON'T KNOW MUCH ABOUT® series. Don't Know Much About® the Universe is a lively and readable guide to the discoveries, theories, and real people that have shaped space exploration, from the beginning of civilization to the present. Using the now-familiar and popular question-and-answer format that has appealed to millions of readers, Davis sets his sights on a subject that has inspired the greatest of fascinations, produced many popular misconceptions, and ultimately helped shape the course of history.

From a historical overview of man's preoccupation with space to a guided tour of our solar system and beyond, Kenneth Davis seeks, as always, to entertain as he teaches. He looks at issues that go beyond the bounds of simple "Science 101" and asks the kinds of questions we may have wanted to ask back in school but didn't have the nerve.

For example:

Who dug those canals on Mars?
Is a "blue moon" really blue?
What does astronomy have to do with astrology?
Will we end with a bang or a whimper?

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Fifth in Kenneth C. Davis's bestselling series, Don't Know Much About the Universe: Everything You Need to Know About the Cosmos but Never Learned explores questions "not usually found in science textbooks: What does astronomy have to do with astrology? Did extraterrestrials build the pyramids? Who dug those canals on Mars? ...Was Werner von Braun a war criminal?" In this chatty, eminently approachable science and history survey, Davis (Don't Know Much About the Bible) quotes poets, unscrambles Galileo's coded notes to Kepler, defines "nova" and "planetary nebula" in liberal-arts-friendly terms, discusses The X-Files and generally strives to put science-phobes at ease. Illus., including several cartoons.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

The Don't Know series has attained commercial success by meeting people's desire to rectify their complete ignorance about a subject. Having already enlightened his audience about the Civil War, the Bible, and geography, Davis now applies his question-and-answer formula to astronomy. His questions frequently play off familiar aspects of the subject, such as, What object could have been the star of Bethlehem? A conversational response follows, with pointers to recent books on the matter at hand, and then Davis promptly moves on to the next query. He organizes his questions into five conventional groups: the history of astronomy, a description of the solar system, a description of the Milky Way and the local group of galaxies, the development of space technology, and the rudiments of big bang cosmology. The text is interspersed with astro-themed cartoons, which provide comic relief, and chronologies. By the conclusion, the neophyte on a self-teaching mission will have mastered the basics of the sun, the moon, and the stars. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 368 pages
• Publisher: Harper; 1st edition (September 4, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060194596
• ISBN-13: 978-0060194598
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.3 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,665,691 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Ken Davis is the author of Don't Know Much About History, which spent 35 consecutive weeks on The New York Times bestseller list, and gave rise to the Don't Know Much About series, which has a combined in-print total of 4.3-million copies.Ken Davis has been dubbed The King of Knowing by Amazon.com because he becomes a subject expert in all of the areas he writes about; the Bible, Mythology, the Universe, the Civil War, for example. Ken has also been a Wise Man; on Who Wants to be a SuperMillionaire and a Life Line on the regular edition of the show. Ken Davis's success aptly makes the case that Americans don't hate history, just the dull version they slept through in class. But many of them want to know now because their kids are asking them questions they can't answer. Davis's approach is to refresh us on the subjects we should have learned in school. He does it by busting myths, setting the record straight and always remembering that fun is not a four-word letter word. A somewhat well-kept secret: Ken Davis never graduated from college, but he was awarded an honorary doctorate from Concordia College in Bronxville, where he was also asked to give a commencement address. Ken Davis is a frequent media guest. He has appeared on hundreds of television and radio shows, including NPR, The Today Show, Fox and Friends, CNN, and The Discovery Channel. He has been a commentator for All Things Considered, and has written for the New York Times. In addition to his adult titles, he writes the Don't Know Much About Children's series published by HarperCollins. He lives in New York with his wife. They have two grown children.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

51 of 52 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars A Sloppy Disappointment, October 28, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Don't Know Much About The Universe: Everything You Need to Know About the Cosmos but Never Learned (Hardcover)

Davis lists an impressive bibliography of sources. If only he had actually consulted them.

For a book promising "Everything you need to know about the cosmos but never learned," this trots out a dismaying wealth of old myth and sets little of the record straight. According to Davis, Stonehenge -- which he incorrectly glosses as "stone hinge," obviously unaware what a henge is -- was built by druids around 1900 BC. As every English schoolchild knows, it was a ruin centuries before the first druid ever set foot in Britain. (There is a reason that it and dozens of other stone circles are known as "Stone Age Monuments.")

Davis has astronomer Tycho Brahe die from a urinary tract infection after an all-night bender. Brahe in fact died from complications of a burst bladder because he considered it impolite to leave a six-hour banquet in his honor long enough to relieve himself -- which Davis could have gleaned from any responsible biography.

He perpetuates when he could have punctured the myth (eagerly promoted by Welles himself) that Orson Welles's "War of the Worlds" broadcast sent "millions" into panic in 1938. Davis can't spell Copernicus's Polish name (Koppernigk, not "Kopernik"). ...

I could forgive all of this if Davis would only, like the even more factually-deprived Richard Shenkman, deliver a good read. But he's surprisingly turgid and uninteresting.

Take Davis's title at its word. This is one to leave on the shelf.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Better than Nuttin!, January 11, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Don't Know Much About The Universe: Everything You Need to Know About the Cosmos but Never Learned (Hardcover)

Contrary to the other 2 reviews, I thought this did exactly what I hoped. This is a simple review -- okay, simplistic review -- of the universe, but I was barely 8 when I last had any formal instruction about the vastness of the heavens. I have managed to be successful in my life in spite of this dereliction, but now in the comfort of an easy chair with a cigar and glass of cab for company, I can finally learn that some guy in 300 some-odd BC calculated the earth's circumference to within a couple hundred miles. My kids knew that, of course -- probably from some video game -- but it was a wowie for me. So what if Davis doesn't know how to spell Polish names. I am not trying out for a spot on the next Mars mission. This may not be a scholarly work, but it's a good read.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars You Don't Want to Know about Kenneth Davis., January 22, 2002

By 

"claresdad" (San Anselmo, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Don't Know Much About the Universe (Audio Cassette)

Kenneth Davis' "Don't Know Much About..." books are fun and interesting. There are occasional factual errors, so use his works to get an overview or refreshment of the subject, and don't rely too heavily on specific historical anecdotes. But I recommend reading, not listening. Davis has a penchant for droning on about himself, his critique of the schools, and his own philosophy of learning. When doing so, he is verbose and repetitive. With a book, you can skim over his homilies and get to the data points. Unfortunately, you can't do that with an audiocassette or CD. In addition, the charts and lists he puts in his books are fine when you can view them, but they don't come through well when he reads them to you. I recommend skipping the cassettes or CDs -- try the books.