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Theories for Everything: An Illustrated History of Science
 
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Theories for Everything: An Illustrated History of Science [Hardcover]

John Langone (Author), Bruce Stutz (Author), Andrea Gianopoulos (Author)
3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)

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Book Description

November 21, 2006
Theories for Everything highlights the rich, compelling stories behind science's greatest discoveries and the minds and methods that made them possible. Authoritative, entertaining, and easy to follow, it provides indispensable information on our current theories about the natural and physical world as well as a concise overview of how those ideas evolved.

Filled with illustrations, topical essays, and sidebars, these fascinating pages cover every major topic imaginable—astronomy, the human body and its inner workings, the nature of matter and energy, genetics and evolution, and the complex relationship between mind and behavior. Broken down by subject, the book provides readers with a thorough examination of each set of related theories as they are tested and refined and introduces all the major figures in the history of science, including Aristotle, Archimedes, Copernicus, Galileo, Descartes, Pascal, Newton, Edison, Pasteur, Darwin, Pavlov, Curie, Einstein, Freud, Feynman, and Hawking. The lives of more than 45 scientists are captured in special time lines that add depth and detail to the running narrative.

Each discovery is presented as a detective story: the narrative focuses on how inquisitive investigators posit, revise, and improve upon their descriptions of nature. And like any first-rate mystery, it entices its readers, inviting them to match wits with the scientific sleuths whose theories for everything have unraveled nature's riddles and reshaped how we see our world.

Frequently Bought Together

Theories for Everything: An Illustrated History of Science + The Science Book: Everything You Need to Know About the World and How It Works (National Geographic) + The Knowledge Book: Everything You Need to Know to Get by in the 21st Century
Price For All Three: $65.56

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Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Written by seasoned popular-science authors, this typically colorful National Geographic production is a basic introduction to the historical process of science. The late Langone concisely introduces the concept of a theory, emphasizing that it is a general truth about the natural world and not, as in common parlance, a supposition. Definition in hand, the book dives into the oldest science, astronomy, with the most tenaciously held theory, Ptolemy's geocentric cosmos. As with ancient authority in other sciences, such as Galen on human physiology, Ptolemy put curiosity to sleep until Copernicus, Kepler, and Newton formulated testable theories that encompassed larger classes of phenomena. The treatment of the other major sciences likewise emphasizes the gradual overthrow of a reigning theory by a more comprehensive one. Addressing physics, chemistry, geology, biology, and neurology, the authors deploy graphical aids, including time lines, thumbnail biographies, and sidebars, to explain the major theories and figures in each science. With its profusion of illustrations, this is an inviting orientation to the fascinations of science. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About the Author

John Langone was a veteran science journalist and author who had been an editor at both Discover and Time magazines, and a contributor to the science section of the New York Times, as well as a Kennedy Fellow at Harvard, a Fulbright fellow in Tokyo, and a fellow at the Center for the Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford. His previous books for National Geographic were The Mystery of Time and The New How Things Work.

Product Details

  • Hardcover: 408 pages
  • Publisher: National Geographic (November 21, 2006)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0792239121
  • ISBN-13: 978-0792239123
  • Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 1.2 x 9.9 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 2.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #669,807 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

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Average Customer Review
3.6 out of 5 stars (5 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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25 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, Educational Book, May 17, 2008
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This review is from: Theories for Everything: An Illustrated History of Science (Hardcover)
Please disregard the ludicrous ravings of this book's first reviewer, who judges the entire tome on the basis, not of its cover, but of a single sidebar. He inexplicably dismisses the eminently-qualified authors, who have been senior editors of such publications as Discover, Natural History, and Astronomy, and who I can assure you were thoroughly vetted by National Geographic.

"Theories for Everything" is a beautifully illustrated and well-written introduction to the history of science, particularly useful to young people but also to adults who would like a general refresher. Divided into six chapters -- The Heavens, The Human Body, Matter and Energy, Life Itself, Earth and Moon, Mind and Behavior -- it is neither exhaustive nor highly academic, but it is fun and lively, full of timelines and mini-biographies of science luminaries, which should encourage further exploration.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Great for grandchildren, April 14, 2010
By 
Bill McConnell (Arlington, Texas) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Theories for Everything: An Illustrated History of Science (Hardcover)
The clear writing, accompanied by intelligent and detailed drawings and illustrations provide young minds with fantastic insight into their world as it had come to exist before they did - something some generations do not really comprehend.
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4.0 out of 5 stars A Single-Volume Mini-Encyclopedia Packed With Information, June 7, 2011
This review is from: Theories for Everything: An Illustrated History of Science (Hardcover)
I agree with the reviewer who thinks that this volume is a bit textbooky. But look at what you get. Major themes in this book include outer space, the human body, matter and energy, and much more. Some of the topics featured are how science works, the Babylonian calendar, the four-humor theory of the Ancient Greeks, the Earth and Moon, asteroid impacts, and the human genome.

Time lines are included in order to enable the reader to trace major developments in each of the major fields of science. Featured thinkers and scientists include Aquinas, Bacon, Descartes, Copernicus, Newton, Einstein, Galen, Harvey, Fleming, Pauling, and many more. An extensive bibliography is provided for further study.

This book is an excellent reference source. It is an asset for any science classroom.
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