The Unexpected Universe

Author: Loren Eiseley
Publisher: Library of America
ISBN: 1598535455
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 245

Book Description
“No one has ever managed to make the pursuit of knowledge feel more soulful or more immediate than Loren Eiseley . . . ” —Ben Cosgrove, The Daily Beast At the height of a distinguished career as a paleontologist, Loren Eiseley turned from fieldwork and scientific publication to the personal essay. Here, in The Unexpected Universe, he displays his far-reaching knowledge and searching curiosity about the natural world, and the qualities that led many to hail him as a “modern Thoreau.” Fascinating accounts of the journeys of Odysseus, Captain Cook, and Charles Darwin frame Eiseley’s more modest wanderings as a suburban naturalist, attentive to the lives of small creatures. Sometimes he travels no further than the local dump. And yet, like Homer’s hero or these great explorers, he continually finds a universe “not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose.”

The Unexpected Universe

Author: Loren C. Eiseley
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN: 9780156928502
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 256

Book Description
A naturalist deals informally with the way in which totally unexpected twists in the evolutionary process bring renewal of hope in the life of our planet.

The Simple Beauty of the Unexpected

Author: Marcelo Gleiser
Publisher: University Press of New England
ISBN: 1611689406
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 200

Book Description
Marcelo Gleiser has had a passion for science and fishing since he was a boy growing up on the beaches of Rio de Janeiro. Now a world-famous theoretical physicist with hundreds of scientific articles and several books of popular science to his credit, he felt it was time to connect with nature in less theoretical ways. After seeing a fly-fishing class on the Dartmouth College green, he decided to learn to fly-fish, a hobby, he says, that teaches humility. In The Simple Beauty of the Unexpected, Gleiser travels the world to scientific conferences, fishing wherever he goes. At each stop, he ponders how in the myriad ways physics informs the act of fishing; how, in its turn, fishing serves as a lens into nature's inner workings; and how science engages with questions of meaning and spirituality, inspiring a sense of mystery and awe of the not yet known. Personal and engaging, The Simple Beauty of the Unexpected is a scientist's tribute to nature, an affirmation of humanity's deep connection with and debt to Earth, and an exploration of the meaning of existence, from atom to trout to cosmos.

How to Profit from Prophets

Author: Maurice A. Fetty
Publisher: CSS Publishing
ISBN: 0788012770
Category : Advent sermons
Languages : en
Pages : 88

Book Description
Prophets have not done well in history -- at least not by ordinary standards: Elijah seemed to be the only one in Israel resisting Baalism. Amos was told to keep silent and go back where he came from. Jeremiah was scorned and imprisoned. John, the Baptist was beheaded, and... Jesus, the greatest of them all, was crucified. By ordinary standards the prophets have not done well because, as Jesus said, we ignore or kill the messengers of God. And yet it is the extraordinary standards of the prophets that intrigue us, inspire us, and stimulate our minds and consciences to God's ways and thoughts. Because of their extraordinary standards the prophets continue to shape us and history. In this challenging Advent-Christmas book, Maurice A. Fetty reminds us again how it is important to "profit from prophets." Maurice A. Fetty is Senior Minister of the Congregational Church of Manhasset (United Church of Christ) in Manhasset, New York. He has also served churches in Grand Rapids, Michigan; Minneapolis; East Harlem; and Brooklyn. Fetty holds the Master of Sacred Theology Degree from Union Theological Seminary and the Master of Arts Degree from Christian Theological Seminary. In addition to numerous articles he has authored several books, including Putting Your Life On The Line; Sex, Love And Marriage; and The Divine Advocacy.

The Unexpected Universe of Doris Lessing

Author: Katherine Fishburn
Publisher: Praeger
ISBN:
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 202

Book Description
In this first study of Doris Lessing's science fiction, Fishburn devotes a chapter to each of Lessing's seven novels. Her major argument is that Lessing uses these novels to change our perception of reality by describing worlds that are simultaneously similar to and different from our own. Of particular importance is the fact that each narrator, by functioning as an intermediary or guide-leader, helps skeptical readers to experience the alien worlds of Lessing's imagination. As she traces the development of these seven narrators, Fishburn shows how they eventually fulfill the role of the idealized author Lessing described in The Small Personal Voice. In examining how these texts challenge us to change, Fishburn discusses the influence of Marxist and Sufi thought on Lessing and also points out the striking similarity betwen Lessing's philosophy of wholeness and the discoveries of modern physics.

Faith Rising—Between the Lines

Author: David B. Bowman
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
ISBN: 1666700320
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 132

Book Description
This writing intends to rouse would-be believers to faith--or enhance the faith of others--through the adventure of modern fiction. While taking note of the secularity of our era, the author insists the Spirit of God has not departed the scene. The opening poem by Emily Dickinson, "Tell all the truth but tell it slant," proposes the author's contention that the "indirect discourse" of fictional writers may welcome readers to faith's door in ways sermonic speech never did. The modern authors chosen for this purpose are Izak Dinesen, Annie Dillard, Kent Haruf, Loren Eiseley, Gary Trudeau, Garrison Keillor, William Golding, Walker Percy, Frederick Buechner, and Gabriel Marcel. Having explained one work each by these noted authors, the book closes by pointing to ways in which embedded faith may rise out of these pages to meet the reader where he or she lives.

The Night Country

Author: Loren Eiseley
Publisher: Library of America
ISBN: 1598535471
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 248

Book Description
One of America’s most beloved naturalists reflects on the “fallibility of science, the mystery of evolution, and the surprise of life” in this fascinating essay collection (Time) Weaving together memoir, philosophical reflection, and his always keen observations of the natural world, Loren Eiseley’s essays in The Night Country explore those moments, often dark and unexpected, when chance encounters disturb our ordinary understandings of the universe. The naturalist here seeks neither “salvation in facts” nor solace in wild places: discovering an old bone or a nest of wasps, or remembering the haunted spaces of his lonely Nebraska childhood, Eiseley recognizes what he calls “the ghostliness of myself,” his own mortality, and the paradoxes of the evolution of consciousness.

Toward a Dialogue of Understandings

Author: Mary Ellen Pitts
Publisher: Lehigh University Press
ISBN: 9780934223379
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 364

Book Description
In Toward a Dialogue of Understandings, Mary Ellen Pitts examines scientist Loren Eiseley's unique impact as a thinker and writer.

Fantastic Numbers and Where to Find Them

Author: Antonio Padilla
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
ISBN: 0374600570
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 211

Book Description
A fun, dazzling exploration of the strange numbers that illuminate the ultimate nature of reality. For particularly brilliant theoretical physicists like James Clerk Maxwell, Paul Dirac, or Albert Einstein, the search for mathematical truths led to strange new understandings of the ultimate nature of reality. But what are these truths? What are the mysterious numbers that explain the universe? In Fantastic Numbers and Where to Find Them, the leading theoretical physicist and YouTube star Antonio Padilla takes us on an irreverent cosmic tour of nine of the most extraordinary numbers in physics, offering a startling picture of how the universe works. These strange numbers include Graham’s number, which is so large that if you thought about it in the wrong way, your head would collapse into a singularity; TREE(3), whose finite nature can never be definitively proved, because to do so would take so much time that the universe would experience a Poincaré Recurrence—resetting to precisely the state it currently holds, down to the arrangement of individual atoms; and 10^{-120}, measuring the desperately unlikely balance of energy needed to allow the universe to exist for more than just a moment, to extend beyond the size of a single atom—in other words, the mystery of our unexpected universe. Leading us down the rabbit hole to a deeper understanding of reality, Padilla explains how these unusual numbers are the key to understanding such mind-boggling phenomena as black holes, relativity, and the problem of the cosmological constant—that the two best and most rigorously tested ways of understanding the universe contradict one another. Fantastic Numbers and Where to Find Them is a combination of popular and cutting-edge science—and a lively, entertaining, and even funny exploration of the most fundamental truths about the universe.

Near and Distant Horizons

Author: John Herlihy
Publisher: Sophia Perennis
ISBN: 9781597310086
Category : Creation (Islam)
Languages : en
Pages : 204

Book Description
Near and Distant Horizons: In Search of the Primary Sources of Knowledge With originality and insight, the author makes a compelling case for the need to identify the sources of a traditional knowledge that still has the power to enrich people's lives in today's materialistic and anti-spiritual world. What are the true sources of knowledge? Are there headwaters for the universal laws of nature? Is there a source so transcendent that it can resolve the perennial mystery concerning the origin of life and the creation of man? Is there a wellspring of knowledge that can neutralize the duality of the world by offering a unified vision of the Whole? This work reflects upon the significance of three principal sources of knowledge in the Islamic Traditions. They are Revelation as the expression of the supreme mind of God, Nature as the universal body of God, and Man as the human image of God. The book's absorbing inquiry and reflective style throw light on the dark mysteries that still confront people today, and will appeal to readers interested in an alternative to the theories of modern science, taking them on an inward journey whose destination lies far beyond the horizon of our time. John Herlihy, an American Muslim, was educated at Boston University and Columbia University in New York City. He has written a number of books on traditional themes, including Modern Man at the Crossroads and Borderlands of the Spirit. He is the Director of an educational program at the Petroleum Institute, a new engineering university in the United Arab Emirates.