Bones, Rocks and Stars: The Science of When Things Happened (Macmillan Science) - Hardcover

Turney, C.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1403985995 ISBN 13: 9781403985996

Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006

Synopsis

What is the Turin Shroud? When were the Pyramids built? Why did the dinosaurs die out? How did the Earth take shape? With questions like these, says Chris Turney, time is of the essence. And understanding how we pinpoint the past, he cautions, is crucial to putting the present in perspective and planning for the future.

About this title

About the Author

CHRIS TURNEY is a British Geologist based at the University of Exeter. He did the radiocarbon dating on the 'Hobbit' fossil of Flores, Indonesia, that hit the headlines worldwide. He has published numerous scientific papers and magazine articles and done many media interviews thanks to his infectious enthusiasm for working out what happened when. In 2007, Chris was awarded The Sir Nicholas Shackleton Medal for outstanding young Quaternary scientist for his pioneering research on past climate change and dating the past.

Reviews

Starred Review. In the tradition of Malcolm Gladwell, geologist Turney provides an absorbing look into the ways humans reckon time both in their daily lives and in their view of the past. Bringing together science and history in a populist, intellectual adventure, Turney takes on an eclectic roster of world-class mysteries, from the identity of King Arthur and the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin to the age of the cosmos. Turney presents his arcane topics-such as the effect of earth's orbital irregularities on the construction of the pyramids-with the ease and affability of your favorite college professor, and narrates the history of these mysteries with a keen sense of drama. Although each of the chapters seems at first glance to be distinct from the rest (the calendar, comets, ice ages, megafauna, the Missing Link, and dinosaurs among them), the work is actually a single investigation broken into many parts, whose underlying unity emerges gradually. Though Turney means for the book to provide a refutation of Creationism (which he feels has no place in scientific discourse or education), he limits his engagement with the issue to the introduction and epilogue, wisely letting his subject matter speak for itself. This book will appeal to a wide audience, particularly those who got a kick out of Blink or Freakonomics.
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Edition details

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Publication date: 2006
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1403985995
• ISBN 13: 9781403985996
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 199