Showing titles in Astronomy & Space Science

The stars and constellations are among the few remaining objects that appear to us just as they appeared to our distant ancestors. From anywhere on Earth, a person may view the celestial panorama simply by stepping outside at night and gazing upward. This nonfiction narrative presents the tales of the 48 classical constellations, compiled from literature spanning a thousand years from Homer to Claudius Ptolemy. These age-old tales have captured the human imagination from ancient times to the present.

Four more series of Brian Cox and Robin Ince’s multi award-winning science/comedy show - including the 100th episode and 'The Infinite Moonkey Cage', a special hour-long episode celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo moon landings. One of BBC Radio 4’s most popular programmes, The Infinite Monkey Cage sees Physicists Robin Ince and Brian Cox taking a witty, irreverent look at the world through Scientists’ eyes.

In Calculating the Cosmos, Ian Stewart presents an exhilarating guide to the cosmos, from our solar system to the entire universe. He describes the architecture of space and time, dark matter and dark energy, how galaxies form, why stars implode, how everything began, and how it's all going to end. He considers parallel universes, the fine-tuning of the cosmos for life, what forms extraterrestrial life might take, and the likelihood of life on Earth being snuffed out by an asteroid.

The modern materialist approach to life has conspicuously failed to explain such central mind-related features of our world as consciousness, intentionality, meaning, and value. This failure to account for something so integral to nature as mind, argues philosopher Thomas Nagel, is a major problem, threatening to unravel the entire naturalistic world picture, extending to biology, evolutionary theory, and cosmology. Since minds are features of biological systems that have developed through evolution, the standard materialist version of evolutionary biology is fundamentally incomplete.

In 1610, Galileo published the Siderius nuncius, or Starry Messenger, a "hurried little masterpiece" in John Heilbron's words. Presenting to the world his remarkable observations using the recently invented telescope, Galileo dramatically challenged our idea of the perfection of the heavens and the centrality of the Earth in the universe. Indeed, the appearance of the little book is regarded as one of the great moments in the history of science.

From the longest-serving Flight Director in NASA's history comes a revealing account of high-stakes Mission Control work and the Space Shuttle program that has redefined our relationship with the universe. A compelling look inside the Space Shuttle missions that helped lay the groundwork for the...

In his latest work, former senior computer systems designer and bestselling authorGregg Braden merges these ancient and modern world views into a powerful new model of time. Marrying the modern laws of fractal patterns to the ancient concept of cycles, he demonstrates how everything from the war...

On October 4, 1957, a time of Cold War paranoia, the Soviet Union secretly launched the Earth's first artificial moon. No bigger than a basketball, the tiny satellite was powered by a car battery. Yet, for all its simplicity, Sputnik stunned the world.

Looking up at the night sky fills a person with wonder, knowing there is so much unknown out there! Admiring the universe can put things in perspective – if only we could capture that feeling. Tonight, you can! The first ever photo was taken in 1826 and at the end of the following decade, the moon was captured. But it wasn’t until the late 19th century that technology advanced to the point where details of stars could be seen, and only really the last 20 years that software has taken this to a new level.

Dr. Michael Guillen, a best-selling author, Emmy award-winning journalist and former physics instructor at Harvard, used to be an atheist ― until science changed his mind. Once of the opinion that people of faith are weak, small-minded folks who just don’t understand science, Dr. Guillen ultimately concluded that not only does science itself depend on faith, but faith is actually the mightiest power in the universe.

In the Shadow of the Moon tells the story of the most exciting and challenging years in spaceflight, with two superpowers engaged in a titanic struggle to land one of their own people on the moon. Drawing on interviews with astronauts, cosmonauts, their families, technicians, and scientists, as well as rarely seen Soviet and American government documents, the authors craft a remarkable story of the golden age of spaceflight as both an intimate human experience and a rollicking global adventure.

With impressive examples von Däniken illustrates some of the numerous cities that were dug underground as safe harbors from the destructive boulders. Miles and miles of underground passageways have been discovered around the world as they made space for villages and entire cities. To end the book, von Däniken presents his newest discoveries of an event: In 2017, the author was informed that strange mummified creatures were found near the Peruvian village of Nazca. One of the mummies, apparently several thousand years ago, had been implanted with a metal plate under the skin.

Digital Apollo examines the design and execution of each of the six Apollo moon landings, drawing on transcripts and data telemetry from the flights, astronaut interviews, and NASA's extensive archives. Mindell's exploration of how human pilots and automated systems worked together to achieve the ultimate in flight - a lunar landing - traces and reframes the debate over the future of humans and automation in space.

Given the fact that there are perhaps 400 billion stars in our galaxy alone and perhaps 400 billion galaxies in the universe, it stands to reason that somewhere out there, in the 14-billion-year-old cosmos, there is or once was a civilization at least as advanced as our own. The sheer enormity of the numbers almost demands that we accept the truth of this hypothesis. Why, then, have we encountered no evidence, no messages, no artifacts of these extraterrestrials?

A comprehensive study of the missile system that formed a critical component of the United States' nuclear arsenal. The Titan II ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missile) program was developed by the United States military to bolster the size, strength, and speed of the nation's strategic weapons arsenal in the 1950s and 1960s.

Beneath the Night is a history of humanity, told through our relationship with the night sky. From prehistoric cave art and Ancient Egyptian zodiacs to the modern era of satellites and space exploration, Stuart Clark explores a fascination shared across the world and throughout millennia. It is one that has shaped our scientific understanding; helped us navigate the terrestrial world; provided inspiration for our poets, artists and philosophers; and it has given us a place to project our hopes and fears. In the stars, we can see our past - and ultimately, our fate.

A retelling of the classic myths and timeless tales by bestselling author Annette Giesecke that underlie the 88 named constellations in the night sky--from Andromeda to Orion to Ursa Major. Classical Mythology of the Constellations is a stargazer's guide to the wondrous stories of the gods...

More than 30 years ago, Frank White coined the term "overview effect", to describe the cognitive shift in awareness that results from the experience of viewing Earth from orbit or the moon. He found, that with great consistency, this experience profoundly affects space travelers' worldviews - their perceptions of themselves and our planet and our understanding of the future. White found that astronauts know from direct experience what the rest of us know only intellectually: We live on a planet that is like a natural spaceship moving through the universe.

On a cold January morning in 1986, NASA launched the Space Shuttle Challenger, despite warnings against doing so by many individuals including Allan McDonald. The fiery destruction of Challenger on live television moments after launch remains an indelible image in the nation's collective memory. In Truth, Lies, and O-Rings, McDonald, a skilled engineer and executive, relives the tragedy from where he stood at Launch Control Center.

Described as the "ultimate engineer" during his career at NASA, George M. Low was a visionary architect and leader from the agency's inception in 1958 to his retirement in 1976. As chief of manned spaceflight at NASA, Low was instrumental in the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs. Low's pioneering work paved the way for President Kennedy's decision to make a lunar landing NASA's primary goal in the 1960s.