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OUT NOW FROM VERSO:
THE EARTH: FROM MYTHS TO KNOWLEDGE
How mankind discovered the size, trajectory and age of the Earth
HUBERT KRIVINE
Defending scientific truths in an age of obscurantism
http://www.versobooks.com/books/1862-the-earth
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Our planet’s elliptical orbit around the Sun and its billions-of-years existence are facts we take for granted, matters every literate high school student is expected to grasp. But humanity’s struggle towards these scientific truths lasted
millennia. Few of us have more than the faintest notion of the path we have travelled.
Hubert Krivine tells the story of the thinkers and scientists whose work allowed our species to put an age to the planet and pinpoint our place in the solar system. It
is a history of bold innovators, with a broad cast of contributors – not only Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler, but Halley, Kelvin, Darwin and Rutherford, among many others. Courage, iniquity, religious dogmatism, genius and blind luck all played a part.
This
was an epic struggle to free the mind from the constraints of cant, ideology and superstition. From this history, Krivine delineates an invaluable philosophy of science, one today under threat from irrationalism and the fundamentalist movements of East and
West, which threaten both what we have attained at great cost and what we still have to learn.
Scientific progress is not a sufficient condition for social progress; but it is a necessary one. The Earth is not merely a history of scientific learning, but
a stirring defence of Enlightenment values in the quest for human advancement.
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Read Tariq Ali’s foreword to THE EARTH, where he urges us to see beyond a facile opposition between religious dogmatism and relativism, on the Verso blog:
http://www.versobooks.com/blogs/1997-an-anti-obscurantist-intervention-tariq-ali-introduces-hubert-krivine-s-the-earth
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“An excellent book of popular science, written in a straightforward, accessible style.” – Jean Bricmont, Le Monde Diplomatique
“Hubert Krivine’s book is not only a fascinating history of how humanity came to understand the age and motion of the Earth – it is also an object lesson in the philosophy of science, which will upset religious fundamentalists and extreme-social-constructivist
sociologists in equal measure.” – Alan Sokal, Professor of Physics at New York University and Professor of Mathematics at University College London
“Clear and fascinating.” – La Quinzaine Litteraire
“A wonderful reflection on science.” – Mediapart
“Krivine’s new book should be read, distributed, and defended: it outlines — allowing only for the uncertainties of science inquiry — how we know what we know about the earth.” – Flavorwire
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HARDBACK: APRIL 2015 (UK) / 304 pages / ISBN: 9781781687994 / £20.00 / $29.95 / $35.00 (Canada)
THE EARTH is available at a 30% discount on our website, with free shipping and bundled ebook. Purchasing details here: http://www.versobooks.com/books/1862-the-earth
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