The Beginner's Guide to Constructing the Universe: The Mathematical Archetypes of Nature, Art, and Science - Paperback

by Michael S. Schneider (Author)

Discover how mathematical sequences abound in our natural world in this definitive exploration of the geography of the cosmos

You need not be a philosopher or a botanist, and certainly not a mathematician, to enjoy the bounty of the world around us. But is there some sort of order, a pattern, to the things that we see in the sky, on the ground, at the beach? In A Beginner's Guide to Constructing the Universe, Michael Schneider, an education writer and computer consultant, combines science, philosophy, art, and common sense to reaffirm what the ancients observed: that a consistent language of geometric design underpins every level of the universe, from atoms to galaxies, cucumbers to cathedrals. Schneider also discusses numerical and geometric symbolism through the ages, and concepts such as periodic renewal and resonance. This book is an education in the world and everything we can't see within it.

Contains numerous b&w photos and illustrations.

Back Jacket

The Universe May Be a Mystery,
But It's No Secret

Michael Schneider leads us on a spectacular, lavishly illustrated journey along the numbers one through ten to explore the mathematical principles made visible in flowers, shells, crystals, plants, and the human body, expressed in the symbolic language of folk sayings and fairy tales, myth and religion, art and architecture. This is a new view of mathematics, not the one we learned at school but a comprehensive guide to the patterns that recur through the universe and underlie human affairs. A Beginner's Guide to Constructing, the Universe shows you:

• Why cans, pizza, and manhole covers are round.

• Why one and two weren't considered numbers by the ancient Greeks.

• Why squares show up so often in goddess art and board games.

• What property makes the spiral the most widespread shape in nature, from embryos and hair curls to hurricanes and galaxies.

• How the human body shares the design of a bean plant and the solar system.

• How a snowflake is like Stonehenge, and a beehive like a calendar.

• How our ten fingers hold the secrets of both a lobster and a cathedral.

• And much more.