The Shadow Club: The Greatest Mystery in the Universe--shadows--and the Thinkers who Unlocked Their SecretsA remarkable exploration of how shadows have forever fascinated us: their extraordinary hold on our fears and imagination; their importance to astronomers, scientists, philosophers, and artists; their influence on myth and religious beliefs. What's stranger than a shadow? Shadows are messengers from the world of darkness, images that we can't shake off, black spots that have troubled our sleep through the ages. And yet shadows have been the key to unlocking some of our toughest scientific problems: the reason for eclipses, the distances between planets, the shape and size of the earth, the structure of the solar system, the nature of time itself. In this unique study--combining history, science, and anthropology--Roberto Casati discusses the famous and the obscure who, armed with imagination and creativity, struggled with the concept of shadow and provided us with explanations of and uses for our constant companion. Among those who were part of this "shadow club" were Eratosthenes and Galileo, ancient Arab astrono-mers and modern mathematicians, classical Greek painters and Leonardo da Vinci. And now, the name Casati--who has given us the first book devoted to the subject--can be added. Roberto Casati was born in Milan in 1961. A research director at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, he lives in Paris and works at the Institut Nicod, a laboratory of the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales and of the Ecole Normales. He studies the cognition of strange things--images, colors, sounds, places, holes--and shadows. With Achille Varzi he is the author of Holes and Other Superficialities and Parts and Places. |
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The Shadow Club: The Greatest Mystery in the Universe - Shadows - and the ... Roberto Casati No preview available - 2004 |
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Al-Biruni Alexandria Anaxagoras ancient appears Aristarchus Aristarchus of Samos astronomical babies body bowl cast a shadow celestial century B.C. Codex Atlanticus cognitive concept of shadow crater dark date unknown Desargues Desargues's Theorem discoveries distance drawing earth earth's shadow Eratosthenes example Galileo geometry hole hypothesis idea Jupiter Jupiter's Kepler lamp Len Talmy Leonardo light source look lunar eclipse lunar phases mathematical measure meridian method moon moon's mountains move naked eye night observed painter painting Parmenides penumbra perception perspective phases picture planet Plato pole problem projection pyramid ring Rome satellites Saturn screen seems seen shad shadow cast shadow line shadow theater shadowy rays shape side silhouette SKIA solar clocks solar eclipse solstice soul space sphere spots Starry Messenger stars story strange stylus sun's sundial surface telescope Thales theory there's things tion trace treatise triangle understand Venus visible wall zone