Kitty Ferguson – författare

What is a black hole? Could we survive a visit to one ... perhaps even venture inside? Have we yet discovered any real black holes? And what do black holes teach us about the mysteries of our Universe? These are just a few of the tantalizing questions examined in this tour-de-force, jargon-free review of one of the most fascinating topics in modern science. In search of the answers, we trace a star from its birth to its death throes, take a hypothetical journey to the border of a black hole and beyond, spend time with some of the world's leading theoretical physicists and astronomers, and take a whimsical look at some of the wild ideas black holes have inspired. Prisons of Light - Black Holes is comprehensive and detailed. Yet Kitty Ferguson's lightness of touch and down-to-earth analogies set this book apart from all others on black holes and make it a wonderfully stimulating and entertaining read.

In 1963 Stephen Hawking was given two years to live. Defying all the odds, he died in March 2018 at age seventy-six as the most celebrated scientist in the world. This carefully researched and updated biography and tribute gives a rich picture of Hawking's remarkable life - his childhood, the heart-rending beginning of his struggle with motor neurone disease, his ever-increasing international fame, and his long personal battle for survival in pursuit of a scientific understanding of the universe. From more recent years, Kitty Ferguson describes his inspiring leadership at the London Paralympic Games, the release of the film The Theory of Everything, his continuing work on black holes and the origin of the universe, the discovery of 'supertranslations', and the astounding 'Starshot' program. Here also are his intense concern for the future of the Earth and his use of his celebrity to fight for environmental and humanitarian causes, and, finally, a ground-breaking paper he was working on at the time of his death, in which he took issue with some of his own earlier theories. Throughout, Ferguson summarizes and explains the cutting-edge science in which Hawking was engaged and offers vivid first-hand descriptions of his funeral in Cambridge and the interment of his ashes in Westminster Abbey. This is an amazing and revealing tribute, assessing Hawking's legacy in and out of science.

Suppose you and I still wondered whether all of the pinpoints of light in the night sky are the same distance from us. Suppose none of our contemporaries could tell us whether the Sun orbits the Earth, or vice versa, or even how large the Earth is. Suppose no one had guessed there are mathematical laws underlying the motions of the heavens. How would - how did - anyone begin to discover these numbers and these relationships without leaving the Earth? What made anyone even think it was possible to find out “how far,” without going there? In Measuring the Universe we join our ancestors and contemporary scientists as they tease this information out of a sky full of stars. Some of the questions have turned out to be loaded, and a great deal besides mathematics and astronomy has gone into answering them. Politics, religion, philosophy and personal ambition: all have played roles in this drama. There are poignant personal stories, of people like Copernicus, Kepler, Newton, Herschel, and Hubble. Today scientists are attempting to determine the distance to objects near the borders of the observable universe, far beyond anything that can be seen with the naked eye in the night sky, and to measure time back to its origin. The numbers are too enormous to comprehend. Nevertheless, generations of curious people have figured them out, one resourceful step at a time. Progress has owed as much to raw ingenuity as to technology, and frontier inventiveness is still not out of date.

The extraordinary, unlikely tale of Tycho Brahe and Johannes Kepler and their enormous contribution to astronomy and understanding of the cosmos is one of the strangest stories in the history of science.Kepler was a poor, devoutly religious teacher with a genius for mathematics. Brahe was an arrogant, extravagant aristocrat who possessed the finest astronomical instruments and observations of the time, before the telescope. Both espoused theories that seem off-the-wall to modern minds, but their fateful meeting in Prague in 1600 was to change the future of science.Set in one of the most turbulent and colourful eras in European history, when medieval was giving way to modern, Tycho and Kepler is a double biography of these two remarkable men.

What is a black hole? Could we survive a visit to one? Perhaps even venture inside? What would we find? Have we yet discovered any real black holes? And what do black holes teach us about what physicist John Archibald Wheeler called “the deep, happy, mysteries of the universe”?These are just a few of the tantalizing questions examined in this jargon-free review of one of the most fascinating topics in modern science. In search of the answers, we trace a star from its birth to its death throes, take a fabulous hypothetical journey to the border of a black hole and beyond, spend time with some of the world’s leading theoretical physicists and observational astronomers scanning the cosmos for evidence of real black holes, and take a whimsical look at some of the wild ideas black holes have inspired.

In 1963 Stephen Hawking was given two years to live. Defying all the odds, he died in March 2018 at age seventy-six as the most celebrated scientist in the world. This carefully researched and updated biography and tribute gives a rich picture of Hawking's remarkable life - his childhood, the heart-rending beginning of his struggle with motor neurone disease, his ever-increasing international fame, and his long personal battle for survival in pursuit of a scientific understanding of the universe. From more recent years, Kitty Ferguson describes his inspiring leadership at the London Paralympic Games, the release of the film The Theory of Everything, his continuing work on black holes and the origin of the universe, the discovery of 'supertranslations', and the astounding 'Starshot' program. Here also are his intense concern for the future of the Earth and his use of his celebrity to fight for environmental and humanitarian causes, and, finally, a ground-breaking paper he was working on at the time of his death, in which he took issue with some of his own earlier theories. Throughout, Ferguson summarizes and explains the cutting-edge science in which Hawking was engaged and offers vivid first-hand descriptions of his funeral in Cambridge and the interment of his ashes in Westminster Abbey. This is an amazing and revealing tribute, assessing Hawking's legacy in and out of science.

Stephen Hawking was diagnosed with motor neurone disease at the age of 21 and was expected to live for only another two years. He went on to write books and deliver public lectures right up until his death at the age of 76 in 2018. Hawking achieved commercial success with several works of popular science in which he discusses his own theories and cosmology in general. His book A Brief History of Time, a layman's guide to cosmology, appeared on the Sunday Times best-seller list for a record-breaking 237 weeks and sold more than 10 million copies.As Martin Rees, the cosmologist, astronomer royal and Hawking’s longtime colleague wrote, “His name will live in the annals of science; millions have had their cosmic horizons widened by his best-selling books; and even more, around the world, have been inspired by a unique example of achievement against all the odds — a manifestation of amazing willpower and determination.”In this concise and informative guide to Hawking’s life and work, his key scientific achievements – from gravitational singularities to quantum cosmology – are covered in an approachable and accessible way. This is a celebration of an icon of modern physics, who inspired generations of scientists and changed our understanding of the universe.