A Natural History of Time

Science News,  August 25, 2007  

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A NATURAL HISTORY OF TIME PASCAL RICHET

Geochemists and astrophysicists have determined that the universe is billions of years old. However, until the past century, attempts to prove the age of the universe were based on religion as well as on science, Richet profiles the notion of time throughout history, focusing on the history of Earth and life on it. The ancient Greeks believed that time was infinite. Christian scholars struggled to reconcile their belief that the age of the universe could be expressed in millennia with emerging scientific evidence that the universe was indeed billions of years old. Harmonizing scientific evidence with religious belief sometimes required a stretch of the imagination; for example, fossils were once explained as relics from the biblical great flood. And though scholars as early as the 10th century recognized the effects of erosion and sedimentation, no one made the connection between these processes and the passage of geological time. using radiometric-dating methods, scientists of the early 20th century finally established a time line for the universe. Univ. Chicago, 2007, 470 p., b&w illus., hardcover, $29.00.

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