Final Frontier - Brian Clegg ****

This book takes the reader on a fascinating journey through the subject of space exploration.

After a discussion of how space travel is portrayed, sometimes unrealistically, in science fiction; this book gives us an informative and interesting breakdown of the various aspects of space travel. Whether it is establishing a base on the Moon, terraforming Mars or mining asteroids for minerals, throughout the book the ideas and concepts which are discussed are explained in a clear and engaging fashion.

As the book says on several occasions, whether nations justify any space exploration on political, scientific or commercial grounds; the underlying reason that humans will leave this planet is because of humankind's innate desire to explore and expand our frontiers. This book is a wonderful discussion of how that exciting voyage will probably unfold.

To finish, here's what the veteran science writer John Gribbin said:

An enjoyable romp across space and time, from Cyrano de Bergerac to future space-warp driven interstellar craft, via Verne, Wells and the possibility of colonising the solar system.

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Review by Rhodri Evans

Please note, this title is written by the editor of the Popular Science website. Our review is still an honest opinion – and we could hardly omit the book – but do want to make the connection clear.

Comments

Target Earth – Govert Schilling *****

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The Decline and Fall of the Human Empire - Henry Gee ****

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The Language of Mathematics - Raúl Rojas ***

One of the biggest developments in the history of maths was moving from describing relationships and functions with words to using symbols. This interesting little book traces the origins of a whole range of symbols from those familiar to all, to the more obscure squiggles used in logic and elsewhere. On the whole Raúl Rojas does a good job of filling in some historical detail, if in what is generally a fairly dry fashion. We get to trace what was often a bumpy path as different symbols were employed (particularly, for example, for division and multiplication, where several still remain in use), but usually, gradually, standards were adopted. This feels better as a reference, to dip into if you want to find out about a specific symbol, rather than an interesting end to end read. Rojas tells us the sections are designed to be read in any order, which means that there is some overlap of text - it feels more like a collection of short essays or blog posts that he couldn't be bothered ...

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