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JOKES & 'TOONS
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Non-Fiction Book Reviews
by Sharlee Plett
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The Discoverers:
A History of Man's Search to Know His World and Himself
by Daniel J. Boorstin
I am an avid reader of historical works. I find that it gives me
tremendous perspective on technology, religion and many other disciplines.
The Discovers is about critical historical discoveries and innovations
that facilitated the progress of technology and how they affect historical
works and presentations.
Boorstin makes you look and really think about the time periods he examines.
For example, he reviews the historical track of time-keeping as a technology
and reminds us that our very precise time keeping technologies did not always
exist. Imagine living during a time when you arranged your meetings by saying
I will meet you in five days, in the middle of the afternoon! He looks at the
entire series of discoveries about time and the solar system that
culminate in our current technologies. He looks at the various time-keeping devices
that were invented, the origin of our calendar, the role that astronomy plays.
From time, he moves onto planetary exploration and the biological sciences.
Each discovery builds on earlier discoveries and each discoverer was faced with
having to re-examine the fundamental assumptions of his or her time.
We take so much for granted and never stop to think how we might have interpreted
events if we had to build up our knowledge without this road of hard-won discovered
knowledge. Think about it - if you had no science education whatsoever - would you
really be able to figure out what caused a plant to grow? Could you conclude that the
earth was actually round? Would you be able to figure that the moon affected the tides?
What sort of explanations would you come up with?
Wonderful, thought-provoking and very much a challenge to our own complacency!
Click to purchase or get further info on The Discoverers at Amazon.com
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