God's Equation

By Dr. Amir Aczel

In a work that is at once lucid and profound, renowned mathematician Dr. Amir Aczel, critically acclaimed author of Fermat's Last Theorem, takes students into the heart of science's greatest mystery. In January 1998, astronomers found evidence that the cosmos is expanding at an ever-increasing rate--the way we perceived the universe was changed forever. The most compelling theory cosmologists could find to explain this phenomenon was Einstein's cosmological constant, a theory he conceived--and rejected---over eighty years ago. Drawing on newly discovered letters of Einstein--many translated here for the first time--years of research, and interviews with prominent mathematicians, cosmologists, physicists, and astronomers, Aczel takes us on a fascinating journey into "the strange geometry of space-time," and into the mind of a genius. Here the unthinkable becomes real: an infinite, ever-expanding, ever-accelerating universe whose only absolute is the speed of light. Awesome in scope, nuanced in detail, God's Equation is science writing at its finest.

Review by Randomhouse