Science is done by fallible people, a fact too often forgotten both by those who glorify science as absolute truth, and those who despise science because sometimes it fails.

Starwatchers: A History of Discovery in the Night Sky
JOANNE BAKER
(BLOOMSBURY, 272 PP, £22)
TABLET BOOKSHOP PRICE £19.80 • TEL 020 7799 4064

Astronomy is not the study of stars or planets; it is the study of what we human beings think we know about those things. This insight is at the heart of Joanne Baker’s delightful book. She doesn’t just recite what we have learned about the universe; she tells the stories of the star- watchers, people past and present, of many different cultures, whose work we use today when we try to understand the things in the sky.

The book is framed with the author’s own story. We relive her childhood fascination with space, and her life as a professional astronomer – the call for tea in Morse Code at the Cavendish Lab (where she worked with the Cosmic Anisotropy Telescope); the unforgettable joy of observing a total solar eclipse, and of being lost in the stars above the Silk Road in China.

Get Instant Access

Continue Reading

Register for free to read this article in full

REGISTER

Subscribe for unlimited access

SUBSCRIBE NOW

From just £37.50 quarterly

  Print copy of The Tablet delivered directly to your door.
  Complete access to all Tablet website content including all premium content.
  Access to the weekly digital copy of The Tablet.
  Full access to The Tablet’s archive – over 180 years of back issues.

Already a subscriber? Login