Ice Age: The Theory That Came In From The Cold! Book

On July 24, 1837, naturalist Louis Agassiz stunned the learned members of the Swiss Society of Natural Sciences by addressing them not with the anticipated lecture on fossil fishes, but with a passionate presentation on the existence of Ice Ages. No one was convinced. Agassiz even went so far as to drag reluctant members of the Society up into the mountains to see the evidence—the scars left on hard rock by the process of glaciation. (Many skeptics present tried to explain these away as the product of the wheels of passing carriages!) Extraordinary as it may seem, it took another 140 years before the Ice Age theory was fully proven and understood.

John and Mary Gribbin tell the remarkable story of how we came to understand the phenomenon of Ice Ages. They focus on the key personalities obsessed with the quest for answers to tantalizing questions. How frequently do Ice Ages occur? How do astronomical rhythms affect the Earth's climate? Have there always been two polar ice caps? Is it true that tiny changes in the heat balance of the Earth could plunge us back into full Ice Age conditions?

With startling new material on how the last major Ice Epoch could have hastened human revolution, Ice Age explains why the Earth was once covered in ice—and how that made us human.

About the Authors:
John Gribbin trained as an astrophysicist at the University of Cambridge and is currently visiting Fellow in astronomy at the University of Sussex. His many books include In Search of Schrödinger's Cat, The Little Book of Science, The Birth of Time, Hyperspace, Q is for Quantum,and Stardust.

Mary Gribbin studied psychology at the University of Sussex and is best known as a writer of science books for young readers. She works in education in East Sussex.

Together John and Mary Gribbin have written several science books, including Richard Feynman: A Life in Science.