Day the Universe Changed Book

I believe this was the companion book to the wonderful PBS Series of the same title hosted by James Burke (in the 1980's). In it, he pinpoints pinnacle points in scientific history that changed the world as we know it (hopefully you weren't reading that last sentence aloud).

What I love most about this book is that Mr Burke understands that no Scientific "discovery" or theory actually drops from a tree like Newton's apple (no matter how tasty that apple is). He does a wonderful job rewinding from the point of "discovery" to illuminate the culture and people who came before to create just the right atmosphere for "discovery" (I swear I'm going to stop putting that word in quotations). He also carries the narrative long after the discovery to show us the effects it's still having on us today.

We are (in many ways) children of these discoveries. We are able to imagine a Universe where Earth is not the center because of men like Copernicus and Galileo, and that notion changes our point of view. More controversially, men like Darwin have shown us a Universe where "Man" is not the center, and this point of view upsets some people so much that they cannot live in such a world (and so deny it's existence even to this day).

These are but two examples from the book. I'm always surprised it isn't required reading in all colleges (perhaps it isn't boring enough), but then-- what do I know? Perhaps there are better text books out there. I just can't imagine them.