Reviews for Counting the eons

The average rating for Counting the eons based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2014-06-11 00:00:00 Chris Skelly A collection of essays by science fiction author Isaac Asimov that examine and explain the natural universe similar to Carl Sagan or Neil Degrasse Tyson. Asimov begins each essay with anecdotal stories about his personal life, which are funny and charming, before connecting them to the central theme of each essay. I must admit, though, that much of the hard numbers and facts were lost on me. Quarks and neutrinos still seem obscure and puzzling to me, but at least I feel like I understand them better now that I've read this book. I believe that the later essays are the stronger ones in this collection, particularly the last one where Asimov argues that Milton was a science fiction writer centuries before the genre was popular.

Review # 2 was written on 2017-09-14 00:00:00 Craig Woods A collection of 17 essays from Asimov. This is the 3rd such collection I've read. I'm not as interested in cosmology and particle physics or perhaps just not intelligent enough to really appreciate everything Isaac is trying to do in these essays. That makes it harder to read in that I don't follow or understanding everything I'm reading so bits and pieces hopefully stick and I just try and complete it. One particular essay called "Let Einstein Be!" summed up my experience with the book. It was the essay that I got stuck on and stopped reading for a long time. Once it was finished though it was one of my favorites and I think I learned the most from. It helped me to visualize or provide structure to the theory of relativity and all physics in giving the example of the difference in euclidean geometry on a plane vs geometry on the surface of a sphere. The sphere being the Earth in this example. I'll plod on and continue with the great explainers works. Maybe I'll work my way through the crash course phyics class before trying too much more in that area.