The Universe Story : From the Primordial Flaring Forth to the Ecozoic Era--A Celebration of the Unfolding of the Cosmos

Features

• Cover Type: Paperback with 320 pages
• Published by: HarperOne March 11, 1994
• Written in: English
• ISBN 10 Number: 0062508350
• ISBN 13 Number: 978-0062508355
• Book Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.9 x 1 inches
• Weighs: 11.2 ounces

From Publishers Weekly
Physicist Swimme ( The Universe is a Green Dragon ) and historian/theologian Berry ( The Dream of Earth ) fashion a cosmology with alternating chapters of popular astrophysics and a kind of sociology of science that seems, at the start, like a secular Book of Genesis. The admixture of physics and anthropology soon decays into an artificial comprehension akin to the most irresponsible New Age reasoning. In the "Primordial Flaring Forth" section, the authors discuss their perceived need for a new language to express a current cosmology: "Thus to articulate anew the story of our relationships in the world means to use the words of one of the modern languages that implicitly, and to varying degrees, obscures or even denies the reality of these emerging relationships." Offering evidence that, among other things, first cousins should not marry, this soft union of theology and physics reveals less about the universe than either field can by itself. The writers' tortured prose will likely offend the scientific sensibilities of most general readers.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal
Physicist Swimme and cultural historian Berry here examine and synthesize a vast body of knowledge and hypothesis from the fields of astronomy, physics, biology, anthropology, and history. They seek to provide a concise but comprehensive story of the development and evolution of the universe, the earth, and humanity. The authors incorporate what they consider to be the most convincing hypothesis and take an inclusive perspective that views the entire universe as a continually developing, interconnected community. Their book presents a fascinating exploration of the earth's history and, in richly evocative language, paints a picture of the evolution of the universe as a awesome, ongoing creative activity. The final chapter explores the growing human influence on the condition of the planet and pleads for ecological responsibility. This is an engaging presentation written in nontechnical language. Recommended for popular science collections.
- Elizabeth Salt, Otterbein Coll. Lib., Westerville, Ohio
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Reader Reviews
"There is eventually only one story," collaborators Swimme and Berry write, "the story of the universe. Every form of being is integral with this comprehensive story. Nothing is itself without everything else. Each member of the Earth community has its own proper role within the entire sequence of transformations that have given shape and identity to everything that exists" (p. 288). Beginning 15 million years ago (p. 7), THE UNIVERSE STORY follows the universe "from its original Flaring Forth through the shaping of the galaxies, the elements, the Earth, its living forms, the human mode of being, then on through the course of human affairs during the past century" (p. 241). The product of its writers' "imaginative power as well as intellectual understanding" (p. 237), this book "is not the story of a mechanistic, essentially meaningless universe, but the story of a universe that has from the beginning has [sic] its mysterious self-organizing power that, if experienced in any serious manner, must evoke an even greater sense of awe than that evoked in earlier times at the experience of the dawn breaking over the horizon, the lightning storms crashing over the hills, or the night sounds of the tropical rainforests, for it is out of this story that all of these phenomena have emerged" (p. 238). This superb book shows that the universe acts "in an integral manner" (p. 26), everything in the universe existing for everything else (p. 263). For plants and animals, "the universe is a chorus of voices" (p. 42). We are told, for instance, "the winds speak to the butterfly, the taste of the water speaks to the butterfly, the shape of the leaf speaks to the butterfly and offers guidance that resonates with the wisdom coded into the butterfly's being" (p. 42). Similarly, we can "climb a mountain and get hit by something so profound, at so deep a level," that we will never be quite the same (p. 41). For humans, "the adventure of the universe depends upon our ability to listen" (p. 44) to "the mountain language, river language, tree language, the language of the birds and all animals and insects, as well as the languages of the stars in the heavens" (p. 258). We also learn Walt Whitman's sentience was "an intricate creation of the Milky Way, and his feelings are an evocation of being, an evocation involving thunderstorms, sunlight, grass, and death. Walt Whitman is a space the Milky Way fashioned to feel its own grandeur" (p. 40). The moral of this STORY is that the Earth is "a one-time endowment" (p. 246). Through the destruction of the rainforests at the rate of an acre a day, by disturbing the chemical balance of the planet through petrochemicals, through genetic engineering, and through the "radioactive wasting of the planet," we are "eliminating the very conditions for renewal of life in some of its more elaborate forms" (pp. 246-7). "As the natural world recedes in its diversity and abundance, so the human finds itself impoverished in its economic resources, its imaginative powers, in its human sensibilities, and in significant aspects of its intellectual intuitions" (p. 242). This celebration of the unfolding universe will change the way you look at life. G. Merritt