Stephen Hawking is one of the most remarkable figures of our time - a Cambridge genius who has earned international celebrity and become an inspiration to those who have witnessed his triumph over disability. This is Hawking's life story by Kitty Ferguson, written with help from Hawking himself and his close associates.Updated and substantially expanded from her earlier book of 1992, this carefully researched, up to the minute biography gives a rich picture of Hawking's life - his childhood, the heartrending beginning of his struggle with motor neurone disease, his ever-increasing international fame, and his long personal battle for survival in pursuit of a scientific understanding of the universe. Throughout Kitty Ferguson also summarizes and explains the cutting-edge science in which Hawking has been engaged.Stephen Hawking is written with the clarity and simplicity for which all Kitty Ferguson's books have been praised. The result is a captivating account of an extraordinary life and mind.

The enthralling story of Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans, whose insight transformed the ancient world and still inspire the realms of science, mathematics, philosophy and the arts. Einstein said that the most incredible thing about our universe was that it was comprehensible at all. As Kitty Ferguson explains in this eye-opening new book, Pythagoras had much the same idea – but 2,500 years earlier. Though many know him only for the so-called Pythagorean theorem, in fact the pillars of our scientific tradition – the belief that the universe is rational, that there is unity to all things, and that numbers and mathematics are a powerful guide to truth about nature and the cosmos – hark back to the convictions of this legendary scholar and his ancient followers. Alongside the poignant human saga, Kitty Ferguson brilliantly evokes Pythagoras' ancient world, showing how his ideas spread in antiquity and in the Middle Ages, and chronicles the incredible influence he...

The enthralling story of Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans, whose insights transformed the ancient world and still inspire the realms of science, mathematics, philosophy, and the arts. "Pythagoras's influence on the ideas, and therefore on the destiny, of the human race was probably greater than that of any single man before or after him," wrote Arthur Koestler. Though most people know of him only for the famous Pythagorean Theorem (a2 +b2=c2), in fact the pillars of our scientific tradition-belief that the universe is rational, that there is unity to all things, and that numbers and mathematics are a powerful guide to truth about nature and the cosmos-hark back to the convictions of this legendary sixth-century B.C. scholar. Born around 570 B.C. on the cultured Aegean island of Samos, Pythagoras (according to ancient tales) studied with the sage Thales nearby at Miletus, and with priests and scribes in Egypt and Babylon. Eventually he founded his own school at Croton in southern...