Starborn
Ratings1
Average rating4
15
Ratings1
Average rating4
A sweeping inquiry into how the night sky has shaped human history For as long as humans have lived, we have lived beneath the stars. But under the glow of today's artificial lighting, we have lost the intimacy our ancestors once shared with the cosmos. In Starborn, cosmologist Roberto Trotta reveals how stargazing has shaped the course of human civilization. The stars have served as our timekeepers, our navigators, our muses--they were once even our gods. How radically different would we be, Trotta also asks, if our ancestors had looked up to the night sky and seen... nothing? He pairs the history of our starstruck species with a dramatic alternate version, a world without stars where our understanding of science, art, and ourselves would have been radically altered. Revealing the hidden connections between astronomy and civilization, Starborn summons us to the marvelous sight that awaits us on a dark, clear night--to lose ourselves in the immeasurable vastness above.
Reviews with the most likes.
In Starborn: Our Place in the Universe, astrophysicist Roberto Trotta ambitiously attempts to synthesize physics, astronomy, philosophy, and spirituality while exploring the origins of the cosmos and humanity's place within it. While the book offers an admirable overview of scientific theories about the universe's evolution, the scope at times feels too sprawling.
Trotta covers concepts like dark matter, the Big Bang, stellar life cycles, and planet formation. He has a talent for explaining complex ideas in plain language. However, the broader existential questions feel hastily tacked on rather than tightly integrated. The narrative can come across as disjointed as it swerves between abstract cosmology and philosophical musings.
Casual readers may find the frequent digressions into technical details tedious at points. Trotta sometimes loses sight of the forest for the trees. The prose, while clear, rarely sings. The analogies and artistic flair that might have brought the cold equations to life are few and far between.
In the end, Starborn feels like more of a laundry list of astronomical facts than a coherent meditation on our cosmic origins. Readers seeking an accessible but mixed bag overview of the universe's greatest hits will find something to satisfy their curiosity. But those hoping for a moving spiritual experience may come away underwhelmed by the book's clinical approach. A worthwhile read for fans of astrophysics, but unlikely to become a genre classic.
