Polyphony -- the interweaving of simultaneous sounds -- is a crucial aspect of music that has deep implications for how we understand the mind. In Polyphonic Minds, Peter Pesic examines the history a
In the natural science of ancient Greece, music formed the meeting place betweennumbers and perception; for the next two millennia, Pesic tells us in Music and the Makingof Modern Science, "liberal ed
The age-old question "Why is the sky blue?" begins a quest through science, history, and art, from Aristotle and Newton through Goethe and Einstein. Children ask, "Why is the sky blue?" but the questi
In 1824 a young Norwegian named Niels Henrik Abel proved conclusively that algebraic equations of the fifth order are not solvable in radicals. In this book Peter Pesic shows what an important event t
The separateness and connection of individuals is perhaps the central question of human life: What, exactly, is my individuality? To what degree is it unique? To what degree can it be shared, and how?
Nature has secrets, and it is the desire to uncover them that motivates the scientific quest. But what makes these "secrets" secret? Is it that they are beyond human ken? that they concern divine matt
