Anaximander

Carlo Rovelli

Over two thousand years ago, a Greek philosopher had a number of astonishing ideas that paved the way for cosmology, physics, geography, meteorology, and biology, unleashing a new way of seeing the world. Anaximander's legacy includes the revolutionary idea that the Earth floats in a void, that the world can be understood from a natural, rather than supernatural, perspective, that animals evolved, and that universal laws govern all phenomena. He introduced a new style of rational thought, open to uncertainty and the advancement of knowledge. In this elegant work, renowned physicist Carlo Rovelli highlights the importance of Anaximander's overlooked legacy to modern science. Rovelli approaches Anaximander as a scientist concerned with highlighting the profound nature of scientific thinking, which Rovelli identifies in its rebellious ability to reimagine the world again and again. Anaximander celebrates the radical absence of certainty that characterizes the scientific pursuit of knowledge.