Was Isaac Newton really inspired by a falling apple? At least that’s the story he told about his “discovery” of gravity. It’s just one story in Nicholas Mee’s The Cosmic Mystery Tour, a compact, speed-reader’s journey through the history and current conclusions of science as it developed in the West. The British science writer picks out key figures (Albert Einstein, Michael Faraday), makes a point to include women (astronomers Cecilia Payne, Jocelyn Bell) and races through key concepts (relativity, quantum mechanics) in understandable form. Mee steers away from controversy, holds to consensus whenever possible and glances sideways at science and pop culture. One example: The cover of Joy Division’s album Unknown Pleasures (1979) was based on the periodic signal of a pulsar.
