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A Beginner's Guide to Constructing the Universe: Mathematical Archetypes of Nature, Art, and Science
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List Price: $18.95
Our Price: $12.89
Your Save: $ 6.06 ( 32% )
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Manufacturer: HarperPerennial
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 516.001
EAN: 9780060926717
ISBN: 0060926716
Label: HarperPerennial
Manufacturer: HarperPerennial
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 351
Publication Date: 1995-11-08
Publisher: HarperPerennial
Release Date: 1995-09-29
Studio: HarperPerennial
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Editorial Reviews:
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The Universe May Be a Mystery,
But It's No SecretMichael Schneider leads us on a spectacular, lavishly illustrated journey along the numbers one through ten to explore the mathematical principles made visible in flowers, shells, crystals, plants, and the human body, expressed in the symbolic language of folk sayings and fairy tales, myth and religion, art and architecture. This is a new view of mathematics, not the one we learned at school but a comprehensive guide to the patterns that recur through the universe and underlie human affairs. A Beginner's Guide to Constructing, the Universe shows you: - Why cans, pizza, and manhole covers are round.
- Why one and two weren't considered numbers by the ancient Greeks.
- Why squares show up so often in goddess art and board games.
- What property makes the spiral the most widespread shape in nature, from embryos and hair curls to hurricanes and galaxies.
- How the human body shares the design of a bean plant and the solar system.
- How a snowflake is like Stonehenge, and a beehive like a calendar.
- How our ten fingers hold the secrets of both a lobster and a cathedral.
- And much more.
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Universal appeal
Comment: CONSTRUCTING THE UNIVERSE has been on the bookshelf for over a year, and it's really only now that I'm beginning to fully appreciate and process Schneider's masterpiece and its implications - or what could be called an Almanac of Discovery. Although not wanting to write a review until I had finished absorbing it completely, ultimately this work will never date as it's the kind of visual and text based product that provides a continual unfolding of yet deeper and deeper levels of understanding. Its not one of those books that is restricted to a single epiphany or message; I've noticed how it has changed and informed my view of nature's patterns, and geography, on various hiking trips through sacred space.
Yet strangely, Schneider's work is also accessible and appealing to my kids, who have wholeheartedly taken up the challenge and tried to build temples with their crazy Dad; applying their maths and geometry lessons with patience as compasses, string and wooden pegs have been variously lost and dropped.
I'm not into extremely complex and detailed sacred geometry; so this work is absolutely ideal for my needs; yet don't be fooled into thinking it's simply a beginner's piece either, for it most certainly is not. At 350 odd pages of diagrams, descriptions, tables and references to science, mythology, and ancient texts, CONSTRUCTING THE UNIVERSE provides a rich thematic mathematical and geometric approach to the world we live in. Highly recommended. Rgds
Customer Rating:
Summary: Thank Heavens for Michael Schneider!
Comment: This book is a very rich resource for all artists and designers. He moves beyond number as quantity and shows the rich array of the patterns, structures, symbolism, and natural examples of each number's unique qualities.
It's number explained for visual thinkers. Oh how I wish I had been given this approach in elementary and high school. I knew numbers were intriguing, but not as calculation for business and engineering. FINALLY someone who understands number can show us through our eyes and hands the beauty and elegance of numbers without
using a slide rule, or calculator. It's done visually and the worksheets for each number are very interesting and provide the experience of number and structure. I recommend it highly to all artists and designers, and students.
Customer Rating:
Summary: A profound book
Comment: "It is written on the limitless constellations of the celestial heavens, on the depths of the emerald seas and on every grain of sand in the vast desert that the world which we see is an outward and visible dream of an inward and invisible reality." - Sufi saying.
This book is a beautiful re-introduction to the "Sacred Geometry", the study of the simple mathematical patterns that dominate the universe. At the same time this practice both argues for a creator and also one who is unlike the standard "Holy book" picture for his basic engines of creation unfold like a lotus flower into infinity.
Unlike most stuff found in a "New Age" store, this book is not arguing you to believe anything, it shows you and teaches you and lets your own mind do the work. If I ever become a teacher I'll use bits of this book to try to get students to actually think and hopefully enjoy math, arts, the sciences.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Be ready to think!
Comment: Artfully done with many interesting side notes. Easy to read, the book raises many deep questions. Well worth the price!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Abundant resource for insights & illustrations about sacred geometry
Comment: Colleague Michael Schneider (who I had the pleasure of interviewing on community radio/TV a few years ago) wrote this outstanding book that has wonderful little illustrations and photographs showing how geometry and number remind us universal archetypes every where we turn in nature, art and architecture. For over a decade I've recommended this book as a perfect complement to my Sacred Geometry Design Sourcebook which you can also find here on Amazon or on my website at www.GeometryCode.com. If you want a great place to begin exploring sacred geometry (even though he doesn't call it that :-), A Beginner's Guide... and SGDS make a great pair of references.
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