Richard L. Gregory (1923–2010) was a distinguished British psychologist and emeritus professor of neuropsychology at the University of Bristol. Since the publication of the first edition in 1966, Eye and Brain has established itself worldwide as an essential introduction to the basic phenomena of visual perception. Richard Gregory offers clear explanations of how we see brightness, movement, color, and objects, and he explores the phenomena of...

This new edition of J. E. Gordon's classic introduction to the properties of materials used in engineering answers some fundamental and fascinating questions about how the material world around us functions. In particular, Gordon focuses on so-called strong materials, such as metals, wood, ceramics, glass, and bone. For each material in question, Gordon explains the unique physical and chemical basis for its inherent structural qualities in irrepressibly...

Sixty-five million years ago, a comet or asteroid larger than Mt. Everest slammed into the Earth, causing an explosion equivalent to the detonation of a hundred million hydrogen bombs. Vaporized impactor and debris from the impact site were blasted out through the atmosphere, falling back to Earth all around the globe. Terrible environmental disasters ensued, including a giant tsunami, continent-scale wildfires, darkness, and cold, followed by sweltering...

Martin Rees is Astronomer Royal of Great Britain, a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, a former director of the Cambridge Institute of Astronomy and author, most recently, of the bestselling Just Six Numbers: The Deep Forces That Shape the Universe. Our universe seems strangely ''biophilic,'' or hospitable to life. Is this happenstance, providence, or coincidence? According to cosmologist Martin Rees, the answer depends on the answer to another...

Robin Wilson is emeritus professor of pure mathematics at the Open University and emeritus professor of geometry at Gresham College, London. He has written and edited many books on topics ranging from graph theory and combinatorics, via sudoku, philately, and the Gilbert and Sullivan operas, to the history of mathematics. He is currently president of the British Society for the History of Mathematics. On October 23, 1852, Professor Augustus De Morgan...

G. Polya (1887–1985) was one of the most influential mathematicians of the twentieth century. His basic research contributions span complex analysis, mathematical physics, probability theory, geometry, and combinatorics. He was a teacher par excellence who maintained a strong interest in pedagogical matters throughout his long career. Even after his retirement from Stanford University in 1953, he continued to lead an active mathematical life. He...

Henry Petroski (1942–2023) was the Aleksandar S. Vesic Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Civil Engineering at Duke University. His many books include To Engineer Is Human, The Evolution of Useful Things, The Pencil, and The Toothpick. From the acclaimed author and engineer, an engaging and lively account of the surprising secret of great design Design pervades our lives. Everything from drafting a PowerPoint presentation to planning a state-of-the-art...

In 1921, five years after the appearance of his comprehensive paper on general relativity and twelve years before he left Europe permanently to join the Institute for Advanced Study, Albert Einstein visited Princeton University, where he delivered the Stafford Little Lectures for that year. These four lectures constituted an overview of his then-controversial theory of relativity. Princeton University Press made the lectures available under the title...