Web of Change: Flame Challenge Project: Flame Challenge Questions from past years

Children ask, "Why is the sky blue?" but the question also puzzled Plato, Leonardo,and even Newton, who unlocked so many other secrets. The search for an answer continued forcenturies; in 1862 Sir John Herschel listed the color and polarization of sky light as "the twogreat standing enigmas of meteorology." In Sky in a Bottle, Peter Pesic takes us on a quest to theheart of this mystery, tracing the various attempts of science, history, and art to solve it. Hebegins with the scholars of the ancient world and continues through the natural philosophers of theEnlightenment, the empiricists of the scientific revolution, and beyond. The cast of charactersincludes Aristotle, Leonardo da Vinci, Kepler, Descartes, Euler, Saussure, Goethe, Rayleigh, andEinstein; but the protagonist is the question itself, and the story tells how we have tried toanswer it.Pesic's odyssey introduces us to central ideas of chemistry, optics, and atomic physics.He describes the polarization of light, Rayleigh scattering, and connections between the appearanceof the sky and Avogadro's number. He discusses changing representations of the sky in art, from newstyles of painting to new pigments that created new colors for paint. He considers what the sky'snighttime brightness might tell us about the size and density of the universe. And Pesic asksanother, daring, question: Can we put the sky in a bottle? Can we recreate and understand itsblueness here on earth? This puzzle, he says, opens larger perspectives; questions of the color andbrightness of the sky touch on secrets of matter and light, the scope of the universe in space andtime, the destiny of the earth, and deep human feelings.

A physicist explains the concepts he helped develop in this book for lay people.

In Infinity and the Mind, Rudy Rucker leads an excursion to that stretch of the universe he calls the "Mindscape," where he explores infinity in all its forms: potential and actual, mathematical and physical, theological and mundane. Rucker acquaints us with Gödel's rotating universe, in which it is theoretically possible to travel into the past, and explains an interpretation of quantum mechanics in which billions of parallel worlds are produced every microsecond. It is in the realm of infinity, he maintains, that mathematics, science, and logic merge with the fantastic. By closely examining the paradoxes that arise from this merging, we can learn a great deal about the human mind, its powers, and its limitations. Using cartoons, puzzles, and quotations to enliven his text, Rucker guides us through such topics as the paradoxes of set theory, the possibilities of physical infinities, and the results of Gödel's incompleteness theorems. His personal encounters with Gödel the mathematician and philosopher provide a rare glimpse at genius and reveal what very few mathematicians have dared to admit: the transcendent implications of Platonic realism.

What is infinity? Explore this fascinating and complex math concept and its purpose in our world in this picture book that both demystifies and explains. Perfect for kids who grew up on Baby University books like Quantum Physics for Babies. Defining infinity is difficult. But there is one thing people do every day that leads to infinity-counting. No matter what large number you name, there is always a larger number. By reading this book, kids can begin to think about this and other powerful ideas involving infinity, including how infinity relates to rocket science. Featuring clear text and beautiful photographs, this is an excellent choice for kids who want to delve deeper into math and science and for those ready to look at the world in a new way.