But, in the event, it was much better than I'd expected. The premise of this short book seemed unpromising: a physicist with no formal training in classics or history was apparently claiming that Anaximander, a Greek philosopher about whom almost nothing is known, is the spiritual father of modern science. Anaximander celebrates the radical lack of certainty that defines the scientific quest for knowledge. He examines Anaximander as a scientist interested in shedding light on the deep nature of scientific thinking, which Rovelli locates in his rebellious ability to reimagine the world again and again. In this elegant work, acclaimed physicist Carlo Rovelli brings to light the importance of Anaximander's overlooked legacy to modern science. He introduced a new mode of rational thinking with an openness to uncertainty and to the progress of knowledge.

Anaximander's legacy includes the revolutionary idea that the earth floats in a void, that the world can be understood in natural rather than supernatural terms, that animals evolved, and that universal laws govern all phenomena. Over two millennia ago, a Greek philosopher had a number of wondrous insights that paved the way to cosmology, physics, geography, meteorology, and biology, setting in motion a new way of seeing the world. The bestselling author of Seven Brief Lessons on Physics illuminates the nature of science by exploring the revolutionary ideas of one of its great forefathers: the Greek philosopher Anaximander

Rovelli anaximander