Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea
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 Softcover edition | |
| Author | Charles Seife |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Subject | Zero, nothingness |
| Genre | Non-fiction |
| Published | February 7, 2000 |
| Publisher | Viking Adult |
| Publication place | United States |
| Media type | Print, e-book |
| Pages | 256 pp. |
| ISBN | 978-0670884575 |
| Followed by | Alpha & Omega |
Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea is a non-fiction book by American author and journalist Charles Seife.[1][2] The book was initially released on February 7, 2000, by Viking.
The book offers a comprehensive look at number 0 and its controverting role as one of the great paradoxes of human thought and history since its invention by the ancient Babylonians or the Indian people. Even though zero is a fundamental idea for the modern science, initially the notion of a complete absence got a largely negative, sometimes hostile, treatment by the Western world and Greco-Roman philosophy.[3]
Zero won the 2001 PEN/Martha Albrand Award for First Nonfiction Book.
Review
Of course, Seife's book is not a typical biography. There are no tell-all interviews with the number one or any of zero's other neighbors on the number line... Seife's book begins—of course—at Chapter Zero, with a story of how only recently a divide by zero error in its control software brought the guided missile cruiser USS Yorktown grinding to a halt. As Seife relates, "Though it was armored against weapons, nobody had thought to defend the Yorktown from zero. It was a grave mistake." Maybe it's not the pulse-pounding drama of a Tom Clancy novel, but it's enough foreshadowing to launch Seife on an essay which begins with notches on a 30,000-year-old wolf bone and ends with the role of zero in black holes and the big bang.