"Encompassing more than 200 alphabetically arranged entries, The Oxford Guide to the History of Physics and Astronomy traces the evolution of these bodies of knowledge as well as planetary science from the Renaissance to the beginning of the twenty-first century. For students, teachers, scientists, and readers of popular science books, the Guide deciphers the techniques and philosophies of physics and astronomy as well as the historical periods from which they emerged. Inside are Galileo's falling bodies, Newton's world system, pulsars and quasars, and proper quanta of other topics as illuminating as Light, as absorbing as Black Holes, and as expansive as the Theory of Everything. Biographies of leading contributors to natural knowledge, arranged where appropriate in pairs as in Plutarch's Lives, connect the personal with the general development of scientific ideas and the wider course of discovery." "The entries follow an elaborate organizational plan, which amounts to a new classification of knowledge, its institutional settings, and its applications. This plan is reprinted in the opening pages of the Guide." "Thoroughly cross-referenced, and accented with attractive black and white artwork, no other source is as systematic and authoritative or as informative and inviting in its coverage of physics, astronomy and planetary science."--Jacket.