| Contents |
The shape of space -- The universal mollusk -- The size of space -- The hall of mirrors -- The four scales of geometry -- Absolute or relative space? -- Celestial mirages -- Black hole -- Foam, strings, and loops -- From relativity to the big bang -- What is the curvature of the universe? -- Open or closed? -- The knowledge of places -- From the cylinder to the pretzel -- Fascinating shapes -- Topology and relativity -- Small, strange universes -- Topological mirage -- Hunting for ghosts -- Midnight suns -- Cosmic crystallography -- Circles in the sky -- Inflation, the infinite, and the folds -- Maya -- Folds in the universe -- A brief history of space -- The edge paradox -- The dark night paradox -- Non-Euclidean geometries -- Cosmos and logos -- Cosmic questions -- Expansion and the infinite -- Galaxies in flight -- The rate of expansion -- The age of the universe -- Astronomical distances -- Cosmic mathematics -- Cosmic repulsion -- Dark matter -- The cosmic microwave background -- Is the universe flat? -- Symmetry -- Polyhedra -- The classification of surfaces -- The classification of three-dimensional spaces -- Topos and cosmos -- Afterword: Listening to the cosmic drum. |
