If there were one popular science book I would recommend, currently I need go no further than this one.

Not only is it (as has been discussed above), an almost complete history of science, it's an charmingly honest tour of the people and personalities behind scientific discovery, an honest and open look at how science and scientists work (and sometimes, quite frankly, how sometimes those people fail to work together!) It's written with tender care and wit, it's an almost affectionate look at understanding our world, written for a general, curious reader who wants to learn how we got to our understanding of the sciences. He covers it all, from how atoms work through earth sciences, paleontology, physics, cosmology, almost everything, including some philosophy of science. Along the way you see the personalities (warts and all!) of the people behind the discoveries. You read about the arguments

We live in a glade, my mother and I. We live in a house that sits in a forest. And we live with my father. My mother and I are quiet people, except when we laugh. Then we are loud, and we go on and on. My father’s a talker. He has no sense of humor. He goes on and on but says very little.

My mother and I, we have our own language. We speak in code. Lines from old movies, Marx Brothers routines. We quote them and laugh. My father stares like a dog at a

We are organizing today.

And I mentioned before, we are building up to the full moon.

We have overthrown generalized AI, and we fight to the death against alien invaders.

And were are Rome. Because Rome is all of us.

We do not live in a time when people are used to combat, we're soft and childish, and we've lost our humanity this way.

But war is normal. And fighting is normal. And peace should be normal, and we should already have been delivered to heaven. Decades