Of clocks and time / Lutz Hüwel.

Περιλαμβάνει βιβλιογραφικές παραπομπές.

1. Days, months and years -- 1.1. A first discourse on measurement, units and precision -- 1.2. What we see in the sky--stars, planets, Sun and Moon -- 1.3. What the solar system looks like -- 1.4. What a day makes -- 1.5. Discovering the laws of motion -- 1.6. Absolute space and time -- 1.7. A bit of mechanics--or why the solar system is stable -- 1.8. Not quite a clock yet--the Antikythera mechanism

2. Hours, minutes and seconds -- 2.1. Origins of the metric system and the SI unit of time -- 2.2. A generic clock -- 2.3. Toy clock I : bouncing bead in a box -- 2.4. Friction I : spoiling the bouncing bead -- 2.5. Toy clock II : the simple harmonic oscillator -- 2.6. Friction II : spoiling the simple harmonic oscillator -- 2.7. Toy clock III : the pendulum -- 2.8. Resonance and feedback -- 2.9. Numbers for comparison -- 2.10. From Huygens to shortt--how the pendulum revolutionized time-keeping

3. From milliseconds to attoseconds : is there a limit? -- 3.1. From quartz vibrations... -- 3.2. ...to quartz clocks -- 3.3. The first atomic clock was not one -- 3.4. Dancing electrons are making waves--the old-fashioned way -- 3.5. Inner workings and limits of atomic clocks -- 3.6. How time fared in the quantum revolution -- 3.7. Inside the hydrogen atom -- 3.8. Quanta make their entrance -- 3.9. Precisely specified fuzziness -- 3.10. Does nature play dice? -- 3.11. Fountain clocks--state-of-the-art time-keeping -- 3.12. A better clock--the ABC of clock comparison -- 3.13. Who needs it?

4. Space and time forever entwined -- 4.1. The ether and the birth of interferometry -- 4.2. c = 299 792 458 m s-1 for everyone -- 4.3. The principle of relativity -- 4.4. A first (boring) application -- 4.5. Moving clocks must run slow -- 4.6. When lightning strikes twice--was it or was it not simultaneous? -- 4.7. Running makes you thinner -- 4.8. Why gravity must slow down clocks -- 4.9. A pair of twins most famous -- 4.10. The invariant space-time interval

5. Deep time or getting old -- 5.1. Earth's age--a cautionary tale -- 5.2. Built on sand--the hourglass as an analogue to radioactive dating -- 5.3. Survival graphs and aging -- 5.4. The neutron and other unstable characters -- 5.5. Radioactive dating of rocks

6. From beginning to end -- 6.1. The fixed stars in their crystal sphere revisited -- 6.2. The cosmic egg -- 6.3. Supporting evidence 1--ancient light -- 6.4. Supporting evidence 2--it is elementary -- 6.5. Supporting evidence 3--it is dark at night -- 6.6. Standard candles and a very long ladder -- 6.7. Was there anything before the Big Bang? -- 6.8. Will it end? -- 6.9. The long now.

Of Clocks and Time takes readers on a five-stop journey through the physics and technology--and occasional bits of applications and history--of timekeeping. The author offers conceptual vistas and qualitative images, along with equations, quantitative relations, and rigorous definitions. The book includes discussion of the rhythms produced by the motion of sun, moon, planets, and stars, summary of historical theoretical insights that are still influential today, examination of the tools that allow us to measure time, as well as explanations of radioactive dating and Einstein's theories of relativity.