Faster Than The Speed Of Light

The speed of light, as most scientists will tell you, is one of the foundations of modern physics: the eternal constant. Even to suggest a varying speed of light (VSL) is tantamount to committing academic suicide. Yet Joao Magueijo has spent much of his professional career doing just that. This is an elaborate cosmological detective story that takes the reader through the early work of Einstein and Hubble to the author's own struggles to get VSL recognized in an atmosphere of academic snobbery, intransigence and downright hostility. More than that, this is the story of an idea - possibly the most significant idea since Einstein's general theory. The possibility that the speed of light is not constant and that, specifically, it travelled faster in the early universe than it does now has staggering implications for the world of science. Magueijo's world is one in which cosmic strings can be used as 'fast lanes' for space travellers. His is an eternal universe powered by a perpetual sequence of big bangs. And this is what makes the book so bewitching. Should Magueijo be right then, his work doesn't just mean rewriting the books on cosmology, black holes and astrophysics but throwing them away and starting again from scratch. Whether posterity remembers VSL as one of science's great 'Eureka!' moments or another academic dead-end remains to be seen. What is indisputable is the power of Magueijo's ideas - conveyed with a passion, humour and an naturalness which will put even the most science-phobic readers at their ease. Faster Than The Speed of Light challenges, charms and compels. After all, how often do you get to read a book that really could change the world? (Kirkus UK)