- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub
About this book
'Twinkle, twinkle, little star, how I wonder what you are …' Are you a giant Nazi iceberg?On 4 October 1957, the Soviet Union's famous satellite Sputnik was launched into orbit, and the Space Age began. Or did it? Sputnik may have marked the beginning of humanity's physical exploration of the universe, but we had already been exploring it with our minds for thousands of years, often with some very surprising results. To mark the sixtieth anniversary of Sputnik's launch (and seventy years since the first flying saucer sighting, in 1947), S. D. Tucker seeks out the strangest, most surprising and downright silliest ideas about outer space that have arisen throughout history.Human beings have always gazed up at the twinkling stars and wondered what exactly they are; the heavens an inky-black canvas upon which people have projected their fantasies and those of the societies they lived in. From tales of crumbling canals and lost civilisations on Mars to the mind-boggling proposal that flying saucers were piloted by alien bees with jewels for eyes, mankind has gone down a lot of blind alleys before finally finding the scientific answers that were needed to initiate the blast-off that took us up to the moon in 1969.This entertaining and revealing book explores stories of the stars invented before Sputnik, the Space Age or modern science were even a glimmer in the eye of mankind, and goes on to consider the odd and tenuous theories about space that still exist to this day. Whether you're intrigued by the notion of living planets singing and having sex with one another, the universe's secret roof, or the moon's hidden finger, Space Oddities will offer you a close-up telescopic view of the weird and wonderful world that people throughout history have imagined lies beyond the stars.
Frequently asked questions
Yes, you can cancel anytime from the Subscription tab in your account settings on the Perlego website. Your subscription will stay active until the end of your current billing period. Learn how to cancel your subscription.
No, books cannot be downloaded as external files, such as PDFs, for use outside of Perlego. However, you can download books within the Perlego app for offline reading on mobile or tablet. Learn more here.
Perlego offers two plans: Essential and Complete
- Essential is ideal for learners and professionals who enjoy exploring a wide range of subjects. Access the Essential Library with 800,000+ trusted titles and best-sellers across business, personal growth, and the humanities. Includes unlimited reading time and Standard Read Aloud voice.
- Complete: Perfect for advanced learners and researchers needing full, unrestricted access. Unlock 1.4M+ books across hundreds of subjects, including academic and specialized titles. The Complete Plan also includes advanced features like Premium Read Aloud and Research Assistant.
We are an online textbook subscription service, where you can get access to an entire online library for less than the price of a single book per month. With over 1 million books across 1000+ topics, we’ve got you covered! Learn more here.
Look out for the read-aloud symbol on your next book to see if you can listen to it. The read-aloud tool reads text aloud for you, highlighting the text as it is being read. You can pause it, speed it up and slow it down. Learn more here.
Yes! You can use the Perlego app on both iOS or Android devices to read anytime, anywhere — even offline. Perfect for commutes or when you’re on the go.
Please note we cannot support devices running on iOS 13 and Android 7 or earlier. Learn more about using the app.
Please note we cannot support devices running on iOS 13 and Android 7 or earlier. Learn more about using the app.
Yes, you can access Space Oddities by S. D. Tucker in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in History & Social History. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.
Information
Table of contents
- Cover
- Introduction: Black Mirror, White Ice
- 1 - Sphere of Fear: Sputnik Spooks the World
- 2 - Flat-out Lies: Flat Earths and Unvisited Moons
- 3 - Diana’s Dust: The Accidental Murder of a Moon-goddess
- 4 - Heavenly Bodies: NASA, Alien Sex and Marrying the Universe
- 5 - Planetary Pareidolia, Part I: Seeing Ourselves through a Telescope, via the Moon
- 6 - Planetary Pareidolia, Part II: Seeing Ourselves through a Telescope, via Mars
- 7 - California Dreaming: Eccentric Orbits around the Desert Sun
- 8 - Desert Warfare: The Contactees Conquer the World
- 9 - Red Planets: Communism throughout the Cosmos?
- 10 - Engineering the Future: From Soviet Science Fiction to Science Fact?
- 11 - Atomic Aliens: The Interplanetary Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
- 12 - From Sputniks to Beatniks: Getting out of This World by Whatever Means
- 13 - Venus Has a Penis: The Coital Cosmology of Charles Fourier
- 14 - Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out: Talking with Aliens, Talking with Ourselves
- 15 - Girl From Mars: Dr Robinson’s Interplanetary Telegraph of Love
- 16 - You Look Familiar: The Alien in the Mirror
- 17 - Wandering Stars: Astral Travels
- 18 - Jung Dreamers: From Freud to Flammarion
- Conclusion: Owning Your Own Space
- Notes
- Bibliography