The 20th century was a period of outstanding scientific achievements. Breakthroughs answered ancient questions: the source of heredity in the DNA molecule and the explanation of earthquakes, volcanoes, and other geological mysteries through plate tectonics. There was an expansion of our universe from thousands to billions of light years and at the same time an implosion into the weird quantum features of the subatomic world, the mastery of which would lead to nanotechnologies that make GigaByte storage devices and GigaHz processors everyday terms by the end of the century. A shift occurred in our fundamental understanding of nature from the familiar, deterministic world of Newtonian Mechanics and Maxwell's Electromagnetism to the counterintuitive domains of Einstein's Relativity and Heisenbergs Uncertainty Principle. The productive reductionism of previous centuries was supplemented by the integrative approaches of ecology, systems and complexity theory. These themes and the breakthroughs that resulted are explored in a manner accessible and interesting to all students, even those with minimal scientific backgrounds. Advanced mathematics is not required. Emphasis is being placed on a descriptive and numerical understanding of the themes and their implications to thought, society and our daily lives, rather than developing specific science skills.
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