"According to that theory, the eye emitted visual rays, sent out to collect information from the objects they encounter. The problem with its reverse, the intromission theory, was that if light came radiating in all directions from all points on an object, when those rays hit the eyeball they would be hopelessly jumbled -- how could the eye possibly make sense of them?"
Seb Falk is a historian at the University of Cambridge. He's published several articles on medieval astronomy, and The Light Ages is his first book.
In The Light Ages the author discusses the development of science and technology in the medieval world, with particular emphasis placed upon astronomy, his area of concentration. In addition to astronomy he also discusses astrology, medicine, theology, philosophy and other disciplines. He attempts to frame all of these topics within the life of one monk, John of Westwick, who lived and died just before the Renaissance began in earnest.
Oh, and how's your trigonometry? Sections of this book are very mathematical, particularly those dealing with the medieval calendar and contemporary understandings of how celestial bodies move around one another. If your trigonometry is rusty, parts of this book are going to be difficult, and if your eyes glaze over at discussions of azimuths, meridians and declinations it's going to be even worse. For my part I think that I soldiered through it well enough, though I can't say that my efforts were rewarded.
But my main issue with this book isn't the math but rather the framing device. At the close of the book John of Westwick remains an enigma, and attempts to relate events of the time to his comings and goings seem to have ended in failure. His life was simply too remote from some of the people and events described in this book, and an attempt to condense a time period that lasted hundreds of years into a single person's lifetime was probably doomed from the outset.
I'm sure there are better books on the subject, and for this reason I wouldn't recommend The Light Ages.
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