Beating the Odds - 9781848169074

E A Milne was one of the giants of 20th century astrophysics and cosmology. His bold ideas, underpinned by his Christianity, sparked controversy — he believed two time scales operate in the universe.Struggling against poverty, Milne won five scholarships to Cambridge. In World War I he abandoned his studies to develop Horace Darwin's device for anti-aircraft gunnery. Ballistics took Milne back to Cambridge as a don. While in his twenties he fell victim to encephalitis lethargica. Its consequent Parkinsonism reduced him physically, but buoyed by his strong religious faith he refused to slacken his pace. By the age of thirty he was a Manchester professor and a Fellow of the Royal Society. After battling to upgrade the provision of science at Oxford, as a professor there he established a world-renowned centre of astrophysics. When he died, twice widowed, the author — Milne's daughter — was a teenager.This book is born out of curiosity. The author's aim is to show the human face of science, how the course of her father's life was shaped by circumstance and by the influence of illustrious friends and colleagues such as Einstein, Eddington, G H Hardy, J B S Haldane, Hubble, F A Lindemann and Rutherford. Against all odds, Milne emerged as a scientific powerhouse — and a rebellious one at that.