Everything changed when the dial of the age jumped from 19 to 20. In almost every field, discoveries were made or ideas developed in the 20th century that turned our understanding of the universe and ourselves upside down. Everything seemed new, nothing impossible: machines that think, dogs in space, and humans on the moon. Old certainties lost their validity, traditional authorities lost their power. The world no longer wanted to recognize a center. In his own unique way, John Higgs guides us through this century of geniuses and gurus. He explains the theory of relativity using a falling sausage, tells stories of Satanists in the American space program, and explores the question of whether a butterfly in Brazil can cause a tornado in Texas. It’s all incredibly strange and quite mad. A book like a trip.