Rovelli's White Holes - the IB in 150 pages

At the end of term two weeks ago, I set myself the challenge of reading a book a week during the vacation. This task won't be helped by the Galbraith that approaches on my bedside pile, but has been assisted greatly (as always) by Carlo Rovelli - whose small volume White Holes is almost as richly packed as the phenomena it describes.

In fact, I would go so far as to say that White Holes is the IB Diploma Programme in a nutshell.

We encounter musings on the nature of science ("disagreements are the salt of the discipline"). Mathematics, biology, psychology, history, philosophy and even the Monte Bianco make appearances. Dante's Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso, Joyce's Ulysses and Tolkein's Lord of the Rings support analogical understanding - while we remain encouraged to aim for syllogistic reasoning. Diagrams are employed to make visual (albeit in one-too-few dimensions) that which would take skill to imagine. While making a case for the real purpose of language, the rules of language itself are played with.

And I haven't even mentioned the physics (!), which, in essence, is a tale of stars becoming black holes becoming singularities becoming white holes as time continues its forward march.

Were every young person to read Rovelli, with its tales of friendship, love, the universe and dragonflies, I am utterly convinced that they would become more inquiring, knowledgeable and caring for it and the world might just be that ounce more peaceful.