This enlightening and gorgeously illustrated book explores the beauty and mystery of the divine proportion in art, architecture, nature, and beyond. From the pyramids of Giza, to quasicrystals, to the proportions of the human face, the golden ratio has an infinite capacity to generate shapes with exquisite properties. Author Gary Meisner has spent decades researching the subject, investigating and collaborating with people across the globe in dozens of professions and walks of life. In The Golden Ratio, he shares his enlightening journey. Exploring the long history of this fascinating number, as well as new insights into its power and potential applications, The Golden Ratio invites you to take a new look at this timeless topic.

Discussion ranges from theories of biological growth to intervals and tones in music, Pythagorean numerology, conic sections, Pascal's triangle, the Fibonnacci series, and much more. Excellent bridge between science and art. Features 58 figures.

Luca Pacioli stood beside the great Leonardo da Vinci and gazed at The Last Supper. He saw immediately that something was terribly wrong. An orphan from a small town in Italy, Pacioli came of age during the Renaissance seemingly destined for a life of struggle and obscurity. But Pacioli had the good fortune of meeting mentors who recognized his uncanny ability with numbers and introduced him to renowned artists and philosophers, royalty, and popes. At a time when many still used Roman numerals and colleges didn’t even teach mathematics, Pacioli was determined to share his passion and make it accessible and understandable. Apprentice to an artist, but a terrible artist himself, he became a master at calculating mathematical perspective in paintings. Tasked with teaching mathematics with no textbook, he wrote his own—followed by books on double-entry bookkeeping, chess, and the divine proportion. In this way, Luca Pacioli, “the father of accounting,” still has something to teach us—not just about mathematics—but about how we account for setbacks in our lives and how we determine what our legacy will be.

The number Phi, simply defined, is one plus the square root of five, all divided by two. But its myriad occurrences in art, nature, and science have been a source of speculation and wonder for thousands of years. Divine Proportion draws upon both religion and science to tell the story of Phi and to explore its manifestations in such diverse places as the structure of the inner ear, the spiral of a hurricane, the majesty of the Parthenon, and the elusive perfection of the Mona Lisa. A universal key to harmony, regeneration, and balance, Phi is at the heart of a tantalizing story begun on clay tablets in ancient Babylon, and which will continue to be written for centuries to come.

This volume traces W.D. Gann's "Time Factor" and "Law of Vibration" back to the Chaldeans of 3000 BCE Sumer whose principal aspiration was to understand the motion of time. They divided time into years, months, weeks, days, hours, minutes and seconds and devised calendars which helped them predict, and therefore survive, their two rivers' ravaging floods. Inadvertently, their findings also solved the mystery behind the ups and down of money markets. From ancient Sumer to Egypt, ancient China to the native peoples of Central and North America, civilisations unlikely to have had contact with each other built remarkably similar monuments according to geometrical proportions designed to embody cosmic knowledge that would last for all time. Each deciphered time cycles, created calendars and made long term projections of natural phenomena. The Square-of-9 is a matrix embodying nature's cosmic clock. Pauline Novak-Reich takes the reader through ancient math, sacred geometry and lore demonstrating the extraordinary achievements of people who lived in tandem with nature. Each one of these civilisations discovered Nature's "Black Box." Gann often reiterated that: "Everything in existence is based on exact proportion and perfect relationship. There is no chance in nature; because mathematical principles of the highest order lie at the foundation of all things...Vibration is fundamental: nothing is exempt from this law. It is universal, therefore applicable to every class of phenomena on the globe."

The Golden Ratio examines the presence of this divine number in art and architecture throughout history, as well as its ubiquity among plants, animals, and even the cosmos. This gorgeous book—with layflat dimensions that closely approximate the golden ratio—features clear, enlightening, and entertaining commentary alongside stunning full-color illustrations by Venezuelan artist and architect Rafael Araujo. From the pyramids of Giza, to quasicrystals, to the proportions of the human face, the golden ratio has an infinite capacity to generate shapes with exquisite properties. This book invites you to take a new look at this timeless topic, with a compilation of research and information worthy of a text book, accompanied by over 200 beautiful color illustrations that transform this into the ultimate coffee table book. Author Gary Meisner shares the results of his twenty-year investigation and collaboration with thousands of people across the globe in dozens of professions and walks of life. The evidence will close the gaps of understanding related to many claims of the golden ratio’s appearances and applications, and present new findings to take our knowledge further yet. Whoever you are, and whatever you may know about this topic, you’ll find something new, interesting, and informative in this book, and may find yourself challenged to see, apply, and share this unique number of mathematics and science in new ways.

First Published in 2003. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.