Towards a Unified Cosmology
by Reginald O. Kapp
First published in 1960 by Hutchinson & Co. (Publishing) Ltd.
In 1960, when I was a young science graduate serving as a junior officer in a peacetime Royal Navy, Beaverbrook Newspapers Limited, London, instituted "The Scientific Book Guild" which I joined because I felt that a book a month would help me to keep in touch with developments in the sciences. The twenty-five books I collected through my membership of the Guild formed the nucleus of a personal library, and they still have an honoured place on my bookshelves.
Some of the books re-published by the Guild naturally made a deeper impression upon me than others — none more so than Towards a Unified Cosmology which reached me in October, 1962. The painstaking clarity of the presentation together with the penetrating intellect and the patent integrity revealed in Professor Kapp's writing kindled in me a lifelong interest in cosmology, and I was delighted when the author's son, John Kapp [see About Reginald O Kapp — Ed.] kindly gave me permission to include his father's books in the Ardue Library.
I have always intended The Ardue Web Site to be as holistic as possible. As cosmology is the most inclusive of subjects recognised by science, I feel I cannot do better in whatever time remains to me than to re-publish this book and write my own reflections on the subject with the aim of encouraging current and future researchers in the field to take proper notice of Professor Kapp's seminal work and try to find answers to the questions he poses in the hope of arriving at a universally satisfying consensus.
Many friends have helped me with this book. They have directed my reading, corrected my misconceptions, primed me with facts, suggested turns of phrase. Often they have done so unawares, ignorant of the investigations I was pursuing. How can I acknowledge my debt to each of them? Who can keep account of all the written and spoken words from which his own thought has been distilled? So I can name in gratitude only those who have read all or parts of the manuscript and helped me to eliminate many defects literary, scientific and philosophical. These are my wife, Dr. Dorothy Kapp; Dr H. Gruneberg of the Department of Zoology and Comparitive Anatomy at University College, London; Dr Wilkinson of the Department of Biology at University College, Swansea; Mr. W. B. Gallie of the Department of Philosophy at University College, Swansea; and Professor M. T. Smiley of the Department of Greek, University College, London.