Rating: 
Summary: Good effort but falls apart
Review: This book is a historical survey of the origin and meaning of the number zero from ancient Babylonia to modern astronomy. It starts out well, but it begins to founder the closer it gets to modern applications of zero in both mathematics and applied sciences. By the time you reach the last chapter in the book, it's descended into a mess of overexuberant cliches and poorly written passages. It seems that the author is most comfortable with the early and medieval sections of his history, and he does a satisfactory job explaining how zero factored into the beginnings of calculus and the techniques of integraton. But the second half of the book doesn't come together.
Rating: 
Summary: good way to learn some math history
Review: Never realized zero was such a big deal. Whole philosophy hides behind that little symbol. If your scientific minded at all, you'll enjoy the book.
Rating: 
Summary: The Story of Zero
Review: Two books discuss the concept of zero. They are "The nothing that Is: A Natural History of Zero" by Robert Kaplan (1999) and "Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea" by Charles Seiff (2000). The books tackle the same subject but are significantly different in their approach.Both books recognize the difficulties zero caused to the Greeks and their successors. Kaplan emphasizes the mysticism of zero. His book describes the confusion and avoidance of "nothing" throughout civilized history. While there is a smattering of mathematical concepts, the book is mostly an essay revolving about nihilism. This seems somewhat strange as Robert Kaplan has "taught mathematics to people from six to sixty. He is the co-founder of The Math Circle, a program open to the public for the enjoyment of pure mathematics." Seiff's story also includes descriptions of mankind's concern over "nothing" but emphasizes the solutions reached by mathematicians. The book is full of mathematical and physical concepts related to zero. If one is interested in philosophy, read Kaplan. If Math is the desired area, read Seiff.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Book
Review: I always wondered why my Calculus teacher said "before we can continue you must agree that 1 and 0.9999... are the same thing", and this book explains that fact and many others. Although it's not all that scholarly this book is an excellent read, in fact it's readability may be due to it's general tone.
Rating:
Summary: Zero
Review: Great book for people who like math history and theroy.
Rating:
Summary: A Good Read
Review: The writing style is the true star of this one, although the subject matter is also fascinating. The author creates a stunning picture of the complications wrought by first the lack of zero, and then later its presence. Seife gives a chronological development of mathematical thinking from the ancient world of sheep counting (when zero was "unnecessary") to the present day problems of astrophysics (where zero is a stubborn devil that can't be wished away). Sure to be stimulating for the interested reader.
Rating:
Summary: great fun
Review: Clear writing, rare in math / science books, shines throughout here. The final few chapters of this book are in 'woo woo' land [which is 4 stars to zero side of Star Trek Voyager and on to infinity'] but this tome is a great read. It is not at all a math heavy work ... I suspect that a fair grip on 4th grade arithmetic would do it. Great for a 'book report' for a kid who 'hates math'.
Rating:
Summary: There is nothing to it.
Review: Really, there is nothing to it. . . .no-thing. And, it was timely; an aid to sorting out when one may celebrate a new millenium, even how often. To me, the chiefest virtue of the book is its integration of perspectives on zero, what it really means to think negative thoughts and which cultural sets makes doing so easy. Those are the cultures we had better watch and from which we had better learn.
Rating:
Summary: An interesting book, but not for everyone
Review: I read this book a little over a year ago, when I was in my first semester of Calculus. This book gave me a deeper understanding of what we were learning in class.....and it was an easy book to read, though it did move a bit slowly through few points. Overall, I really enjoyed it, and I think that if you are at all curious about the evolution of mathematical ideas, you will likely find it interesting as well. Overall, I'd give it a 4.5, but since half stars are not allowed for in this system, I rounded the score up to five.
Rating: 
Summary: Good back but drags in too many areas
Review: This book should have been a booklet. Chapters 1, 2, 3, and 5 are truly magnificent. Seife starts out by covering the origin of zero in Babylonian mathematics and its transmission into India with Alexander the Great's armies, followed by its movement back westward into the numbering system of the Arabs and its introduction from there into western mathematics, where the Arabic numeral system came to replace the cumbersome Roman numerals. For the first 3 chapters I couldn't put the book down. Chapter 4 is out of place and adds nothing to the rest of the book. Chapter 5, however, is one of the most lucid chapters I've ever read on this subject. Up to this point calculus, might as well have been ancient Sanskrit to me, but Seife makes the concepts make sense-- you're actually able to trace the questions and developments that led to what we recognize as the calculus. You see how the problem of calculating the slope of a curve was solved by some clever methods that made ever finer approximations of the curve with straight lines. This chapter is splendid and alone makes the book worth reading. Unfortunately the book flounders in the remaining chapters, which are both superfluous and disorganized. The appendices still add a lot to it though, explaining ideas like the golden ratio and the derivative in its modern sense. I liked this book overall and would recommend it, just focus on the above chapters and the appendices and you'll get a lot out of it.
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