Sirius is a dog with humanlike intelligence. He is raised by scientist Thomas Trelone in North Wales, near Trawsfynydd. Thomas embarks on a program of using steroids and other chemicals to rapidly develop cognitive power of dogs, resulting in super sheep dogs. Sirius, however, proves to possess a dog intelligence comparable to a normal human being, as he is able to communicate with English words, although it takes some time for the humans to understand his canine pronunciation. He is born at the same time as his creator's human daughter, Plaxy, and the two of them are raised together as brother and sister. When Plaxy leaves for school they drift apart and troubles for Sirius begin. With human intelligence and emotion he declines to lead a life of a regular dog and he tends to develop as a person, but keeps running into obstacles.

This book tells two stories. The first and most obvious is why the star known as Sirius has been regarded as an important fixture of the night sky by many civilizations and cultures since the beginnings of history. A second, but related, narrative is the prominent part that Sirius has played in how we came to achieve our current scientific understanding of the nature and fate of the stars. This is the first book to integrate the cultural history of Sirius with modern astrophysics in a way which provides a realistic view of how science progresses over time.

Since very early times Sirius was a point of attraction in the night sky. It served to synchronize calendars in antiquity and was the subject of many myths and legends, including some modern ones. It was perceived as a red star for more than 400 years, but such reports were relegated to the Mediterranean region. Astronomically, Sirius is a very bright star. This, and its present close distance to us, argues in favor of it being the target of detailed studies of stellar structure and evolution. Its binary nature, with a companion that is one of the more massive white dwarfs, is an additional reason for such studies. This book collects the published information on Sirius in an attempt to derive a coherent picture of how this system came to look as it does.

The most academically credible case for alien visitation. Is the existance of civilisation on earth the result of contact from inhabitants of a planet in the system of the star Sirius prior to 3000BC? There are tribal cultures in present-day Africa whose most sacred and secret and traditions are based on this theory. Central to their cosmology is a body of knowledge concerning the system of the star Sirius that is astounding it in its accuracy of detail, including specific information only recently accessible to modern science. Robert Temple traces the traditions of the Dogon and three related tribes back 5, 000 years to the ancient Mediterranean cultures of Sumer and Egypt. He shows a knowledge dependent on physics and astrophysics, which they claimed was imported to them by visitors from Sirius.

This book tells two stories. The first and most obvious is why the star known as Sirius has been regarded as an important fixture of the night sky by many civilizations and cultures since the beginnings of history. A second, but related, narrative is the prominent part that Sirius has played in how we came to achieve our current scientific understanding of the nature and fate of the stars. This is the first book to integrate the cultural history of Sirius with modern astrophysics in a way which provides a realistic view of how science progresses over time.

A fox terrier who escapes Nazi Germany with his Jewish owners finds himself at Hitler's side during World War II. Can he help the resistance and reunite with his family?--