I know many of you teach Astronomy. I've seen a lot of discussion about
physics texts and I'm curious to learn what folks think about intro astronomy
texts. I've never been involved in the choice, just use what I'm given, since
I just teach one section of solar astronomy and don't even do that every
semester, but I haven't seen one I could like. I've used Flower, Pasachoff,
and now Chaisson & McMillan. Chaisson & McMillan seem to explain things well
and have good clear illustrations, but they teach science as dogma and waste
a lot of time and print bashing religious dogma. Somehow, they think their
dogma is better. They also seem to go into more detail than my students at
a community college seem to be able to assimilate.