Reddit reviews Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe (P.S.)
We found 22 Reddit comments about Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe (P.S.). Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.
Simon Singh explains.
edit: Hey, I didn't expect this to become the top comment. Neat. Might as well abuse it, by providing bonus material:
This is the same Simon Singh discussed in this recent and popular Reddit post; he is a superhero of science popularization. He has written some excellent and highly rated books:
(full disclosure: I have nothing to disclose, other than that I'm a fan of his work.)
I actually enjoyed his book a great deal. Link for the lazy.
http://www.amazon.com/Big-Bang-Origin-Universe-P-S/dp/0007162219
Hawking's On The Shoulders of Giants
Gribbin's The Scientists
Smithsonian's Timelines of Science
There are also a ton of good historical books on almost every major milestone in physics - a few I enjoyed:
The Clockwork Universe by Edward Dolnick
Faraday, Maxwell, and the Electric Field by Nancy Forbes
E=MC2 by David Bodanis
Quantum by Manjit Kumar
The Big Bang by Simon Singh
I can't link you to any histories of biology or chemistry, sorry, those aren't my areas of knowledge.
I come from a similar background. I attended a conservative religious university and eventually found my way out, but was completely uneducated.
"Big Bang" by Simon Singh changed my life. Not only did it put me on the right path in terms of understanding the history of science (and the world), but it did it in a way made it painfully obvious how connected it all is. I cannot recommend it enough. I've shared it with a few friends from school who now endorse it the same way I do.
http://www.amazon.com/Big-Bang-Origin-Universe-P-S/dp/0007162219/
I'd also recommend Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe by Simon Singh. It's more concerned with the origins of the big bang theory itself, but has a few chapters about Lorentz, Einstein, Poincare and the slow development of the theory of relativity, and subsequently special relativity. It's fairly accessible and is light on the math.
I'm not qualified to make a recommendation on basic physics, but here are some of the best examples of science writing I've come across for the other subjects you've listed:
The first atoms came into existence around 380,000 years after the Big Bang, when the universe’s temperature was low enough for electrons to become bound to free nuclei and thus form atoms. Every element heavier than lithium was formed in the cores of huge stars, so carbon and oxygen nuclei didn’t exist until around 100,000,000 years after the Big Bang at the earliest.
The Big Bang wasn’t an explosion, but rather a rapid expansion of space. It didn’t occur in one place, nor was it fueled by a chemical reaction.
Whether something came from nothing or if it even makes sense to talk about what caused the Big Bang — as a notion of causality presupposes the existence of time — remain open questions!
If this seems strange and confusing, don’t worry, it is strange and confusing! The conditions encountered in the Big Bang are extremely far removed from anything we experience in our lives today, so we have little frame of reference to fall back on for understanding the beginning of the universe in an intuitive fashion.
Don’t let this dissuade you, though! There is a huge amount of stuff one can learn about the Big Bang still and its strangeness only makes it more interesting and exciting to learn about, even if some of the concepts take a little time to wrap our heads around!
EDIT:
Here are a pair of classic books written for the interested layman that I think are good introductions to some of the topics at hand:
Big Bang — Simon Singh
A Brief History of Time — Stephen Hawking
I highly recommend science oriented books. Science is no "Maybe, perhaps, whatever", it is clear: facts are true when they are proven as such, and wrong when proven as wrong. There are theories everywhere but no one relies on them before they aren't proven right nowadays.
For a good summary of science, I recommend „A Short History of Nearly Everything". It really is about everything that regards progress in science: From Physics and chemistry, over geology and cosmology to anthropology and evolution. It is a pleasure to read, very well written and researched.
For more detailed, yet very accessible physics and explanations of the universe, there is "Big Bang".
Then there are things that - in my eyes - are beyond anything that TRP touches. Medical conditions which impair your sensory organs or rather the areas of your brain that process those sensations: Complete failure of a brain area, malfunctions in processing, illnesses. Those are very interesting stories and will make you think outside of your box. What would you do if this happened to you? How do people build a life around this? What does it feel and look like inside an affected persons head? Oliver Sacks has written a few books about those conditions/cases. He has a very pleasant and personal style of writing down his stories about the patients or even himself.
Quite analogue to that I recommend the series "Dr. House" if you are interested in that topic.
I can only recall those two from the top of my head. Of course, there are other topics which are interesting as well:
Philosophy (see: Arthur Schopenhauer, Friedrich Nietzsche, Platon), ancient poetry (see: Vergil, Homer, Alighieri) [because this indeed is for the most part fictional, you learn a lot about the spirit of the times], psychology, economy, paleontology, anthropology, etc etc.
Also, you shouldn't miss out on reading up about how cars/car engines are built and how they work (there are great animations of this on Youtube), this can come in handy if you want to repair one or get an idea of what features are worth your money. Same goes for computer technologies, household equipment. Basically I recommend to read up on every technical or even economical topic to be up to date.
As well, you can do researches about daily things. The internet is great at getting you those informations. But be sceptical, everyone on the internet can write articles about anything.
Often times it's the things we don't notice that have the most impact: linguistic (the history of bascially all languages is very exciting), where resources come from (nuclear plants - on this topic I found a well researched article/book on reddit regarding
Chernobyl -, coal power stations, wood clearing, purification plants, oil producers, mining, opencast mining, fishing, farming, animal breeding), the many climate zones of the globe and which one you live in, flora and fauna of the globe, the sea and especially the deep sea.
You get the idea. Turn your head around 360° and look under the surface of things. Lift a rock to see what is underneath, there is a lot to discover.
I actually see a lot of parallels between your situation and where I found myself at your age. It was 14 or 15 that I really developed an interest in science, because before that I hadn't really been properly exposed before that. Fast forward 6 or 7 years, I'm now a third year university student studying physics and I love it; I'll be applying to PhD programs next fall.
Like you, astronomy (by which I broadly mean astronomy, astrophysics, cosmology, etc.) was what really caught my attention. In school, I liked all the sciences and had always been good at math (calculus was by far one of my favorite high school courses because the science can be pretty watered down).
If you're interested in learning more about astrophysics, I would recommend any one of a number of books. The first book on the topic that I read was Simon Singh's Big Bang; I read a couple Brian Greene books, namely The Elegant Universe and Fabric of the Cosmos; I read Roger Penrose's Cycles of Time, and finally Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything. Also, I bought a book by Hawking and one by Michio Kaku that, to this day, sit on a shelf at my parents' house unread. I would recommend Singh's book as a nice book that should be at your level, and in fact it was the one recommended to me by some professors who I bugged with questions about the universe when I was around your age. Also, Bryson's book is a good survey look at a lot of different scientific topics, not just astrophysics/cosmology specific; I enjoyed it quite a lot.
As far as reaching out to people, I would recommend trying to connect with some scientists via email. That's what I did, and they were more responsive than I expected (realize that some of the people will simply not respond, probably because your email will get buried in their inbox, not out of any ill-will towards you).
At this point, I'll just stop writing because you've more than likely stopped reading, but if you are still reading this, I'd be more than happy to talk with you about science, what parts interest(ed) me, etc.
Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe
The Grand Design
> Thank you for the attempt at clarification. I am afraid that I still do not understand - it makes more scientific sense to claim that something came from nothing?
This is a common misunderstanding of what the Big Bang is referring to.
The Big Bang is not an event 13.7 billion years ago that created the universe. The Big Bang is the currently happening expansion and evolution of the universe. It is an event that happened after time=0. The Big Bang is not an explosion into spacetime. It is an explosion OF spacetime.
When atheists say things like 'Time didn't exist before the Big Bang, so it's nonsense to ask what happened before the Big Bang' they are not being facetious or evasive.
It really is like asking 'What's north of the North Pole?' If you are standing on the North pole, there is no direction you can face that can be described as being 'north' of your position. Even looking straight up or straight down are not 'north' of your position.
There is no 'before' the Big Bang, because time starts with the Big Bang.
What happened at time=0? "We don't know, and it is possible we CAN NEVER know." In fact, it is possible that the question is meaningless.
What I do know though, is that saying 'God did it' doesn't answer the question, and prevents exploration that may answer the question.
> Matter has always existed a priori, which therefore allowed the chemical reaction of the Big Bang.
The Big Bang was not a chemical reaction. I hope by my brief explanation above you get that now.
> Matter came as a result of the "Big Bang," but we do not know what caused the "Big Bang" in terms of quantifiable, physical evidence. All that is offered is conjecture.
Essentially correct. However, the conjecture has a grounding and does not violate ANY of the known laws of the universe. I HIGHLY recommend watching the lecture by Laurence Krauss, "A Universe From Nothing".
Now, as for how matter came to be, we actually have very good explanations, based on particle accelerator experiments. Very early, the universe was so hot and dense that there was no matter, just a lot of heat and energy. As the universe expanded, it cooled. Once it cooled enough, the energy was able to bundle into discrete particles, when then combined into mostly hydrogen atoms, with a little helium thrown in for variety. The rest of everything in the universe came about by nuclear fusion within the heart of stars. We are literally made from the dust of the stars.
I highly recommend The Fabric of the Cosmos, by Brian Greene and Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe by Simon Singh as a good introduction to the science of cosmology.
> The problem is that if we do not apply the attribute of eternity to God, then we will find ourselves citing an infinite regression of "God X created God Y, who was created by God Z." But, again, I simply point back to the acceptance of either the Big Bang or matter always existing - scientists do not know with absolute certainty, but still make the claim.
Exactly the same issue here on the other side: you believe, but do not KNOW (remember what I said about semantics mattering sometimes?) that God is in fact eternal. You MUST assert the eternal nature of God for precisely the reason you presented; to end the infinite regress. However, you haven't answered the question, you have made an assertion, based on belief, not knowledge.
> Both atheist materialists and Christians have to accept something a priori to defend a premise and a conclusion. First and foremost, of course, is the premise that we really exist. Second is that we can come to know something. Third would be that reality as we see it is real.
Totally agree. And philosophy is useful for thinking about these premises. However, no matter what you think about the situation, if we do not accept these three premises, we can't accomplish much.
First, you have to assume you exist. Trying to operate while assuming anything contrary to that is meaningless. You literally cannot do it. Part of the nature of consciousness is the implied fact that you exist, for without that implication, you would not be conscious. Sure, it's a tautology, but there you go.
Second, obviously we can come to know things, because otherwise we would be a brain in a vat, cut off from all sensory perception. Since we have sensory perception, we have information flowing into our consciousness. If nothing else, we come to know that sensory input. The question becomes how trust worthy is it? Since it is fairly obvious to anyone who has seen an optical illusion that our senses can be tricked, we have developed the scientific method to test our sensory perception.
And that's where we hit the third premise. Science allows us the best way yet found to determine if what we know does in fact reflect the nature of reality. How do we know science is the best way we have found? Because SCIENCE WORKS BITCHES!!! Yes, I am invoking utilitarianism.
> And yet we hold to abstract ideas of non-provable ideals. The human race (in general) holds to concepts of "morality" and "truth" and "goodness" and "badness", but we cannot test or defend those ideas with physical, repeatable, empirical evidence.
Correct. I agree 100%. Science cannot tell us what is good, right, wrong, moral, immoral, bad, evil, etc. Science can only tell us what is. The value judgments are left up to us.
Now, science CAN (and in fact is beginning to) tell us where and how these 'moral ideals' we have came from/developed.
As an atheist, if you follow the the concept to it's logical end, you come to the realization that there is no such thing as objective morality. All morality is subjective. The best I have ever heard it stated:
The difference between good and evil is EXACTLY the difference between the lion and the gazelle.
I don't see a collision between science and philosophy. Generally what I see is a failure to understand how best to integrate the two disciplines.
Kinda coming late to this.
First- let me say that I have listened to this podcast on occasion, and usually enjoy it. In fact, I often find that when it does discuss women in history, it is extremely interesting because what is discussed flies in the face of a common perception of women in history (ie, that they were powerless and had no influence).
Because these particular episodes tend to be the ones most accurately described as "stuff I missed in history class"- they become the most memorable. If I were to describe the podcast to someone, I would probably mention that it often covered women in history. I wouldn't really write a letter of complaint, because... well, it would only really bother me if I felt that they were getting it wrong (and I am way too much of a history noob to really have that reaction unless we are talking about one of a very few things I have actually studied as an adult), or if I felt the presentation was deliberately partisan. It's not- and women featured in it are sometimes portrayed as protagonists, and sometimes antagonists- which makes it a somewhat refreshing take on inclusivity. In particular I remember some bit about the influence of washington wives in mid-18th century america that was none too flattering. Oftentimes I find that attempts to tell "herstory" paint women as a saintly underdog of history- always doing great things, never making mistakes. Sometimes you'll run into what seem to me to be strange emphasis effects (consider Pickering vs Leavitt. Variable stars are really cool, but somehow the context of their discovery as part of the process of nailing down the big bang theory is missing from wikipedia)^1. That's not what this podcast does.
When I hear "stuff you missed"- I assume it is going to be an examination of past events from perspectives not generally given the spotlight in history classes- which tend to focus on the stories of the famous and powerful, and the conflicts between them. The title of the show would lead me to expect to hear more about Leavitt than Pickering, because I would expect the history of nailing down the big bang theory to be prominent, whereas "Pickering's Harem" and the discovery of variable stars might be left out (although, I've really only read one history of the Big Bang theory, and that is where I first learned about Leavitt). "Pickering's Harem" is interesting outside of that particular bit of scientific history because it highlights how the conventions of the time (public discomfort at the impropriety of men and women working side by side at night under the light of stars) affected the professional opportunities available, even when you could pursue degrees in a field- especially if you've ever worked in an observatory and know how unromantic it is, and how little hanky panky you would expect in the freezing conditions that are required viewing things at night at high altitudes without introducing atmospheric disturbance.
I don't think I'd just write it up exclusively to implicit bias. Sexism exists, and there is resentment for ideologically-driven efforts in the area like this one. Historical innacuracy aside, detractors seem to derive far too much enjoyment from denigrating the woman who was incorrectly identified as the inspiration for Rosie the Riveter for only working a few weeks, or maintaining that Ada Lovelace was only indisputably the world's first technical writer to just claim that people just want accurate accountings of history. People seem to want history to reflect that people like them were important- and that people who aren't like them have their importance exaggerated. We expect some strange transitive property of history in which we seem to be tallying up what accolades we are personally worthy of, despite the fact that we had nothing to do with it.
It sounds like you want someone to tell you for certain that there either is/is not a God/Hell and how the universe as we know it came to be (ie what caused the Big Bang) and wrap it up in a box with a pretty bow and put it under your Christmas tree for you to open.
Guess what - we'd all like that!
No one knows these answers for sure. There IS a lot of evidence for the Big Bang even though you say you don't believe in it. You say you want the truth and that is the truth...we really can't help you if you ask a question, we give you an answer (supported by many forms of evidence), and you tell us, for the most part, that we're lying.
What was "before" that (yes, I know it's bad terminology but we all know what I mean) - no one knows.
Is there a god? No one knows but there is zero evidence for one. Same for hell.
You might feel better if you become a Deist for awhile while you try to figure things out. Sometimes it's scary for people to think they might be an atheist so soon after questioning their faith.
In the meantime I'd read up on the Big Bang and the universe in general. Watch Cosmos.
Here are some books to help you get started:
Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe - Simon Singh
Origins: Fourteen Billion Years of Cosmic Evolution - Neil deGrasse Tyson
A Brief History of Time - Stephen Hawking
Good book for the layperson on the Big Bang.
Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe
For a thriller treatment of infections diseases, the following are a nice read
I'm inclined to also suggest the works of Simon Singh, to whom I was introduced by his book on math and cryptography - The Code Book. But he has also written about cosmology and "alternative" medicine. The later got him involved in a landmark libel lawsuit in the UK. For that reason, there is probably more than the usual bit of politics you'd expect in a popular science book. However, in the post-truth era of Donald Trump and company, that maybe fitting if bitter medicine.
Edit: As someone who may not have the best scientific background, one might be prone to confuse science with pseudoscience. Even today, there is no shortage of low quality literature on UFOs and parapsychology. As such, Carl Sagan's The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark is highly recommended.
I was a YEC until I read Simon Singh's book Big Bang, which convinced me that the evidence for an old universe was strong and convincing. For the next several years before my full deconversion, I was an old-earth creationist.
You just can't argue with the speed of light, and the "God created the light already on the way to Earth" just seemed really stupid.
Basically, because people are stubborn and refuse to let go of their ideas. Sometimes the older, established scientists refused to accept newer models or theories because they believe that their's is the correct one; and sometimes they stop or stifle the progress of younger scientist. It's usually only after the older scientists have retired/died that new paradigms arise.
You should read [Simon Singh's The Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe] (http://www.amazon.com/Big-Bang-The-Origin-Universe/dp/0007162219) for some historical examples.
I’m sure you now realize this forum is about the TV show, but plenty of people here have the basic knowledge about this so you may get some good answers.
The simplest answer is we don’t know. We don’t even know for sure if the Big Bang actually happened. But it was calculated by observing the motion of the stars and calculating where they’d be if time was reversed. And when they did that, the stars and galaxies all met at a single point 14.2(ish) billion years ago.
There have been other observations to back up this claim (CBR for one) so it has become widely accepted by the scientific community.
But since all measurements are reset at the time of the Big Bang, it’s hard to tell what happened before then (if anything).
This is of course an oversimplification of a complicated scientific theory, but it gets the point across. If you want to read more about the Big Bang theory, Simon Singh wrote a nice book that’s not too hard to understand if you don’t have a science background).
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBDA2E52FB1EF80C9
wikipedia
depending on where you are from, read a book about every major war your country fought. Who's kidding who, wars are the interesting parts.
Biographies or auto-biographies are interesting.
I remember as a kid i liked, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rise_and_Fall_of_the_Great_Powers
http://www.amazon.com/The-Making-Atomic-Bomb-Anniversary/dp/1451677618
Recently liked:http://www.amazon.com/Big-Bang-Origin-Universe-P-S/dp/0007162219
I would recommend Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe by Simon Singh. He leads the reader through our own history of cosmological discovery. Starting with the ancient Greeks and how they found the circumference of the earth with just a stick and a hole in the ground and ending with the big bang theory. It doesn't get very technical.
It's a starting point at least. There was also another post here that led to a list of the 100 best science books.
As for self-awareness, I really don't have any suggestions, but just the fact that you are seeking to be more self aware is a step in the right direction.
Good luck!
I would recommend reading "Big Bang" by Simon Singh. Very easy to read and entertaining too.
If you're looking for a history of physics, I highly recommend Big Bang by Simon Singh. Its a really interesting introduction into the history of how we know what we know in physics and astronomy, and how we've gotten to this point in our accumulation of scientific knowledge.