"The book is the first I have seen to put the details, both historical and conceptual, of the origin of the Universe within the grasp of the general reader. As such, it is a tremendous service to us all." --Isaac Asimov
"Weinberg builds such a convincing case . . . that one comes away from his book feeling not only that the idea of an original cosmic explosion is not crazy but that any other theory appears scientifically irrational." --Jeremy Bernstein, New Yorker
"His book is science writing at its best." --Martin Gardner, New York Review of Books
Now updated with a major new afterword that incorporates the latest cosmological research, this classic of contemporary science writing by a Nobel Prize-winning physicist explains to general readers what happened when the universe began and how we know.
Steven Weinberg received the 1979 Nobel Prize for Physics for his work in unifying two of the fundamental forces of nature, and in 1991 he was awarded the National Medal of Science at the White House. His earlier prize-winning book The First Three Minutes is the classic account of the "Big Bang," the modern theory of the origin of the universe. Among his other books are The Theory of Subatomic Particles and Gravitation and Cosmology: Principles and Applications of the General Theory of Relativity. Steven Weinberg is a member of the Royal Society of London as well as the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, and has been awarded numerous honorary degrees, most recently from Columbia University and the Universities of Salamanca and Padua.
Raymond Todd is an actor-director in the theater, a poet, a jazz trombonist, and a documentary filmmaker who lives in New York.
"The most
beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the
source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion
is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt
in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed." --
Albert Einstein
"Come forth into the Light
of things. Let Nature be your teacher." --
William Wordsworth"This is my simple
religion. There is no need for temples, no need for complicated
philosophy. Our own brain and our heart is our temple. The
philosophy is kindness." -- Dalai
Lama"There is only one
good...knowledge. There is only one evil...
ignorance." -- The
Death of Socrates"The
greatest virtues are those which are most useful to other
persons." --
Aristotle
"If we only do what is required of us, we
are slaves. The moment we do more, we are free." --Cicero"Science without
religion is lame, religion without science is
blind." --Albert
Einstein"If any man wish to write in a clear style
let him be first clear in his thought and if any would
write in a noble style let him first posess a noble
soul." --GoetheI do not feel obliged to
believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense,
reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their
use. --Galileo
Galilei