Cosmology And Controversy

Author : Helge Kragh
Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 0691227713
Total Pages : 515 pages
Book Rating : 4.19/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Cosmology and Controversy written by Helge Kragh and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2021-03-09 with total page 515 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For over three millennia, most people could understand the universe only in terms of myth, religion, and philosophy. Between 1920 and 1970, cosmology transformed into a branch of physics. With this remarkably rapid change came a theory that would finally lend empirical support to many long-held beliefs about the origins and development of the entire universe: the theory of the big bang. In this book, Helge Kragh presents the development of scientific cosmology for the first time as a historical event, one that embroiled many famous scientists in a controversy over the very notion of an evolving universe with a beginning in time. In rich detail he examines how the big-bang theory drew inspiration from and eventually triumphed over rival views, mainly the steady-state theory and its concept of a stationary universe of infinite age. In the 1920s, Alexander Friedmann and Georges Lemaître showed that Einstein's general relativity equations possessed solutions for a universe expanding in time. Kragh follows the story from here, showing how the big-bang theory evolved, from Edwin Hubble's observation that most galaxies are receding from us, to the discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation. Sir Fred Hoyle proposed instead the steady-state theory, a model of dynamic equilibrium involving the continuous creation of matter throughout the universe. Although today it is generally accepted that the universe started some ten billion years ago in a big bang, many readers may not fully realize that this standard view owed much of its formation to the steady-state theory. By exploring the similarities and tensions between the theories, Kragh provides the reader with indispensable background for understanding much of today's commentary about our universe.

Author : Helge Kragh
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0199209162
Total Pages : 285 pages
Book Rating : 4.63/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Conceptions of Cosmos written by Helge Kragh and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2007 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is a historical account of how natural philosophers and scientists have endeavoured to understand the universe at large, first in a mythical and later in a scientific context. Starting with the creation stories of ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, the book covers all the major events in theoretical and observational cosmology, from Aristotle's cosmos over the Copernican revolution to the discovery of the accelerating universe in the late 1990s. It presents cosmology as asubject including scientific as well as non-scientific dimensions, and tells the story of how it developed into a true science of the heavens. Contrary to most other books in the history of cosmology, it offers an integrated account of the development with emphasis on the modern Einsteinian andpost-Einsteinian period. Starting in the pre-literary era, it carries the story onwards to the early years of the 21st century.

Author : Craig Sean McConnell
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 304 pages
Book Rating : 4.02/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Big Bang-steady State Controversy written by Craig Sean McConnell and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Pierre Kerszberg
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 424 pages
Book Rating : 4.69/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Invented Universe written by Pierre Kerszberg and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 1989 with total page 424 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This new volume will give readers a complete history of the development of relativistic cosmology in the first half of the twentieth century. It traces the beginnings of the theory in 1917 with Einstein's first static model of the universe based on general relativity, and follows his conversion to the new cosmology after a series of controversial meetings with Dutch astronomer Willem De Sitter. The impact of these discussions on Eddington and Weyl, who later formulated the most fundamental principle of cosmology is examined, while the works of Friedmann and Lemaître, pioneers of the expanding universe theory, are covered in-depth. This valuable history will also provide insights on how and why the relativistic way of thinking contributes to some of the most enduring philosophical issues of our time.

Author : Barry R. PARKER
Publisher : Springer
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 384 pages
Book Rating : 4.11/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Vindication of the Big Bang written by Barry R. PARKER and published by Springer. This book was released on 1993-03-21 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written for the layperson, this readable account of the big bang theory explains complex topics of astrophysics and cosmology in plain terms without mathematics. The author discusses the discovery of the expansion of the universe, successes of the big bang model, discovery of cosmic background radiation, singularities, the redshift controversy, and plasma cosmology. Black and white photos included. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Author : F. Hoyle
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 9780521662239
Total Pages : 382 pages
Book Rating : 4.30/5 ( download)

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Download or read book A Different Approach to Cosmology written by F. Hoyle and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2000-02-17 with total page 382 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a different kind of book about cosmology, a field of major interest to professional astronomers, physicists, and the general public. All research in cosmology adopts one model of the universe, the hot big bang model. But Fred Hoyle, Geoffrey Burbidge and Jayant Narlikar take a different approach. Starting with the beginnings of modern cosmology, they then conduct a wide ranging and deep review of the observations made from 1945 to the present day. Here they challenge many conventional interpretations. The latter part of the book presents the authors' own account of the present status of observations and how they should be explained. The controversial theme is that the dependency on the hot big bang model has led to an unwarranted rejection of alternative cosmological models. Writing from the heart, with passion and punch, these three cosmologists make a powerful case for viewing the universe in a different light.

Author : Rodney Holder
Publisher : Lion Books
ISBN 13 : 0745956262
Total Pages : 208 pages
Book Rating : 4.68/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Big Bang Big God written by Rodney Holder and published by Lion Books. This book was released on 2013-10-18 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How did the universe begin and how has it evolved? Does a scientific explanation mean that we can do without God? Why are the laws of nature so special ('fine-tuned') as to produce a universe with intelligent creatures like us in it in the first place? Can the existence of a multiverse, a vast or infinite collection of universes, explain the specialness of this universe? This book argues that only God provides an explanation for the universe to exist at all, and that design by God provides the best and most rational explanation to adopt for the fine-tuning.

Author : Helge Kragh
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0191003344
Total Pages : 416 pages
Book Rating : 4.49/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Higher Speculations written by Helge Kragh and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011-01-07 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Throughout history, people have tried to construct 'theories of everything': highly ambitious attempts to understand nature in its totality. This account presents these theories in their historical contexts, from little-known hypotheses from the past to modern developments such as the theory of superstrings, the anthropic principle, and ideas of many universes, and uses them to problematize the limits of scientific knowledge. Do claims to theories of everything belong to science at all? Which are the epistemic standards on which an alleged scientific theory of the universe - or the multiverse - is to be judged? Such questions are currently being discussed by physicists and cosmologists, but rarely within a historical perspective. This book argues that these questions have a history and that knowledge of the historical development of 'higher speculations' may inform and qualify the current debate on the nature and limits of scientific explanation.

Author : George B. Field
Publisher : Addison Wesley Longman
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 360 pages
Book Rating : 4.81/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Redshift Controversy written by George B. Field and published by Addison Wesley Longman. This book was released on 1973 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : B. Bertotti
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 9780521372138
Total Pages : 460 pages
Book Rating : 4.35/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Modern Cosmology in Retrospect written by B. Bertotti and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1990-10-25 with total page 460 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Modern cosmology aims to determine the origin, evolution, and ultimate fate of the Universe. This is an area of modern science that has engendered fierce debates which have captured public interest. This book recounts the development of modern cosmology, in chapters contributed by many of the leading protagonists. It is a fascinating account of physical and observational cosmology, the great cosmological debates, important observations and the riddle of dark matter. The enormous controversy surrounding the Big Bang theory is retold in personal recollections from H. Bondi, W. McCrea, and Fred Hoyle. This is followed by chapters on the discovery of cosmic radio waves and the contributions made by radio astronomers to current cosmology. The book concludes with a tribute to some of the pioneers of cosmology.