Science Cosmology

Professor Brian Cox uncovers some of the most extraordinary natural events on Earth and in the universe and beyond. From the immensity of the universe and the roundness of Earth to the form of every single snowflake, the forces of nature shape everything we see. Pushed to extremes, the results are astonishing. In seeking to understand the everyday world, the colours, structure, behaviour and history of our home, we develop the knowledge and techniques necessary to step beyond the everyday.

Dr. Michael Guillen, a best-selling author, Emmy award-winning journalist and former physics instructor at Harvard, used to be an atheist ― until science changed his mind. Once of the opinion that people of faith are weak, small-minded folks who just don’t understand science, Dr. Guillen ultimately concluded that not only does science itself depend on faith, but faith is actually the mightiest power in the universe.

Whether pondering black holes or predicting discoveries at CERN, physicists believe the best theories are beautiful, natural, and elegant, and this standard separates popular theories from disposable ones. This is why, Sabine Hossenfelder argues, we have not seen a major breakthrough in the foundations of physics for more than four decades. The belief in beauty has become so dogmatic that it now conflicts with scientific objectivity: Observation has been unable to confirm mindboggling theories, like supersymmetry or grand unification, invented by physicists based on aesthetic criteria.

When Charles Darwin finished The Origin of Species, he thought that he had explained every clue but one. Though his theory could explain many facts, Darwin knew that there was a significant event in the history of life that his theory did not explain. During this event, the "Cambrian explosion", many animals suddenly appeared in the fossil record without apparent ancestors in earlier layers of rock. In Darwin's Doubt, Stephen C. Meyer tells the story of the mystery surrounding this explosion of animal life.

Neil deGrasse Tyson has a talent for guiding readers through the mysteries of outer space with stunning clarity and almost childlike enthusiasm. This collection of his essays from Natural History magazine explores a myriad of cosmic topics. Tyson introduces us to the physics of black holes by explaining what would happen to our bodies if we fell into one; he also examines the needless friction between science and religion, and notes Earth's status as "an insignificantly small speck in the cosmos".

A Brief Welcome to the Universe offers a breathtaking tour of the cosmos, from planets, stars, and galaxies to black holes and time loops. Best-selling authors and acclaimed astrophysicists Neil deGrasse Tyson, Michael A. Strauss, and J. Richard Gott take listeners on an unforgettable journey of exploration to reveal how our universe actually works. Propelling you from our home solar system to the outermost frontiers of space, this book builds your cosmic insight and perspective through a marvelously entertaining narrative.

Our universe has been growing for nearly 14 billion years. But almost everything about it, from the elements that forged stars, planets, and lifeforms, to the fundamental forces of physics, can be traced back to what happened in just the first three minutes of its existence. In this book, Nobel Laureate Steven Weinberg describes in wonderful detail what happened in these first three minutes.

Does the universe embody beautiful ideas? Artists as well as scientists throughout human history have pondered this "beautiful question". With Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek as your guide, embark on a voyage of related discoveries, from Plato and Pythagoras up to the present. Wilczek's groundbreaking work in quantum physics was inspired by his intuition to look for a deeper order of beauty in nature.

In Journey Through The Solar System, you can join the experience of a lifetime without leaving your home. Get ready for an unforgettable space holiday! You're about to launch on a voyage beyond your wildest dreams, touring the marvels of our Solar System (the sun, planets, comets, and asteroids) and the mysteries of the cosmos.

One of the most influential thinkers of our time, Stephen Hawking is an intellectual icon, known not only for the adventurousness of his ideas but for the clarity and wit with which he expresses them. In this new book Hawking takes us to the cutting edge of theoretical physics, where truth is often stranger than fiction, to explain in laymen’s terms the principles that control our universe.

This third edition surveys the applicability of Egyptian cosmological concepts to our modern understanding of the nature of the universe, creation, science, and philosophy. Egyptian cosmology is humanistic, coherent, comprehensive, consistent, logical, analytical, and rational.

One of the leading physicists of her generation, Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein is also one of fewer than one hundred Black American women to earn a PhD from a department of physics. Her vision of the cosmos is vibrant, buoyantly nontraditional, and grounded in Black and queer feminist lineages. Dr. Prescod-Weinstein urges us to recognize how science, like most fields, is rife with racism, misogyny, and other forms of oppression. She lays out a bold new approach to science and society, beginning with the belief that we all have a fundamental right to know and love the night sky.

Right now, you are orbiting a black hole. The Earth goes around the Sun, and the Sun goes around the centre of the Milky Way: a supermassive black hole—the strangest and most misunderstood phenomenon in the galaxy. In A Brief History of Black Holes, University of Oxford astrophysicist Dr Becky Smethurst charts the scientific breakthroughs that have uncovered the weird and wonderful world of black holes, from Hawking radiation to the iconic first photographs of a black hole in 2019.

Our true origins are not only human, or even terrestrial, but in fact cosmic. Drawing on recent scientific breakthroughs and cross-pollination among geology, biology, astrophysics, and cosmology, Origins illuminates the soul-stirring leaps in our understanding of the cosmos. This newly revised and updated edition features such startling discoveries as the more than 5,000 newly detected exoplanets that shed light on the origins of and possibilities for life in the cosmos.

Since its 2009 launch, the Kepler satellite has discovered more than 2,000 exoplanets, or planets outside our solar system. More exoplanets are being discovered all the time, remarkable in their variety. Astronomer Michael Summers and physicist James Trefil explore these remarkable recent discoveries: planets revolving around pulsars, planets made of diamond, planets that are mostly water, and numerous rogue planets wandering through the emptiness of space.

Something strange is going on in the cosmos. Scientists are uncovering a catalogue of weird phenomena that simply can’t be explained by our long-established theories of the universe. After decades of fruitless searching, could we finally be catching glimpses of a profound new view of our physical world? Or are we being fooled by cruel tricks of the data? In Space Oddities, Harry Cliff, a physicist who does cutting-edge work on the Large Hadron Collider, provides a riveting look at the universe’s most confounding puzzles.

The Trouble with Physics argues that a limited notion of time is holding physics back. It's time for a major revolution in scientific thought. The reality of time could be the key to the next big breakthrough in theoretical physics. What if the laws of physics themselves were not timeless? What if they could evolve? Time Reborn offers a radical new approach to cosmology that embraces the reality of time and opens up a whole new universe of possibilities.

Does time exist? What is infinity? Why do mirrors reverse left and right but not up and down? In this scintillating collection, Holt explores the human mind, the cosmos, and the thinkers who’ve tried to encompass the latter with the former. With his trademark clarity and humor, Holt probes the mysteries of quantum mechanics, the quest for the foundations of mathematics, and the nature of logic and truth. Along the way, he offers intimate biographical sketches of celebrated and neglected thinkers, from the physicist Emmy Noether to the computing pioneer Alan Turing and the discoverer of fractals, Benoit Mandelbrot.

In Powers of the Universe, cosmologist Brian Swimme identifies 11 powers that are present everywhere and throughout time in the universe. By examining these powers, Dr. Swimme reveals the characteristics of the universe that exist in the subatomic particles, the elements, the galaxies, stars, supernovas, planets, continents, oceans, life, and humans.

We are living in a golden age in astronomy and in the search for life the universe. Over the last few decades, space exploration has shown that not only are there habitable environments within our solar system, but there are millions of exoplanets within our galaxy that could support life. We are on the cusp of breakthroughs that will revolutionize our understanding of our place in the cosmos in. In The Secret Life of the Universe, astrobiologist and the director of the Carl Sagan Center at the SETI Institute Nathalie A. Cabrol takes us to the frontiers of the search for life.