THE FIRST MAJOR WORK IN NEARLY A DECADE BY ONE OF THE
WORLD’S GREAT THINKERS—A MARVELOUSLY CONCISE BOOK WITH NEW
ANSWERS TO THE ULTIMATE QUESTIONS OF LIFE
When
and how did the universe begin? Why are we here? Why is
there something rather than nothing? What is the nature of
reality? Why are the laws of nature so finely tuned as to
allow for the existence of beings like ourselves? And,
finally, is the apparent “grand design” of our universe
evidence of a benevolent creator who set things in motion—or
does science offer another explanation?
The most
fundamental questions about the origins of the universe and
of life itself, once the province of philosophy, now occupy
the territory where scientists, philosophers, and
theologians meet—if only to disagree. In their new book,
Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow present the most recent
scientific thinking about the mysteries of the universe, in
nontechnical language marked by both brilliance and
simplicity.
In The Grand Design they explain that
according to quantum theory, the cosmos does not have just a
single existence or history, but rather that every possible
history of the universe exists simultaneously. When applied
to the universe as a whole, this idea calls into question
the very notion of cause and effect. But the “top-down”
approach to cosmology that Hawking and
Mlodinow
describe would say that the fact that the past takes no
definite form means that we create history by observing it,
rather than that history creates us. The authors further
explain that we ourselves are the product of quantum
fluctuations in the very early universe, and show how
quantum theory predicts the “multiverse”—the idea that ours
is just one of many universes that appeared spontaneously
out of nothing, each with different laws of
nature.
Along the way Hawking and Mlodinow question
the conventional concept of reality, posing a
“model-dependent” theory of reality as the best we can hope
to find. And they conclude with a riveting assessment of
M-theory, an explanation of the laws governing us and our
universe that is currently the only viable candidate for a
complete “theory of everything.” If confirmed, they write,
it will be the unified theory that Einstein was looking for,
and the ultimate triumph of human reason.
A succinct,
startling, and lavishly illustrated guide to discoveries
that are altering our understanding and threatening some of
our most cherished belief systems, The Grand Design is a
book that will inform—and provoke—like no other.
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