Time, Space, Stars, and Man : The Story of the Big Bang

by Woolfson, Michael M.

• ISBN13: 9781848162730
• ISBN10: 1848162731
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2009-03-30
• Publisher: World Scientific Pub Co Inc

Summary

Most well-read, but non-scientific, people will have heard of the term "Big Bang" as a description of the origin of the Universe. They will recognize that DNA identifies individuals and will know that the origin of life is one of the great unsolved scientific mysteries. This book brings together all of that material. Starting with the creation of space and time - known as the Big Bang - the book traces causally related steps through the formation of matter, of stars and planets, the Earth itself, the evolution of the Earth's surface and atmosphere, and then through to the beginnings of life and the evolution of man. The material is presented in such a way that a non-scientist can comprehend it, without using formulae or equations but still preserving the integrity of the involved science. This book does not solve the mysteries of what initiated the Big Bang or how life evolved from inanimate matter, but it does make clear the nature of those problems. The reader will be left with a sense of wonderment that he or she actually exists! Book jacket.

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. ix
Musing	p. 1
The Universe	p. 9
Christian Doppler and His Effect	p. 11
Measuring Distances in the Universe	p. 19
Edwin Hubble's Expanding Universe	p. 31
A Weird and Wonderful Universe	p. 39
Matter and the Universe	p. 51
The Nature of Matter	p. 53
The Big Bang Hypothesis	p. 65
How Matter Can Clump Together	p. 73
The Universe Develops Structure	p. 87
Stars, Stellar Clusters and Galaxies	p. 93
The First Stars are Born, Live and Die	p. 95
The Formation of Globular Clusters and Galaxies	p. 109
Making the Sun - And Similar Stars	p. 119
A Crowded Environment	p. 135
The Solar System	p. 141
Understanding the Nature of the Solar System	p. 143
Introducing the Planets	p. 157
Satellites Galore	p. 173
"Vermin of the Sky" and Other Small Bodies	p. 193
Planets Galore	p. 207
Forming the Solar System	p. 215
Making Planets	p. 217
Shrinking Orbits and the Survival of Planetary Systems	p. 229
Now Satellites Form	p. 247
What Can Be Learnt from Meteorites?	p. 259
A Little-Bang Theory and the Terrestrial Planets	p. 269
The Moon - Its Structure and History	p. 281
The Very Small Planets - Mars and Mercury	p. 291
Bits and Pieces in the Solar System	p. 299
The Dwarf Planets and Triton	p. 307
Life on Earth	p. 313
The Earth Settles Down - More-or-Less	p. 315
What Is Life?	p. 321
The Alphabets of Life	p. 333
Life Begins on Earth	p. 347
The Survival of the Fittest	p. 355
The Restless Earth	p. 369
Oxygen, Ozone and the Evolution of Life	p. 379
Man and the Earth	p. 399
Musing Again	p. 407
Index	p. 409
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