The Secret Melody: And Man Created the Universe

by Thuan, Trinh Xuan

• ISBN13: 9781932031959
• ISBN10: 1932031952
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-12-15
• Publisher: Templeton Foundation Pr

Summary

"If the cosmos is vast," says astrophysicist Trinh Xuan Thuan, "it is by no means silent." Nature "delights in continuously sending us her notes of music." In this book, originally published in English by Oxford University Press in 1995 and now back in print, Thuan explores the universe, life, and human consciousness in terms of a musical score. As prelude, Thuan describes the many other cosmologies that preceded the Big Bang theory of creation: the magical universe of cavemen, the ancient Chinese concept of the universe, the mathematical universe introduced by Pythagoras, and the helio-centric universe of Copernicus. He then explores the work of Galileo, Thycho Brahe, and other early scientists before moving on to our current understanding of the universe, the ways in which modern astronomers study the universe, the equipment they use, and their major discoveries. An examination of the origin and nature of the universe inevitably raises philosophical and religious questions. Thuan addresses these questions, presenting a provocative case for the anthropic principle and illuminating the place of God in a Big Bang cosmology. Blending up-to-the-minute descriptions of the forefront of astronomy with thoughtful reflections on science's possible impact on philosophical and religious belief, this sweeping monograph explores the boundary between science and philosophy, science and art, and science and religion. With many beautiful and informative illustrations, The Secret Melody presents an enthralling look at our endless efforts to understand the cosmos and to hear the music of the stars.

Table of Contents

Preface to the 2005 Edition	xiii
Preface to the Original Edition	xvii
1 Past Universes	3	(32)
The Magic Universe	7	(1)
The Mythic Universe	7	(2)
The Heavenly Bureaucracy	9	(1)
The Greek Miracle	10	(1)
The Mathematical Universe	11	(1)
The Geocentric Universe	11	(1)
Retrograde Motions	12	(1)
The Scientific Universe	13	(3)
The Earth Is Round	16	(1)
Circles Upon Circles	16	(1)
The Medieval Universe	17	(1)
God and the Angels	18	(2)
What If the Earth Were Moving?	20	(1)
The Heliocentric Universe	21	(1)
The Infinite Universe	22	(2)
Imperfection in the Heavens	24	(1)
Galileo and His Telescope	25	(2)
The Motions of the Planets	27	(2)
What Keeps the Moon from Falling?	29	(2)
The Mechanistic Universe	31	(2)
The Deterministic Universe	33	(1)
The Hypothesis of God Is No Longer Necessary	33	(2)
2 From the Milky Way to the Universe	35	(21)
Capturing Light	36	(1)
Conserving Light	37	(1)
Splitting the Light	37	(2)
The New Forms of Light	39	(1)
The Limits of the Milky Way	40	(2)
A Thin, Flattened Disk	42	(2)
The Sun Is Just an Ordinary Star	44	(1)
The Stars in Motion	45	(1)
Stars That Converge in the Sky	45	(4)
Variable Stars and the Key to the Universe	49	(2)
The Sun Loses Its Central Place	51	(3)
The Extragalactic Universe	54	(2)
3 The Actors in the Drama: The Galaxies and the Space-Time Couple	56	(30)
The Fleeing Galaxies	56	(1)
A Universe With a Beginning	57	(1)
A Universe Without a Center	57	(2)
A Space in Creation	59	(1)
A Dynamic Space	60	(1)
A Universe Without Limits	61	(3)
Light Does Not Bring Fresh News	64	(1)
Ten New Galaxies Every Year	65	(1)
Why Is the Sky Dark at Night?	65	(3)
Elastic Time	68	(1)
The Fountain of Youth	68	(1)
The Space-Time Couple	69	(1)
The Speed of Light Is Costly	69	(1)
My Past Is Your Present, and Their Future	70	(1)
Can We Make an Omelette Before We Break the Eggs?	71	(1)
Remembrance of Things Past	71	(1)
The Arrow of Time	72	(2)
The Miracle of the Broken Plate	74	(1)
Light Cannot Travel into the Past	75	(1)
Stars Are Machines for Creating Disorder	76	(2)
Matter Slows Down Time	78	(1)
Black Holes Turn People into Spaghetti	78	(1)
Black Holes Bring Time to a Halt	79	(1)
All of Eternity in the Blink of an Eye	80	(1)
A Recipe for Making Black Holes	80	(1)
Against All Common Sense	81	(2)
Black Holes Are Hungry	83	(3)
4 The Big Bang Today	86	(30)
Astronomers Are Reluctant to Change Their Habits	86	(1)
The Fossil Radiation That Bathes the Universe	87	(1)
Telephones and Cosmology	88	(1)
For Helium, the Die Is Cast After the First 3 Minutes	89	(1)
The Galaxies Are Slowing Down	90	(1)
A Cosmic Ballet	91	(2)
The Age of the Universe	93	(2)
The Age of the Oldest Stars	95	(1)
The Age of the Oldest Atoms	96	(1)
Why Is the Universe So Homogeneous?	97	(1)
Why Does the Universe Have Structures?	98	(1)
Where Is the Antimatter?	99	(1)
Why Is the Universe So Flat?	100	(1)
The Four Forces	101	(1)
The Glue of the Cosmos	101	(1)
The Glue of Atoms	102	(2)
A Force for Decay	104	(1)
The Glue of Particles	104	(1)
Quantum Uncertainty	105	(2)
Observation Defines Reality	107	(1)
The Dual Nature of Matter	108	(2)
Everything Comes to Those Who Wait	110	(1)
God's Dice and Genetics	110	(2)
Energy Loans from Nature's Bank and Virtual Particles	112	(1)
Evaporating Black Holes	113	(3)
5 The History Book of the Universe	116	(70)
The Frontiers of Knowledge	117	(3)
An Awesome Expansion	120	(2)
Myriad Universes	122	(1)
Everything Arises from Nothing	122	(2)
Another Phase Change in the Universe	124	(1)
The Quarks Are Confined	125	(1)
Matter's First Victory	126	(1)
The Neutrinos Remain Aloof	127	(1)
Antimatter Is Finally Routed	128	(1)
The Decline of the Neutrons	129	(1)
A Factory That Builds Helium	130	(1)
Stopped in Its Tracks	131	(1)
One Helium Nucleus for Every Twelve Hydrogen Nuclei	132	(1)
The Universe Lifts Its Veil	133	(1)
The Reign of Matter	134	(1)
The Villages and Cities of the Universe	135	(2)
The Cosmic Tapestry: Pancakes, Filaments, Voids, and Bubbles	137	(5)
The Seeds of Galaxies	142	(4)
The Actors in the Drama: Gravity and Expansion	146	(1)
The Invisible Mass in the Universe	147	(1)
Model Universes	148	(1)
Too Small Pancakes and Too Large Seeds	148	(3)
A Universe with Massive Neutrinos	151	(2)
"Cold" Dark Matter	153	(3)
Were the First Building Blocks Extremely Tiny?	156	(2)
The Universe Through a Magnifying Glass: Galaxies and Stars	158	(2)
Cosmic Collisions	160	(2)
Cannibal Galaxies	162	(1)
The First Stars	163	(1)
A Second Chance for the Universe	164	(2)
Stars with Layers Like an Onion	166	(1)
Iron, the Recalcitrant Element	167	(1)
Three Ways to Die	168	(5)
Supernovae Do Us a World of Good	173	(2)
Quasars	175	(2)
Molecules in Space	177	(1)
The Invention of the Planet	178	(4)
The Ascent of Life	182	(4)
6 The Invisible and the Fate of the Universe	186	(37)
The Deceleration of the Universe	188	(1)
Giant Elliptical Galaxies Are Not Good Standard Candles	189	(1)
Galactic Cannibalism	190	(1)
The Invisible Mass in the Universe	191	(1)
Weighing the Universe	192	(1)
The Cosmological Principle	192	(1)
Something Dark Around Galaxies	193	(3)
The Extent of the Invisible Mass	196	(2)
Invisible Intergalactic Matter	198	(1)
Failed Stars and Planets	199	(1)
Is God Playing with Cosminos?	200	(1)
Cosmic Mirages	201	(3)
According to the Latest News, the Universe Is Open	204	(2)
The Sun Goes Out	206	(2)
A Long Night	208	(2)
The Evaporation of Black Holes	210	(1)
Diamonds Are Not Forever	211	(2)
Is the Proton Mortal?	213	(2)
A Blazing Inferno	215	(2)
A Cyclic Universe?	217	(2)
Taming Black Holes	219	(2)
Other Forms of Life	221	(2)
7 An Accidental or Necessary Universe?	223	(17)
The Phantom of Copernicus Is Called into Question	223	(1)
Nature's Numbers	224	(2)
The Things in Life	226	(2)
Model Universes Are Sterile	228	(2)
A Very Precisely Adjusted Universe	230	(2)
Parallel Universes	232	(5)
Chance Revisited	237	(2)
Science and Finalism	239	(1)
8 God and the Big Bang	240	(10)
Is a First Cause Necessary?	240	(1)
God and Time	241	(2)
God and Complexity	243	(1)
God and Life	244	(1)
God and Consciousness	245	(2)
God and the Extraterrestrials	247	(1)
The Final Wager	248	(2)
9 The Secret Melody	250	(25)
The Steady-State Universe and Continuous Creation	250	(3)
What If the Universe Were Not Expanding?	253	(1)
Noncosmological Red Shifts	254	(4)
Faster than Light, or a Variable Gravity?	258	(1)
The Modification of Newton's Laws	259	(1)
A Matter—Antimatter Cosmology	259	(1)
The Scientist's Wager	260	(4)
Digitized Images	264	(1)
The Interpretive Eye	265	(1)
Visualizing the Invisible	266	(1)
Machines May Fool Us	266	(2)
Sifting and Transforming Reality	268	(2)
The Inner Fermentation	270	(1)
Foucault's Pendulum	270	(2)
The Universe's Indivisibility	272	(2)
The Secret of the Melody	274	(1)
Appendix A Light and the Doppler Effect	275	(4)
Appendix B The Elasticity of the Space-Time Couple	279	(4)
Appendix C Black Holes	283	(4)
Appendix D The Uncertainty Principle in Quantum Mechanics	287	(2)
Appendix E The Cosmological Parameters and the Evolution of the Universe	289	(4)
Glossary	293	(12)
Bibliography	305	(2)
Index	307