Time, Space, Stars And Man: The Story Of The Big Bang

by Michael Mark Woolfson

Overview

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!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781848162730
Publisher:	Imperial College Press
Publication date:	01/23/2009
Pages:	436
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.90(d)

Table of Contents

Introduction ix

Chapter 1 Musing 1

The Universe 9

Chapter 2 Christian Doppler and His Effect 11

Chapter 3 Measuring Distances in the Universe 19

Chapter 4 Edwin Hubble's Expanding Universe 31

Chapter 5 A Weird and Wonderful Universe 39

Matter and the Universe 51

Chapter 6 The Nature of Matter 53

Chapter 7 The Big Bang Hypothesis 65

Chapter 8 How Matter Can Clump Together 73

Chapter 9 The Universe Develops Structure 87

Stars, Stellar Clusters and Galaxies 93

Chapter 10 The First Stars are Born, Live and Die 95

Chapter 11 The Formation of Globular Clusters and Galaxies 109

Chapter 12 Making the Sun - And Similar Stars 119

Chapter 13 A Crowded Environment 135

The Solar System 141

Chapter 14 Understanding the Nature of the Solar System 143

Chapter 15 Introducing the Planets 157

Chapter 16 Satellites Galore 173

Chapter 17 "Vermin of the Sky" and Other Small Bodies 193

Chapter 18 Planets Galore 207

Forming the Solar System 215

Chapter 19 Making Planets 217

Chapter 20 Shrinking Orbits and the Survival of Planetary Systems 229

Chapter 21 Now Satellites Form 247

Chapter 22 What Can Be Learnt from Meteorites? 259

Chapter 23 A Little-Bang Theory and the Terrestrial Planets 269

Chapter 24 The Moon - Its Structure and History 281

Chapter 25 The Very Small Planets - Mars and Mercury 291

Chapter 26 Bits and Pieces in the Solar System 299

Chapter 27 The Dwarf Planets and Triton 307

Life on Earth 313

Chapter 28 The Earth Settles Down - More-or-Less 315

Chapter 29 What Is Life? 321

Chapter 30 The Alphabets of Life 333

Chapter 31 Life Begins on Earth 347

Chapter 32 The Survival of the Fittest 355

Chapter 33 The Restless Earth 369

Chapter 34 Oxygen, Ozone and the Evolution of Life 379

Chapter 35 Man and the Earth 399

Chapter 36 Musing Again 407

Index 409