Cover image for Theories of everything : the quest for ultimate explanation
Title:
Theories of everything : the quest for ultimate explanation
Personal Author:
Publication Information:
Oxford : Clarendon Press., 1991
ISBN:
9780198539285

Available:*

Library
Item Barcode
Call Number
Material Type
Item Category 1
Status
Searching...
30000000755375 Q175 B27 1991 Open Access Book Book
Searching...

On Order

Summary

Summary

In books such as The World Within the World and The Anthropic Cosmological Principle, astronomer John Barrow has emerged as a leading writer on our efforts to understand the universe. Timothy Ferris, writing in The Times Literary Supplement of London, described him as "a temperate and accomplished humanist, scientist, and philosopher of science--a man out to make a contribution, not a show." Now Barrow offers the general reader another fascinating look at modern physics, as he explores the quest for a single, unifying theory that will unlock nature's secrets.
Theories of Everything is more than a history of science, more than a popular report on recent research and discoveries. Barrow provides a reflective, intelligent commentary on what a true Theory of Everything would be--its ingredients, its limitations, and what it could tell us about the universe. Never before, he writes, have physicists been so confident and so eager in the hunt for this "cosmic Rosetta Stone," as he calls it: "a single all-embracing picture of all the laws of nature from which the inevitability of all things seen must follow with unimpeachable logic." He lays out eight essential ingredients for a Theory of Everything and then explores each in turn, tracing how our knowledge has developed and how scientific discovery relates to our changing philosophy and religious thought in each area. Some of these ingredients are obvious--the laws of nature must be explained, for example, as well as its organizing principles--but others may be surprising, such as broken symmetries and selection biases. A Theory of Everything must account for the fact that the universe is "messy and complicated," he tells us, and for the limitations imposed by the questions we ask and the information we can obtain. The key lies in the remarkable capacity of mathematics to express the fundamental workings of the physical world--a language that the human mind is uniquely equipped to understand and manipulate. Barrow examines what mathematics actually is and describes how it makes the universe intelligible and provides a path to the underlying coherence in nature--which has led, in fact, to arguments that the universe itself is a vast computer. Yet even the most complete theory, even the most comprehensive mathematical explanation, cannot account for the uncomputable varieties of human experience and thought. "No non-poetic account of reality," he writes, "can be complete."
In a field where the authorities converse in equations and mathematical notations, John Barrow speaks with the voice of thoughtful and knowledgeable humanist. Written with eloquence and expertise, Theories of Everything establishes a new perspective on humanity's efforts to explain the universe.


Author Notes

John D. Barrow is a scientist who writes accessibly about astrophysics and cosmology for both the general reader and the expert. Born in 1952, in London, England, Barrow earned a B.S. degree with first-class honors from the University of Durham in 1974. Three years later he received his doctorate from Magdalen College, Oxford. He was a junior research lecturer in astrophysics at Oxford University from 1977 to 1980 and became a lecturer in astronomy at the University of Sussex in Brighton in 1981.

With coauthor Joseph Silk, Barrow published The Left Hand of Creation: The Origin and Evolution of the Expanding Universe in 1983. The book, which explains particle physics and its application to the creation and evolution of the universe, quickly won praise for its lucid style.

Barrow delved further into this topic in 1994 with The Origin of the Universe. In this work he explored such questions as the possibility of extra dimensions to space, the beginning of time, and how human existence is part and parcel of the origin and composition of the universe.

Barrow's other books include Pi and the Sky; Theories of Everything; and The World Within the World. He has also contributed many articles to such professional journals as New Scientist, Scientific American, and Nature.

(Bowker Author Biography)


Reviews 2

Publisher's Weekly Review

Modern physicists believe they are getting closer to a Theory of Everything (TOE), a single, all-embracing picture of the laws of nature. Astronomer Barrow ( The World Within the World ) explores the topsy-turvy implications of current research and speculation. Some TOEs permit many possible universes to exist; in a number of creation scenarios, wormholes physically link a ``Mother Universe'' to simultaneously-born baby universes. Superstring theories--the most popular candidates for a viable TOE--presuppose either nine or 25 dimensions of space instead of the familiar three. Another implication is that the constants of nature--Einstein's ``divine inputs''--may shift in value. A mind-boggling intellectual adventure, this thoroughgoing, often technical discussion encompasses the nature of time and current wrangling among physicists and mathematicians over whether the universe resembles a vast computer program, a kaleidoscopic pattern or neither. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved


Choice Review

Einstein spent the last 30 years of his life searching for a unified theory of nature. He was unsuccessful, primarily because the idea was ahead of its time. Today, much more is known about how such a theory should be constructed, and what it should contain. In this book Barrow sets out eight ingredients that are needed for a "theory of everything." He discusses each of them in detail, then describes the challenges faced by anyone trying to formulate such a theory. He also talks about the likely limitations of such a theory. Overall, he explores a large number of interesting and exciting topics, but he does so at a level that may not be accessible to everyone, as some familiarity with the basic concepts of physics is required for a full understanding. Furthermore, there are a few mathematical equations included. For anyone with the proper background, however, the book is a good introduction.-B. R. Parker, Idaho State University