New theories of everything : the quest for ultimate explanation
"In New Theories of Everything, John D. Barrow examines the ideas and controversies surrounding the ultimate explanation, and what the necessary ingredients of the theory might be. Developing his earlier work Theories of Everything, he tells of the concepts and predictions emerging at the cutting edge of theoretical physics, from the search for a final string theory to the idea of a multiverse and dark energy, as we strive to understand the development of complexity in the universe." "But this is not solely a book about modern ideas in physics, for Barrow also considers and reflects on the philosophical and cultural consequences of a Theory of Everything, its implications for our own existence in the world, and its limits too - for it cannot encompass what lies beyond the mathematical laws, a world not only of physical constants, but of emotions and judgements, of music and art. Yet, Barrow argues, we should not give up in bewilderment: he shows how many insights and questions arise from the pursuit of a Theory of Everything, and what these may mean for our understanding of the cosmos and our own place in it."--Jacket
Print Book, English, 2007
[2nd edition, New edition] View all formats and editions
Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2007
xi, 260 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm.
9780192807212, 9780199548170, 0192807218, 019954817X
122526938
1. Ultimate explanation. An eightfold way ; Myths ; Creation myths ; Algorithmic compressibility
2. Laws. The legacy of law ; The quest for unity ; Roger Boscovich ; Symmetries ; Infinities : to be or not to be? ; From Strings to 'M' ; A flight of rationalistic fancy ; Goodbye to all that
3. Initial conditions. At the edge of things ; Axioms ; Mathematical Jujitsu ; Initial conditions and time symmetry ; Time without time ; Cosmological time ; The problem of time ; Absolute space and time ; How far is far enough? ; The quantum mystery of time ; Quantum initial conditions ; The great divide
4. Forces and particles. The stuff of the Universe ; The copy-cat principle ; Elementarity ; The atom and the vortex ; A world beside itself
5. Constants of nature. The importance of being constant ; Fundamentalism ; What do constants tell us? ; Varying constants ; The cosmological constant
6. Broken symmetries. The never-ending story ; Broken symmetry ; Natural theology : a tale of two tales ; The flaws of nature ; Chaos ; Chance ; The unpredictability of sex ; Symmetry-breaking in the Universe
7. Organizing principles. Where the wild things are ; Big AL ; Time ; Being and becoming organized ; The arrow of time ; Far from equilibrium ; The sands of time ; The way of the world
8. Selection effects. Ubiquitous bias
9. Is 'pi' really in the sky? In the centre of immensities ; The number of the rose ; Philosophies of mathematics ; What is mathematics? ; Mathematics and physics : an eternal golden braid ; The intelligibility of the world ; Algorithmic compressibility rides again ; Continuity : a bridge too far? ; The secret of the Universe ; Is the Universe a computer? ; The unknowable
Revised edition of: Theories of everything / John D. Barrow. 1991
bvbr.bib-bvb.de Klappentext
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