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The Grand Design

The Grand Design

by Leonard Mlodinow and Stephen Hawking
Hardback
Publication Date: 07/09/2010

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THE FIRST MAJOR WORK IN NEARLY A DECADE BY ONE OF THE WORLD'S GREAT THINKERS--A MARVELOUSLY CONCISE BOOK WITH NEW ANSWERS TO THE ULTIMATE QUESTIONS OF LIFE

When and how did the universe begin? Why are we here? Why is there something rather than nothing? What is the nature of reality? Why are the laws of nature so finely tuned as to allow for the existence of beings like ourselves? And, finally, is the apparent "grand design" of our universe evidence of a benevolent creator who set things in motion--or does science offer another explanation?

The most fundamental questions about the origins of the universe and of life itself, once the province of philosophy, now occupy the territory where scientists, philosophers, and theologians meet--if only to disagree. In their new book, Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow present the most recent scientific thinking about the mysteries of the universe, in nontechnical language marked by both brilliance and simplicity.

In The Grand Design they explain that according to quantum theory, the cosmos does not have just a single existence or history, but rather that every possible history of the universe exists simultaneously. When applied to the universe as a whole, this idea calls into question the very notion of cause and effect. But the "top-down" approach to cosmology that Hawking and

Mlodinow describe would say that the fact that the past takes no definite form means that we create history by observing it, rather than that history creates us. The authors further explain that we ourselves are the product of quantum fluctuations in the very early universe, and show how quantum theory predicts the "multiverse"--the idea that ours is just one of many universes that appeared spontaneously out of nothing, each with different laws of nature.

 

Along the way Hawking and Mlodinow question the conventional concept of reality, posing a "model-dependent" theory of reality as the best we can hope to find. And they conclude with a riveting assessment of M-theory, an explanation of the laws governing us and our universe that is currently the only viable candidate for a complete "theory of everything." If confirmed, they write, it will be the unified theory that Einstein was looking for, and the ultimate triumph of human reason.

 

A succinct, startling, and lavishly illustrated guide to discoveries that are altering our understanding and threatening some of our most cherished belief systems, The Grand Design is a book that will inform--and provoke--like no other.
ISBN:
9780553805376
9780553805376
Category:
Philosophy
Format:
Hardback
Publication Date:
07-09-2010
Language:
English
Publisher:
Random House Publishing Group
Country of origin:
United States
Dimensions (mm):
235.97x159.26x20.57mm
Weight:
0.59kg
Leonard Mlodinow

Professor Leonard Mlodinow received his doctorate in theoretical physics from the University of California at Berkeley. He teaches at Caltech.

Stephen Hawking

Stephen Hawking is regarded as one of the most brilliant theoretical physicists since Einstein. He held the position of Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge for thirty years and was the author of A Brief History of Time which was an international bestseller.

His many publications include The Large Scale Structure of Spacetime with G F R Ellis, General Relativity: An Einstein Centenary Survey, with W Israel, and 300 Years of Gravitation, with W Israel.

Among the popular books Stephen Hawking has published are his best seller A Brief History of Time, Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays, The Universe in a Nutshell, The Grand Design and My Brief History.

His other books for the general reader include A Briefer History of Time, the essay collection Black Holes and Baby Universe and The Universe In A Nutshell.

Stephen Hawking died in March 2018.

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