Research Catalog

Title

The secret melody and man created the universe / Trinh Xuan Thuan ; translation by Storm Dunlop.

Author

Trinh, Xuan Thuan.

Publication

New York : Oxford University Press, 1995.

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Holdings

Details

Description

xvi, 313 pages : illustrations; 25 cm

Summary

• In The Secret Melody, Trinh Xuan Thuan examines our many attempts to capture the music of nature and hear the cosmic fugue.
• First, as prelude, he describes the many other cosmologies that preceded the modern Big Bang theory of creation - the magical universe of cavemen, the ancient Chinese idea of the universe (which Thuan compares to a gigantic bureaucracy), the mathematical universe introduced by Pythagoras, and the heliocentric universe of Copernicus - and he explores the work of Galileo, Tycho Brahe, and other early scientists. He then describes in a clear, vivid, and poetic language our current understanding of the cosmos, painting a sharp picture of how modern astronomers study the universe, the equipment they use, the most prominent scientists, and the major discoveries. A mind-boggling portrait of the cosmos emerges in these pages.
• And, of course, any examination of the origin and nature of the universe inevitably raises philosophical and religious questions, and Thuan examines these issues as well, presenting a provocative case for the anthropic principle (which argues that the universe has been fine-tuned to an extreme precision to produce living creatures with consciousness and intelligence) and illuminating the place of God in a Big Bang cosmology.
• Here then is an intriguing look at modern 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.

Uniform Title

Mélodie secrète

Alternative Title

Mélodie secrète

Subject

• Cosmology
• Astrophysics
• Solar system

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. 305) and index.

Contents

1. Past Universes -- 2. From the Milky Way to the Universe -- 3. The Actors in the Drama: The Galaxies and the Space-Time Couple -- 4. The Big Bang Today -- 5. The History Book of the Universe -- 6. The Invisible and the Fate of the Universe -- 7. An Accidental or Necessary Universe? -- 8. God and the Big Bang -- 9. The Secret Melody -- Appendix A: Light and the Doppler Effect -- Appendix B: The Elasticity of the Space-Time Couple -- Appendix C: Black Holes -- Appendix D: The Uncertainty Principle in Quantum Mechanics -- Appendix E: The Cosmological Parameters and the Evolution of the Universe.

ISBN

0195073703 (acid-free paper)

LCCN

94017572

OCLC

ocm30518337

Owning Institutions

Columbia University Libraries