The End of Everything
(Astrophysically Speaking)
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4.6 • 5 Ratings
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- $18.99
Publisher Description
NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE ECONOMIST, OBSERVER, NEW SCIENTIST, BBC FOCUS, INDEPENDENT AND WASHINGTON POST
'A rollicking tour of the wildest physics. . . Like an animated discussion with your favourite quirky and brilliant professor' Leah Crane, New Scientist
'Weird science, explained beautifully' - John Scalzi
We know the universe had a beginning. But what happens at the end of the story?
With lively wit and wry humour, astrophysicist Katie Mack takes us on a mind-bending tour through each of the cosmos' possible finales: the Big Crunch, Heat Death, Vacuum Decay, the Big Rip and the Bounce. Guiding us through major concepts in quantum mechanics, cosmology, string theory and much more, she describes how small tweaks to our incomplete understanding of reality can result in starkly different futures. Our universe could collapse in upon itself, or rip itself apart, or even - in the next five minutes - succumb to an inescapable expanding bubble of doom.
This captivating story of cosmic escapism examines a mesmerizing yet unfamiliar physics landscape while sharing the excitement a leading astrophysicist feels when thinking about the universe and our place in it. Amid stellar explosions and bouncing universes, Mack shows that even though we puny humans have no chance of changing how it all ends, we can at least begin to understand it.
The End of Everything is a wildly fun, surprisingly upbeat ride to the farthest reaches of all that we know.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Mack, a theoretical astrophysicist who has written for Scientific American and Cosmos, debuts with a fascinating tour of the cosmic forces quantum vacuums, dark matter, dark energy, entropy, and gravitation among them that may conspire to end the universe. Excelling at providing just enough scientific detail, Mack sets the scene with an exceptionally lucid history of the universe from the big bang to the present. As to how the end might occur, Mack reveals a surprising number of competing theories, including that the mysterious dark energy will rip the cosmos apart, or, conversely, that the universe will collapse in on itself. In the currently most favored theory, it will be the victim of entropy, a long, cold demise paradoxically named "heat death," and in another scenario, which could happen at any moment, the all-pervading Higgs energy field will become unstable. (In this eventuality, Mack is careful to assure readers, the process will be painless and instantaneous.) In outlining the reasoning behind each theory, she also acknowledges opposing arguments and provides context for how astrophysicists found the supporting data. Despite the seemingly frightening topic, Mack's endlessly entertaining survey is infused with a palpable love of her subject, and will transmit to readers the same joy she finds in exploring the wide and fascinating universe.
Customer Reviews
End times
3.5 stars
The author is an American theoretical astrophysicist and columnist/science communicator in a number of popular journals (Scientific American, NY Times, Slate etc). She’s also very active on the entity formerly known as Twitter, I believe.
“This is the way the world ends: not with a bang but with a whimper.”
(T S. Eliot, The Hollow Men, 1925)
The universe, on the other hand, started with a bang and will end in one of several different ways, e.g., the Big Crunch, Heat Death, The Big Rip, Vacuum Decay. None sounds great. Not to worry though, because it/they won’t happen for another four billion years or so. The Sun will have expanded and burnt us to a crisp long before that. Alternatively, the end might come tomorrow. It’s impossible to be sure. Isn’t cosmology great?
Ms Mack weaves existential philosophy, theoretical astrophysics, cosmology, string theory, and loop quantum something-or-other using an informal style laced with geeky humour to liven things up. That didn’t always work, for me at least. Translation: I found it a bit of a slog at times. On a positive note, I prefer her schtick to Neil De Grasse Tyson’s.