Neil McAleer

This is a descriptive book about our known Cosmos targeted for a popular audience. It encourages but does not engage in extrapolations, theories, and speculations about the universe. For example, "What happened before the Big Bang? This question is a mystery, and most scientists refuse to even speculate about it. In fact, the question really has no meaning in the context of general relativity, since there was no such thing as space and time BEFORE the Big Bang." Well, then. "The word BEFORE itself presupposes the concept of time, which did not exist until the cataclysmic explosion began it all at zero Big Bang." [174] And that happened, approximately, a quantifiable 18 billion years ago. [172] There has not been a moment to lose since!

The Preface notes that before the time of Copernicus (just over 500 years ago), it was obvious to anyone following the Sun that day after day, astral bodies were rotating around the Earth, which is clearly the center. Copernicus said, "Not so. Earth moves around the Sun". Martin Luther thought Copernicus a "fool" for contradicting the Bible. Yet, the science of astronomy was born. Soon, we lost the center, and the modern picture of the universe as populated by innumerable suns, and possibly form of life, has emerged.

Every Chapter is filled with information/facts which are astounding. Chapter 1 describes the Sun, the "mighty yellow dwarf" which is both near and far enough away to enable our lives. It turns out to be an amazing coincidence, one of many, that the Sun and the Moon are the same size in our sky--the equivalence is limned in a light-lined shadow during eclipse. "The Sun has a diameter about 400 times that of the Moon" and is 400 times farther away from us. [24] "A round object of any size will have the same apparent diameter as the Sun or full Moon if it is placed a distance of 108 times its own diameter away from the viewer." [25] You can try this with a penny! Place it on a light-colored backdrop 81 inches away. The realization that the Sun is also shrinking, and pulsing, and we still don't understand the reappearing "holes" in the Sun. We do seem to understand that it will run out of its core of hydrogen in "5 or 6 billion years". The Sun's future is as a Red Giant swelling into the orbits of its Solar System, vaporizing each planet. We find the authors giving mind-boggling shout outs for the use of Solar energy proposed by Freeman J. Dyson and changing black and white holes in the Galaxy to establish interstellar travel proposed by Adrian Berry.[30-31] Somehow it was also comforting to know that the Solar Wind can be harnessed to propel Space Farers using mylar sails of 929 square meters unfurled out of a cannister the size of a trash barrel. [32]

Chapter 2 describes the "magnificent" eight other Planets. Almost everything we thought we knew about our own Solar System as recently as the 1970's has been repeatedly revised. Mercury, Venus (a one-way manned mission would take 1.5 years at Apollo spacecraft speed), Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto are also "uninhabitable" by such as us.

Third Chapter is "The Moon", of which we know much from personal inspection -- Apollo 12 Mission landed on the surface, and testing equipment still remains there. Our bodies are 80% water and the tidal influence of lunar orbit impacts human behavior. [108-109].

4th Chapter describes Meteors, Asteroids, and Comets, with their celestial "shows"--showers and impacts. The author does not bother "defining" these, perhaps because their encounters are so obvious. Most of the 100 million meteors entering Earth's atmosphere burn up and filter down as dust, the total weight of which is 4 million tons, annually.

Chapter 5 is about Stars. "We have direct proof of the existence of at least 100 billion stars...and we're still counting." Here the enormity of distance is brought home--the nearest star system to our Sun is Alpha Centauri, 4.3 light years away. An Apollo spacecraft would take 850,000 years to reach it. We learn that Stars are born in galactic clouds as gaseous nebulae start to condense to nuclear-fusion births. Our life forms are "saved by space". The 2 to 3 light year safe zone distance between stars, and the nova and supernova explosions, spare us the invisible killer high-energy radiation. [141]

Chapter 6 describes our Galaxy--the "cosmic carousel", or giant spiral star system, in which we live. We have now mapped the position of the Sun trillions of miles out from the cosmic hub on one of two arching arms of a rotating disk. [154] Interestingly this book was written before the discovery that there may be a black hole at the center of every galactic system, including our own.

Chapter 7 steps into cosmic gestation--the Birth of the universe. The section comes the closest to speculation, in terms of analyzing how time and space developed from...a What? The author describes the freezing of the quantum, where the micro becomes macro at the limit of the General theory at Planck time and beyond. [178] Introduction of the Hadronic Era, after the Big Bang zero singularity where the Universe is one ten-thousandth of a second old. Hadrons are heavy elementary particles--neutrons and protons, participating in strong interactions. The annihilation of proton-antiproton pairs takes place, and very few Hadrons remain. The four basic forces of nature--gravitational, electromagnetic, weak nuclear, and strong nuclear--have separated out of the primeval force. [179] The author continues the walk, returning to the fact that Hydrogen, in the form of one proton orbited by one electron "is by far that most abundant" element, claiming 73% of the mass of the Universe. Interestingly, Earth is one of the few places where it comes in second in quantity; second to oxygen, to give us water. [189] McAleer returns to description of the motion of the Universe remarking that the Universe is highly uniform in its expansion. Doppler effect (change in apparent wavelength due to relative motion between source and observer) once again points the way. Points out that "uneven-ness" or "lumpiness" has been detected. Yet, "Cosmic background radiation is the ONLY part of the Universe that is everywhere." [193] We seem to inhabit a "clumpy" Universe. This work ends with a review of areas of speculation, without once mentioning that the Cosmos looks like a "thought", or divination.… (meer)

Well written and quite thorough biography that describes the visible Clarke. He was from a conventional world but chose to live a rather unconventional life in Sri Lanka. How unconventional he was is for another book. It is likely that the more complete picture will be some form of biopic rather than a book. His film legacy, film treatment of his books and documentaries, is large and likely available to anyone wanting to bring this very interesting man to life. Enjoyed his books and likely will reread them to recapture he universe as he envisioned it.… (meer)