
How the Universe Got Its Spots
Diary of a Finite Time in a Finite Space
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Narrated by:
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Janna Levin
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By:
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Janna Levin
About this listen
In this audiobook, astrophysicist Janna Levin blends memoir and visionary science to provide a groundbreaking personal account of her life and ideas
Is the universe infinite or just really big? With this question, cosmologist Janna Levin announces the central theme of this book, which established her as one of the most direct, unorthodox, and creative voices in contemporary science. As Levin sets out to determine how big “really big” may be, she offers a rare intimate look at the daily life of an innovative physicist, complete with jet lag and the tensions between personal relationships and the extreme demands of scientific exploration. Nimbly explaining geometry, topology, chaos, and string theory, Levin shows how the pattern of hot and cold spots left over from the big bang may one day reveal the size of the cosmos. The result is a thrilling story of cosmology by one of its leading thinkers.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
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Critic reviews
"[A] lovely, utterly original book. . . . This intimate account of the life and thought of a physicist is one of the nicest scientific books I have ever read—personal and honest, clear and informative, entertaining and difficult to put down."—Alejandro Gangui, American Scientist
"Gorgeously written."—Mary Carmichael, Newsweek
"Highly original. . . . Few scientists are capable of putting their understanding and experiences into words as effectively."—Peter Coles, Nature
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- By Jen on 05-14-19
By: Ron B. Davis, and others
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Waves in an Impossible Sea
- How Everyday Life Emerges from the Cosmic Ocean
- By: Matt Strassler
- Narrated by: Christopher Grove
- Length: 11 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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In Waves in an Impossible Sea, physicist Matt Strassler tells a startling tale of elementary particles, human experience, and empty space. He begins with a simple mystery of motion. When we drive at highway speeds with the windows down, the wind beats against our faces. Yet our planet hurtles through the cosmos at 150 miles per second, and we feel nothing of it. How can our voyage be so tranquil when, as Einstein discovered, matter warps space, and space deflects matter? The answer, Strassler reveals, is that empty space is a sea, albeit a paradoxically strange one.
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No pdf
- By Mark on 01-14-25
By: Matt Strassler
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The Many Hidden Worlds of Quantum Mechanics
- By: Sean Carroll, The Great Courses
- Narrated by: Sean Carroll
- Length: 11 hrs and 51 mins
- Original Recording
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In a field known for startling ideas, the Many-Worlds Interpretation (MWI) of quantum mechanics may take the prize. It holds that parallel to our own world are a large number of other universes, almost identical to ours but with small variations. Copies of each of us inhabit a myriad of these worlds. But they are not us exactly; they share our past history, but they are different people who have unique futures. Although these realms are invisible and can’t communicate with each other, prominent physicists are convinced they must exist.
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Sean Carroll always has such amazing content
- By Amazon Customer on 12-26-23
By: Sean Carroll, and others
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Life as No One Knows It
- The Physics of Life's Emergence
- By: Sara Imari Walker
- Narrated by: Sara Imari Walker
- Length: 7 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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What is life? This is among the most difficult open problems in science, right up there with the nature of consciousness and the existence of matter. All the definitions we have fall short. None help us understand how life originates or the full range of possibilities for what life on other planets might look like. In Life as No One Knows It, physicist and astrobiologist Sara Imari Walker argues that solving the origin of life requires radical new thinking and an experimentally testable theory for what life is.
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Fascinating thought patterns
- By John linden on 09-10-24
good not great
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A refreshingly personal take on cosmology
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Fantastic
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A necessary read for any physics nerd
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Loving this
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