Interesting and in very dumbed down language (where even I can understand this stuff). Hawking comes across as pretty arrogant, but he is Hawking.

This has been a good read. The author has put a lot of time and effort. Being a writer myself, I find it commendable. The content is decent and keeps you hooked for a long time. And some parts are simply minds blowing. I look forward to reading more books like this. All in all, a good experience for an avid reader like me.

Hawking searched for a single substance that underlies all of reality. This might be found at the beginning of the Big Bang (or pre-Big Bang moment?), a point at which gravity pulled all matter-energy into a singularity. Here, the density is so great that the matter particles (electrons, quarks, neutrinos) and three of the four (2) force particles (gluons, photons, W-Z bosons) lacked differentiation and were in some philosophical sense something that was "One," something that preceded "the Many" that, post Big Bang, differentiated over time.

What this Hawking quest leaves unanswered (or not discussed by Boslough), is what creates the Big Bang explosion? Physicists know that with the electro-magnetic force, like charges repel and unlike charges attract, and presumably something similar happens with the quarks within the nucleus; physicists also know that the collapsing process of larger-scale stars push particles beyond a breaking point, resulting in supernova explosions. (3) Is there a connection between this forcing of energy-particles, in whatever form, into an incompatible "One" that results in the explosion process which creates "the Many" that differentiates over time? (4)

Regarding this interest in pulling together the four forces, gravity is the outlier (in what sense for the physicist I don't know). The forces that interact at the atomic and subatomic, microscopic scale involve attraction that allows for merger and combination via the transfer of energy, or repulsion that preserves some form of independence/integrity. Gravity is said to involve only an attractive force. (5) It acts on everything, pulling matter-energy toward the center, in effect in a singularity and Big Bang scenario, overwhelming everything (all atomic, sub-atomic matter-energy). (6) What is it - what is the single underlying force - that integrates energy and matter together like this? If it is gravity, what is it about gravity that overpowers repulsive forces, allowing attraction to reign supreme? Is the singularity result (black hole or pre-Big Bang) the One? Or, because the pressure is too intense, "the One" is, in the end, unstable and explodes to create movement, change, differentiation and "the Many" in the cosmos?

(1) "Hawking, like most theoretical physicists, now believes that the secret of the most elusive of all goals lies in the very early universe, the period within the first trillionth of a second after the beginning of the Big Bang. It is there when the four forces we see in our cold, stable universe were probably one."

(2) Gravity, operating at the macro level, pulls energy and matter into a singularity via mutual attraction. Interestingly, under general relativity, while matter-energy is pulled into a singularity, in quantum mechanics, there is no point. There is only a field.

(3) Hawking is known for his theorizing on black hole radiation, the seeping of energy out of a black hole. But if black holes are singularities like a pre-Big Bang moment, why wouldn't a black hole also explode? Boslough also writes that black holes "as Hawking tells it, are rips in the fabric of space and time so dense and distorted by unimaginable gravitational forces that for years physicists believed nothing could escape from one, including light." I don't understand what Boslough is stating. The "rip in the fabric of space and time" is rich in imagery, but it also suggests that the black hole is so massively heavy that it breaks through the "fabric" of space-time (whatever "fabric" means), as if it was some flat bed sheet (versus matter and energy being pulled from all directions toward a gravitational center). The next question, is "Into what?"

(4) In a post Big Bang scenario, energy is radiated outward, dissipating across space and time, in a generalized, entropic process, though there's a localized clumping of matter and energy into galatic clusters, galaxies, stars and planets. Isn't this internally propelled movement? Is this (per Einstein's special theory of relativity?) the uniform movement of cosmic matter and energy that is then acted upon (accelerated), as Einstein theorized with general relativity, by larger-scale bodies of matter-energy that depress the fabric of space-time, which guide other matter-energy toward the center? Interestingly, the reference to entropy -- "the amount of energy available to perform a physical task must always decrease," in a process of gradual "inutility" - seems to be defined in Earthly-human terms, as opposed, say, to a more cosmically-oriented process of "heat death," which is the lessening of power differentials and therefore movement and change within fields of matter and energy.

(5) Referencing Einstein, Boslough says that gravity is not a force "in the usual sense." Large masses do not literally pull smaller masses. Rather, they depress the "fabric" (which is?) of space-time, like a bowling ball sitting on a blanket, depressing it in the middle, and smaller masses merely following the natural trajectory in "the fabric" toward the center. The discussion of gravity is incomplete in this Boslough book. Heavy mass draws matter-energy into itself to a central point, but the Earth and planets are not drawn into the sun so other factors (distance per the inverse square law) plus speed and counter-pulling masses are also involved. Boslough also reverts to the traditional notion of gravity as a force when he references the "tug-of-war between the powerful outward-directed force" of a star's "heat and radiation" (electro-magnetic force, carried by photons?), and "the strong inward-directed force of gravity." Elsewhere, he refers to the pull of gravity on a person toward the earth and says that is the same as "inertia of his body resisting." Though gravity does not repel like an electric-magnetic charge, this statement suggests that gravity's attraction does have a flip side, which via inertia, resists (i.e., mutual attraction involves mutual resistance of sorts).

(6) If a star has a greater mass (1.4 times or more of the sun), the (Pauli?) "exclusion principle will be overpowered by gravitation....breaking atomic nuclei apart, destroying atoms."

This was definitely a quick read considering how lazy I am with books. It was quite engaging from the start to finish. The author writes about his conversations with Stephen and the questions that he has almost resonate with what you would have asked if you had met him in person. Towards the end, the author goes into detail about the Bubble or Bang theory where personally I felt a bit lost. And finally "Is the End in Sight for Theoretical Physics?" by Mr. Hawking in the Appendix is a must read!

Great read. A little bit on Hawking, the man himself, and a lot bit on the theoretical research that defined his life.

It was good.

"We dance 'round in a ring and suppose, but the Secret sits in the middle and knows." (Robert Frost)

Buku terbitan 1985, dan merupakan 'the first popular introduction to the man and his work', katanya. Saya menandainya dengan 'it was ok' karena ini merupakan buku ke sekian tentang Hawking dan teori-teorinya yang pernah saya baca, jadi tidak banyak informasi baru yang saya dapat dari buku ini, malah cenderung kurang dan agak membosankan karena faktor usia buku ini. Tapi kembali lagi, 'it was ok'. Bahasanya ringan dan mudah dimengerti, penjabaran teorinya tidak terlalu mendalam. Bagian awal buku ini banyak menarasikan kehidupan pribadi Hawking, sesuai judulnya, 'Stephen Hawking's Universe'. Setidaknya buku ini menyegarkan kembali ingatan saya tentang event horizon dan pernyataan kontroversial Hawking baru-baru ini (yah, tidak baru-baru juga sih) "there are no black holes" (yang sebenarnya merupakan koreksi terhadap event horizon yang tentu saja, apparent horizon belum disinggung di buku ini :p). Juga tentang hukum kedua termodinamika yang sangat saya suka: entropi.

"Things are as they are because we are."

This a really complete book about cosmological science , Einstein relativity theory and the cosmos theories , really good book for people who likes science.

This review is based on a re-reading of this 1985 book.

Mr. Boslough has done a good job of putting together a short (150 pages), readable, and fast-paced overview of Hawking the person and the physics concepts associated with him.

Because of the compact format, many, if not most, of the concepts are described too briefly for my taste although they remain interesting and flow logically enough.

Recent observations and advances in cosmology have necessarily given this book an outdated feel. However, a person with a casual interest in the subject should be able to follow along easily and gain insights into Hawking's cerebral world of physics, thereby attaining a starting point for further study.

I found a couple annoying typos, but only a couple.

It's a little outdated being nearly 30 years old but I'm interested in Hawking and the book was rather short. This was one of those books that I really had to concentrate on what I was reading. I found myself more than a few times reading over a section two or three times to better comprehend (or at least attempt to) what was being discussed. In some portions of the book, it was completely over my head. It was an okay introduction to Hawking.

An essential read. No answers to the God question, but The Anthropic Principle and the Big Bang arguments are quite compelling!

This book focuses mostly Hawking's science (as opposed to his personal life, etc.). Although this is written decades before the TV series "Big Bang Theory", it makes Sheldon seem all the more real. Boslough asks some real questions about science and God that Hawking does not shy from answering. Hawking talking about the physicists discussing the universe's past brought to mind theological dispensationalists discussing the cosmic future. They both use their imaginations to make their unfounded theories fit their assumptions.