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 * Main Topics
   Introduction Main Topics Intro The Big Bang and the Big Crunch Special and
   General Relativity Black Holes and Wormholes Quantum Theory and the
   Uncertainty Principle The Beginnings of Life
 * Important Dates and Discoveries
 * Important Scientists
   Important Scientists Bohr, Niels Chandrasekhar, Subrahmanyan Dirac, Paul
   Eddington, Arthur Einstein, Albert Feynman, Richard Friedmann, Alexander
   Gamow, George Guth, Alan Hawking, Stephen Heisenberg, Werner Hoyle, Fred
   Hubble, Edwin Lemaître, Georges Oparin, Alexander Pauli, Wolfgang Planck, Max
   Rutherford, Ernest Sakharov, Andrei Schrödinger, Erwin Schwarzschild, Karl
   Wheeler, John
 * Cosmological Theories Through History
 * The Universe By Numbers
 * Glossary of Terms
 * A Few Random Facts
   A Few Random Facts Where in the universe is the Earth? How fast are we
   traveling through space?? How fast does light travel? How far is it to space,
   the Moon, the Sun, the stars, etc? How many stars are there? How does the Sun
   shine? What different types of stars are there? What is the human body (and
   the Earth, the Sun, the Universe) made of? How many molecules/atoms are there
   in each cubic meter? What if the history of the universe were squeezed into
   the period of one year? What are the coldest and the hottest objects in the
   universe? What is the electromagnetic spectrum? What is a planet? What is a
   dwarf planet? Why do the planets orbit the Sun?


PHYSICS OF THE UNIVERSE: DIFFICULT TOPICS MADE UNDERSTANDABLE


( Click for a larger version)
Map of the main super-clusters of galaxies in an area covering about 7% of the
observable universe (our galaxy is within the Virgo supercluster)
(original source, n/a: dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2008/01/map-of-the-univ.html)


The answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything,
according to Douglas Adams’ excellent book, is 42. The reality, it turns out, is
not quite so simple.

Questions about what the universe is, how it began, how it works, and where it
is going have exercised the minds of some of the smartest scientists of the last
two centuries and, while huge strides have been made in pinning down the science
underlying the workings of the universe, some stubborn obstacles still remain.
In fact, it does sometimes seem that the more we learn and the more questions we
answer, the more there is to learn and the more new questions arise.

Nevertheless, this website tries to summarize some of the main theories and
topics in modern physics and astrophysics without getting into too much serious
mathematics, but at the same time without dumbing it down to the point of
uselessness. It attempts to tread the fine line between the two extremes:
providing sufficient accurate and hard information and explanation, but without
too much confusing detail.

It attempts to cover some of the fundamental topics in 20th Century physics such
as the Big Bang, black holes, quantum theory, special and general relativity,
etc, as well as touching on fascinating concepts such as dark matter and dark
energy, wormholes, the Big Crunch, the Big Freeze and the Big Rip, superstrings,
curved space-time, the uncertainty principle, wave-particle duality and some of
the other bizarre consequences of quantum mechanics, in the process. There is
also a section on the search for the beginnings of life on Earth, even though
this is not strictly physics. It does NOT deal in any detail with classical
physics, except insofar as explanations are necessary in the development of some
of the other main themes.

There are, of course, many other websites out there, both elementary and
technical, and there are even more books published on the subject by a multitude
of eminent scientists. I am most definitely NOT an eminent scientist. In fact, I
am not a scientist at all, merely an interested layman. But I have made use of
several of those admirable books, as well as additional information from any
number of other freely available websites, many of which I have credited on the
Sources page. All pictures and images used are also credited and linked to
source websites.


Albert Einstein

Edwin Hubble

Stephen Hawking

Werner Heisenberg
A few of the major figures in the development of modern physics covered in this
website


There is a section on Important Scientists, with biographies of twenty-one of
the major players in 20th Century physics, from Einstein to Heisenberg to
Einstein to Hubble (oh, and did I mention Einstein?).

I have also tried to further put the subject in perspective by including a
section on Important Dates and Discoveries (chronological milestones in our
understanding of the universe), and one on Cosmological Theories Through History
(a chronological look at some of the main theories and models which have been
developed over the centuries).

Just for fun, I have also included a section on The Universe By Numbers (a list
of some important numbers used in discussions of the universe), and another on
related and not-quite-so-related physics and astronomy snippets and statistics
which I came across in my research, and which I have just called A Few Random
Facts.

There is also a Search box at the bottom of each page, where you can search for
words (e.g. singularity, nonlocality, etc) or phrases (within quote marks e.g.
"black hole", "principle of relativity", etc). If your search unexpectedly does
not yield any matches, look through the Search Tips on the Search Results page
for information on alternative spellings and on widening or narrowing your
search.

Throughout the website, I have tried wherever possible to use plain and simple
words and explanatory analogies, but a certain amount of technical terminology
and jargon is unavoidable in this subject. For convenience, I have put in handy
popup "sticky boxes" (green links like this one) for quick and simple
explanations of the most common technical terms and important concepts, and also
a self-contained Glossary of Terms page.

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