- Book review (Stephen Hawking's A Brief History Of Time)
- Seven fun facts about the Cosmos
- To infinity, and beyond
1. Book Review
To say that this was an easy read would be a lie... but to say that it was an interesting read couldn't be further from the truth. Stephen Hawking's 1988 best-selling science book is one of the most mind blowing things I have ever experienced. In it, he covers topics ranging from space and time, to the uncertainty principle, to black holes, and the origin and fate of the universe. The introduction by another legendary scientist, Carl Sagan, whets your appetite for the pages ahead.
If you want to read this book (and if you are at all interested in the cosmos I highly recommend it), I suggest reading it when you have the least amount of distractions such as noise and fatigue. This is because every page contains so much information that if you blink you'll miss something, an event I found myself doing throughout reading this book. My first attempt at it (yes it's one of those) was last year, and I got half way through it only to lose interest and start something else. So in many ways a level of commitment is needed to get through it; and when you do the rewards will be great.
On my second attempt I had a little more time on my hands, and so took my time. I kept notes on interesting facts (7 of those I will share with you in chapter 2 of this blog), as it was not only a way of keeping track of where I was at, it also solidified my knowledge of often super confusing ideas such as the uncertainty principle and wormholes. This book is meant for someone who has no knowledge of science at all (a 'layman') and even though I know bits and pieces, I've never actually studied physics beyond high school, and even then Mr. Fernside's year 10 science class wasn't the right environment for me to grasp these concepts.
I guess that Hawking does a good job at explaining these concepts to a layman, however I felt that I needed to stop and go on Wikipedia to learn more as I went along, and in that respect (since this book was published in the 80s and the layman back then wouldn't have had their own encyclopaedia in their pocket) the book is a little confusing, and hard to read at times. But that's what I liked about it, he doesn't dumb any of the concepts down at all. Hawking explains a concept once, and if you don't understand it, I think the best thing to do is to just keep reading. An excerpt from the book states, "If you remember every word in this book, your memory will have recorded about two million pieces of information" - and that's if you remember every word.
So my advice is to jump into it with a fresh and open mind, knowing that it's not going to be an easy read, and to keep a piece of paper and pencil handy so you can grasp the universe we live in just that little bit better. In the next chapter, I will share with you 7 of the most interesting things that I came across whilst reading this phenomenal book by a very intelligent man.
If you want to read this book (and if you are at all interested in the cosmos I highly recommend it), I suggest reading it when you have the least amount of distractions such as noise and fatigue. This is because every page contains so much information that if you blink you'll miss something, an event I found myself doing throughout reading this book. My first attempt at it (yes it's one of those) was last year, and I got half way through it only to lose interest and start something else. So in many ways a level of commitment is needed to get through it; and when you do the rewards will be great.
On my second attempt I had a little more time on my hands, and so took my time. I kept notes on interesting facts (7 of those I will share with you in chapter 2 of this blog), as it was not only a way of keeping track of where I was at, it also solidified my knowledge of often super confusing ideas such as the uncertainty principle and wormholes. This book is meant for someone who has no knowledge of science at all (a 'layman') and even though I know bits and pieces, I've never actually studied physics beyond high school, and even then Mr. Fernside's year 10 science class wasn't the right environment for me to grasp these concepts.
I guess that Hawking does a good job at explaining these concepts to a layman, however I felt that I needed to stop and go on Wikipedia to learn more as I went along, and in that respect (since this book was published in the 80s and the layman back then wouldn't have had their own encyclopaedia in their pocket) the book is a little confusing, and hard to read at times. But that's what I liked about it, he doesn't dumb any of the concepts down at all. Hawking explains a concept once, and if you don't understand it, I think the best thing to do is to just keep reading. An excerpt from the book states, "If you remember every word in this book, your memory will have recorded about two million pieces of information" - and that's if you remember every word.
So my advice is to jump into it with a fresh and open mind, knowing that it's not going to be an easy read, and to keep a piece of paper and pencil handy so you can grasp the universe we live in just that little bit better. In the next chapter, I will share with you 7 of the most interesting things that I came across whilst reading this phenomenal book by a very intelligent man.
