Reddit mentions of A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing

It's also being expanded into one of the few books I've ever preordered.

Hey Lawrence! Huge fan of you work, thanks for everything you do.

Here's a link to the new book he mentioned for anyone who wants to pre-order:

A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing

Well worth the $15 in my opinion, to learn about all sorts of cutting edge stuff about the nature and origin of our universe.

And here's the YouTube video to give you a taste for the content. It's a little long, sixty-five minutes total, but definitely worth it.

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For my questions:

• What will the most important areas of physics to specialize in over the next ten-twenty years?
  
  
• What are some central debates that might be resolved in that time?
  
  
• How can we best further physics education in the US?

> We get that our universe is ALL there is, and there is no place to go except within that 4d space-time. The problem is that in our heads, the univers is still contained within a larger "space".

If what you're looking for is a convenient metaphor that is both simple and mathematically accurate, then I'm afraid there simply isn't one. Your best bet is reading books like A Universe from Nothing, which remain relatively simple to grasp yet offer explanations of quality you're unlikely to find on the internet or TV.

You seem to just read the public facing summary of emerging science and interpret it in a way you can easily dismiss.

I implore you to dig deeper into the science you're talking about.

Read this, understand it, and then you can dispute it with your own original points.

As it is now you're just repeating the same arguments that've been shattered over and over again.

It can be explained, though not simply, nor accessibly. Luckily, I'm not just an atheist, I'm also a theoretical physics student. Keep in mind that this of course can not be demonstrated empirically (science is the study of our Universe, so we obviously can't study things outside it in time or space).

Lets go back to before the Universe exists. Let's call this state the Void. It's important to note that no true void exists in our Universe, even the stuff that looks empty is full of vacuum fluctuations and all kinds of other things that aren't relevant, but you can investigate in your own time if you want. In this state, the Void has zero energy, pretty much by definition. Now, the idea that a Void could be transforms into a Universe is not really controversial; stuff transforms by itself all the time. The "problem" with a Universe arising from a Void is that the Universe has more energy than the Void, and it there's not explanation for where all this energy came from. Upon further investigation, we'll actually see that the Universe has zero net energy, and this isn't actually a problem.

Now, let's think about a vase sitting on a table. One knock and it shatters, hardly any effort required. But it would take a significant amount of effort to put that vase back together. This is critically important. Stuff has a natural tendency to be spread out all over the place. You need to contribute energy to it in order to bring it together. We're going to call this positive energy.

Gravity is something different though. Gravity pulls everything together. Unlike the vase, you'd need to expend energy in order to overcome the natural tendency of gravity. Because it's the opposite, we're going to call gravity negative energy. In day to day life, the tendency of stuff to spread out overwhelms the tendency of gravity to clump together, simply because gravity is comparatively very weak. There's quite a few more factors at play here, but stuff and gravity are the important ones.

Amazingly, it turns out that it's possible for the Universe to have exactly as much negative energy as it does positive energy, which means that it would have zero total energy, meaning that it's perfectly possible for it to pop out of nowhere, by dumb luck, because no energy input is required. Furthermore, we know how to check if our Universe has this exact energy composition. And back in 1989, that's exactly what cosmologists did. And it turns out it does. We can empirically show, to an excellent margin of error, that our Universe has zero net energy. Think about that for a second. Lawrence Krauss has a great youtube video explaining the evidence for this pretty incredible claim.

The really incredible thing is, given that our Universe has zero net energy, it's not only possible that it could just pop into existence on day, it's inevitable. It's exactly what we'd expect. Hell, I'd be out looking for God's fingerprints if there wasn't a Universe, not the opposite.

If you want to read more about it, by people who've spent far more time investigating this than I have, I suggest The Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene, and A Universe From Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing by Lawrence Krauss. Both go into detail about the subject, and don't require any prior physics knowledge.

tl;dr The Universe didn't need a "first cause". PHYSICS!

Could you at least explain why you picked the Christian God - and not any of the other Gods?

Surely you've heard the argument that cast a lot of doubt on your beliefs. Have you heard the history of the Mormon religion for example? There the sausage making of religion is rather plain to see, where the supposed prophet can't reproduce his original writing from his supposed gold tablet, so he claims God graced him with another - so his second translation was similar but different. This same sort of sausage making is thought to be the origin of all religions.

Without deviating from the Christian religion just how familiar are you with the bible? I'm not intending to be insulting or rude, but the old testament is filled with petty tales of a vile, jealous, merciless God with very few actual pieces of morality in it. Christianity would have done well to jettison it completely instead of rolling it into the bible.

Just one more thing - a book recommendation for someone interested in space http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/product-reviews/145162445X/ref=dp_top_cm_cr_acr_txt?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

Absolutely one of the most fascinating books that is on the cutting edge of theoretical physics - especially as it relates to new theories of how space actually works! *spoiler (empty space has gravity - and this important)

>It claims He never began existing but rather always existed.

From Carl Sagan:

>If the general picture, however, of a Big Bang followed by an expanding Universe is correct, what happened before that? Was the Universe devoid of all matter and then the matter suddenly somehow created, how did that happen? In many cultures, the customary answer is that a God or Gods created the Universe out of nothing. But if we wish to pursue this question courageously, we must of course ask the next question, where did God come from? If we decide that this is an unanswerable question, why not save a step and conclude that the origin of the Universe is an unanswerable question? Or, if we say that God always existed, why not save a step, and conclude that the Universe always existed? There is no need for a creation, it was always here. These are not easy questions. Cosmology brings us face to face with the deepest mysteries, questions that were once treated only in religion and myth.

Oh, and this part?

>The more we learn about cosmology the more we realize that we actually NEED an uncaused first cause

You've been sadly misinformed. I recommend A Universe From Nothing by Lawrence Krauss, either the talk or the book. The more we learn about cosmology, the less it seems that a creator was required. Our current picture of cosmology is that the universe is geometrically flat, it has zero total energy, and thus could have spontaneously appeared from a state in which there was no matter or energy.

A great book recently came out called "A Universe From Nothing" by Lawrence Krauss. Amazon

Also, he was on The Colbert Report recently. Colbert

He answers these questions better than anyone on Reddit could.

> If there isnt a creator then how did all this life get here?

Abiogenesis is our best working guess for now, but there's a lot of work left to be done. The key thing here though is to be honest and admit that we don't have all the answers rather than wave our hands and say that it was a magical sky faerie.

> I under stand the big bang, at one point all the matter in Universe was compact then it all expanded outwards, well from school I learned that matter cannot be created nor destroyed. How did all that compact matter get there in the first place? I dont know.

It's ok to not know - that's honesty. This excellent book by Lawrence Krauss is fascinating. If you don't have access to it, there's also a talk he gave a few years back.

> I guess I'm getting old enough where my own opinions are forming I'm just trying to decide what I want those opinions to be.

Remember that ultimately our opinions are just that - opinions. The universe is as it is regardless of what we may wish to be true and what we may believe.

You might enjoy Lawrence Krauss' book A Universe From Nothing.

A physicist named Lawrence Krauss wrote a book on this. Its called a universe from nothing. Good read. Also, if youre interested another good book that adresses different attempts to answer the question 'why is there something rather than nothing?' is called "Why does the world exist?" by Jim Holt.

Heres some links:

http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X

http://www.amazon.com/Why-Does-World-Exist-Existential/dp/0871403595/ref=la_B001IGFJ92_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1367993510&sr=1-1

edit: I just noticed that someone else mentioned Krauss in an above comment. Sorry for redundancy.

Because nothingness is impossible, per ASU and Caltech research. There are a ton of books on this subject, along with JSTOR documents (which you should have a subscription too if you are in college). This one is especially easy to read and comprehend the material. Enjoy. I'll gift you the Kindle edition if you really have an avid interest in learning new things.

Well A) the Higgs boson was originally joked as "the goddamn particle" because it was so difficult to detect. Some editor shortened it because that name would have gotten a bad reaction from people.

B) you should really check out cosmologists Lawrence Krauss (video) or Stephen Hawking (transcript). Krauss even wrote an entire book on the topic titled "A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing".

This might be more of a science answer than a broader philosophy answer, but these guys have math to back it up.

And C) "Intelligent Design" has already been ruled out by biologists, who find no convincing evidence. It's evolution and its various mechanisms that explain all the wonders and diversity of life.

Warning, Krauss in particular has a lot of disparaging remarks about religion and its followers.

TL;DR - According to these theoreticians, "nothing" (as a quantum mechanical phenomenon) is physically unstable, and "something" is certain to appear given enough time.

There was a book written about it.

> No one has yet succeeded, then, in explaining how something could literally come out of nothing: in every case some sort of prior condition needs to be presupposed.

I'm surprised there is no mention of physicist Lawrence Krauss's new book, A Universe from Nothing. He does quite a good job explaining how the latest physics suggests that the universe literally did come from nothing.

It is also important to understand that both space and time are features of the physical universe; the universe does not exist within these things. So the notion that we need to explain "prior" causes and what happened "before" the universe began is simply an error, since those words are meaningless without time. An analogous question would be, "where did the universe come from"? There was no space prior to the universe, so it is an error to try to reason spatially.

you know what does take some mystery away from them...

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/145162445X/ref=mp_s_a_1?qid=1343795584&sr=8-1

> If we have an even amount of positive and negative energy throughout the universe that adds up to zero (if this is wrong, please let me know)

It's not wrong, but it's a hypothesis.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-energy_universe

http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=7ImvlS8PLIo

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/145162445X/__1-20 (out in about 11 days)

Given that with the science of very small things (quantum mechanics), many things are thought to be acausal, and given the early universe was very very small indeed, there's no reason to think it had to behave causally.

But in any case, such a change of state from a highly symmetric zero-energy condition to a less symmetric one (nothing to something) may be a spontaneous symmetry-breaking event

http://www.csicop.org/sb/show/why_is_there_something_rather_than_nothing

See also

http://scienceblogs.com/startswithabang/2011/02/can_you_get_something_for_noth.php

but then see this:

http://scienceblogs.com/startswithabang/2011/06/defining_the_big_bang.php

You didn't say how old you were, but if you're financially dependent on your parents, you should probably keep quiet on the subject - including with your sister - until that is no longer the case.

On the something from nothing question, if she is science-minded, give her a copy of the Krauss book on the subject:

http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X

>without a God how did the universe come into existence?

I could rephrase that into a question that would be even more baffling:

>with a God, how did the universe come into existence?

The 2nd one is more crazy to explain, because now you need to know how a god was created, not just why there is or isn't more or less matter and energy.

If you are genuinely interested in astrophysics, here are some good books written by people who know more than me about the issues you mention:

http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X

http://www.amazon.com/Briefer-History-Time-Stephen-Hawking/dp/0553385461

Remember, even if you don't know the answer to a question about nature, it's always OK to say "I don't know." It's not OK to pretend that a story about the supernatural explains an issue in the natural world, if embracing the myth about the supernatural wouldn't really explain how things work, and would really only raise more questions.

A Universe from Nothing by [Lawrence M. Krauss] ( http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_M._Krauss)

Amazon link for the lazy.

Alternatively: Lawrence Krauss' A Universe From Nothing (video) or, better yet, the book.

Here is a great book I just finished, while much broader in scope, will help you understand what is in that 'empty space'.

A Universe From Nothing. Why There is Something Rather Than Nothing.

A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing

Lawrence Krauss

It is brilliant. I loved the lecture from him (with the same title) on youtube and the book takes it to the next level. I have gained so much knowledge just reading a chapter a day on the tube to work.

If you haven't already read it this is a great read:

http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X

How the universe was made?

I think the real crux of the question you're asking is how can something come from nothing? (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong; I don't want to speak for you) Let me just start off by saying there is no definitive scientific answer to this question... yet. However, there are very prominent research scientists who have tackled the question and come up with very cogent theories (backed up by current mathematical models).

I won't pretend to understand most of these theories as I'm a biologist, not a physicist. There is one recent book written on the very topic called A Universe from Nothing by Lawrence Krauss (he is a published theoretical physicist and cosmologist). He posits that particles do in fact spontaneously come into existence and there is scientific proof and reasoning for how and why. I haven't gotten around to reading it myself (it was just published this year), but I've been told it's good for the layman on the topic.

Now let me move on to some of the problems with this question. Perhaps you yourself don't have this supposition, but the supposition many theists make with the question (where did the universe come from?), is that if it can't be answered than God must have done it. This is a logical leap that defies rational reasoning, and is a leap theists have been making for millenia. What makes the tides go in and out? We don't know; must be God. What causes disease? We don't know; must be God. Where did the universe come from? We don't know; must be God?

It's what's known as a God of the gaps; wherein anything that can't be explained is conveniently claimed to have a divine explanation. Until a rational scientific answer comes along and religion takes a step back. There will likely always be gaps in our knowledge base (most definitely in our liftetimes). That doesn't mean we should make the same mistake as our ancestors and attribute these gaps to God. It's okay to simply not know and strive to understand.

Another huge problem with your question is that the theist answer only serves to further complicate the original question.

1. How can something come from nothing?
   
2. Well it can't right? So God must have created that original something.
   
3. God is something. Go back to step 1.
   
   Theists tend to skip that third step, or explain it away as God just always existing. Yet the universe always existing is something that is logically unacceptable to them. If anything, throwing God into the equation only makes it more complicated. A sentient being capable of creating the initial state of the universe would be more complex than what it is creating (meaning God is more complex than the universe). Trying to explain than how God came into being is more complicated than the original question, so nothing has really been answered or solved.
   
   If you're really trying to stump atheists, the best common theist argument I've seen is the cosmological constants one (how are they so fine tuned?). No doubt there are answers, but that's one of the better arguments out there. I won't go into it here, just search for it.

>You seem to be saying entirely different things each time you comment on this point.

I am saying the same thing. Philosophers, particularly before the advent of modern science, have often become so dedicated to concepts that they make faulty assertions about the natural world. Concepts derived from a limited understanding become impediments. Grand metaphysical systems of the past may impress with their internal consistency and complexity, but they do not describe the natural world with the accuracy or usefulness of modern scientific theories.

>but rather whether it is sound.

Soundness implies truth of the propositions used as premises in the argument. How would one test the premises of metaphysical arguments about prime movers and such? While I admit that such arguments may be interesting or internally consistent or even valid to the extent that they do not violate the rules of deduction, they are still built on definitions that do not allow for testing against the natural world and are thus not sound.

>No, physics doesn't suggest anything like this.

Lawrence Krauss would disagree.

>The ontological argument...

Depends on the definition of 'great' and whether such definition does or does not include existence. Descartes' goes on to include 'clear and distinct' ideas of supreme beings. These are very muddy concepts and to say 'well I guess god exists because this proof is valid' just seems silly by the standards of modern science. Grenlins exist because I have defined them as the 'greenest thing' and it is greener to exist than not to.

>science of course relying on the methods of logic.

Science relies on observation. Such observation has at times shown a world that does not conform with traditional notions of logic. It is the strength of science that it adapts to what is observed rather than attempting to squeeze the data into an accepted dogma.

>you seem to regard the meaning of time as being limited to physics

The OP asked about time in regard to cosmology which I believe is best dealt with by physics for reasons stated. If you mean by the 'meaning of time' how one experiences time, how it relates to human affairs, etc., then 'yes' other disciplines, from art to sociology, may have something to say.

A Universe From Nothing by Lawrence Krauss was written only a year ago. It has a great summary of all the exciting discoveries in cosmology from Einstein to recent understandings of dark energy. He even covers an interesting explanation as to "spoiler" how the universe could come from nothing.

If you like the video, I highly recommend you read the book as well. It's more comprehensive, and will blow your mind.

I highly recommend this book:

A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing

Just watched the video at didn't find anything out of the ordinary with it.
Mind you I am not an astronomer or anything, I just find this stuff very interesting, so I read a bunch of books on the subject. I've recently finished Lawrence Krauss' "A Universe From Nothing" and I heartily recommend it, though it's not a particularly easy read.

If you haven't already you should really watch Krauss' talk of the same name (which later resulted in the book). It's my favorite talk on anything ever.

Well there's a few layers to your question.

Traditional Big Bang cosmology doesn't call for "something to come from nothing". The whole "so there was nothing and it exploded" line is a misrepresentation of what the theory is all about. I've just written a really quick and simplified explanation of the Big Bang theory here.

Lately we've been exploring the nature of reality on a quantum scale. We're learning more and more each day about how the universe works on a really tiny scale. It turns out that the things that make the things that make atoms are so weird that even our best scientists have trouble understanding what is going on. We are encountering particles that seem to affect each other over a distance for no reason, particles that seem to behave differently depending on how you look at them and even, you guessed it, particles that flick in and out of existence in flagrant disregard for our regular world view.
I haven't read it myself but A Universe From Nothing by Lawrence Krauss (article) (book) (video) comes highly recommended.

I'm not sure what you mean by "how can they fight each other", do you mind restating the question?

Edit: Oh, and as far as 'Laws vs Universe' is concerned: 'Laws' aren't something that have a concrete existence. It's just a term we use to describe some aspects of the universe's behaviour which we think we understand well. There's no 'chicken / egg' dilemma, there's just the universe.

Theoretical physcist and atheist, Laurence Krauss, does claim just that in his newest book and research:
A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing

Empty space where there is no matter, will always create matter, through quantum mechanics.

And although we can disagree about his theories, he is a well-respected physicist who claims that "nothing created something", or at least could have.

You didn't even begin to answer the question. Thank you for posting though.

Read some physics, there's a great new book by Laurence Krauss.

http://www.amazon.ca/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X

There are some very good ideas out there about the question I think you're asking, but it's so poorly phrased that I'm really not sure. Reading books other than the bible is a good start though.

Just came to post this. His book will be out in a few months: http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X

Then, he is agreeing the universe can make itself. QED.

There is a book by physicist L Krauss on the subject. I imagine the physics is horrible.

http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X

Mine was A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing

http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1347556567&sr=8-1&keywords=lawrence+krauss

> I don't think one does at all. Also, i don't think the last part of what you said fits the first part; it would fit the obverse.

Huh? Every substrate is a system, so if every system needs a substrate, it really seems to me that you'd end up with infinite recursion.

> One of the leading cosmological theories is based on the recent destruction of any empirical paradigm of 'nothing' thanks to Krauss. It's the bubble-chain energy-spike emergent blackhole universe stuff (that I'm betting many people here have read about, though I can't name the guy who is credited with building the framework).

I've heard about it before, but I haven't had time to look into it. According to a summary of his book, Krauss explains how the universe came to existence via quantum gravity. The question is, though, why does quantum gravity exist?

Edit: whoops, you edited your post.

> Philosophically, it would be very hard (dare I say impossible) to even posit a credible hyperthetical metaphyscial structure that wasn't substrate: the moment you have an instance of thing, it is substrate imbued with properties by its parent 'physics' in whatever capacity the universe in question has them. For me, this is really a restsatement of a much purer derivative: "nothing" is the absolutely perfect equivalent of "no system". If there's a system, then there cannot be "nothing". In fact the moment one bounds something as "nothing" conceptually, you are implying a related comparator that negates the concept in the first place.

Well, I'm not saying I have a good alternative, I'm just saying that I don't think we know enough to know that there is no alternative to having a substrate.

>something had to come from something

well, we know this to be true, but we do not know if something can come from nothing. Look up Lawrence Krauss' "A universe from nothing"

>For example, if you believe in the big bang wouldn't have something had to start the big bang (God).

for the sake of argument, i'm going to assume that your god did start the big bang. What caused god?

>So what do you believe was that first push in the creation of whatever the first think in the creation of the universe?

the correct answer is we do not know. Science doesn't make up answers like religion and assert them to be true. Currently, we have no evidence about anything before the big bang or what caused it. Therefore we cannot assume anything at this point.

http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X Suggested reading for anyone interested.

If you're at all interested in this question, I HIGHLY recommend reading Lawrence Krauss's new book A Universe From Nothing. The answer to your question is a key to understanding the title question of the book. It's all explained clearly and is easy to read.

>(Larry Suskind's "A Universe From Nothing")

It's Laurance Krauss who wrote A Universe From Nothing

And I think you are thinking of Leonard Susskind, who is also a physicist and wrote The Black Hole War and The Cosmic Landscape

> The big bang could have happened without God.
>> how?

That's for another thread, which would probably be more suited to another subreddit like /r/AskScience. It suffices for this thread that it merely be shown to be possible, which I believe Lawrence Krauss argues well in his book, A Universe from Nothing. You can see Dr Krauss give a short lecture on his ideas in this lecture, from 2009. He provides a plausible mechanism and reasonable arguments in support of his ideas.

If you wish to claim that it is impossible for the universe to have come about by any means other than a deity, you must provide an argument in support of that claim.

Awe, and I was going to post this link. Nice work sir.

http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X

> Even if your globe trotting analogy is true, how did the cycle start?

If it's true (and I'm not saying it is; it's merely an illustrative example), the cycle truly doesn't have a start; if something similar happens at the end of the universe, it's a circle.

Again, causality is intimately connected to the arrow of time. If the arrow of time can be turned around in some circumstances, something can cause itself!

For a far more educated guess as to what's going on, Laurence Krauss' book A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing has another possible explanation.

This stuff is very far away from normal human experience, and requires a lot of math to understand. It does not make "intuitive" sense.

For a less drastic example, explosions and shock waves at supersonic speeds act very differently from the sort of violent impacts we're used to. (That's supersonic in the material of interest, which is considerably higher inside solid objects than air.) But military research now understands them very well and can design very effective shaped charges as well as supersonic-combustion ramjets.

Orbital mechanics is also confusing as hell until you have studied it for a while. "What do you mean I deccelerate in order to overtake the space station ahead?" But it has also been tested extensively and really works in the real world.

And quantum mechanics is the ultimate mind-bending math with very serious real-world practical usefulness. (Namely microelectronics!)

Human intellect can learn to understand these "unnatural" things, but only with a lot of skull sweat. It's just not going to make sense to someone who is trying to use analogies from their everyday 1-gravity low-speed macroscopic life.

This book explains how the universe can come from nothing. The author is a cosmologist. Here is a video of a lecture he gave explaining the main concepts.

Do! It's a very good talk. It even spawned an entire book.

Here's a really good book on the topic. One theory goes that Universes are popping up all the time like bubble bath under a faucet. We may never know for sure though.

http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X

I can not give you enough upvotes. I will also try to summarize the talk for those that are too lazy to watch the whole video.

Cosmologist are pretty sure that the right answer is the second one: energy came from nothing.

I'll try to explain it: we know that most of the mass of bodies does not come from quarks that form protons and neutrons, it comes from the empty space between them. We have theories that say that empty space is continuously bubbling with particles that pop in and out of existence, and experimental results confirm it. Actually, our best theory is accurate to 10 decimal places with experimental results, that is amazing.

So, what is the energy of vacuum space? Cosmologists calculated that and the answer was: energy of vacuum = 10^120 x mass of all the universe. That's scary, because if it were true, we wouldn't be here. So cosmologists knew that the answer was: the total mass of universe has to be zero (total mass is given by "normal" matter, energy and negative energy). And now we know that it is actually true: accurate measurements showed that our universe is flat, and that means that it was born from an exact balance of negative and positive energy. A flat universe is the only universe that can start from nothing, and our universe is indeed flat.

Dr. Krauss also wrote a wonderful book that I highly recommend: A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing.

Just posted this recomended reading/viewing list in another thread:

Universe from Nothing Video

Universe From Nothing Book (this is not released yet)

The Selfish Gene Book

How New Organs arise video

Why Evolution is true Video

Greatest show on Earth Book

"The Blank Slate", "Guns Germs and Steel" "Your Inner Fish" and "Journey of Man"

Of all these, the last three and "The Selfish Gene" are my faves. "The God delusion is a great book, but it's not as focussed on scientific revelations as these.

It's a fascinating universe, I envy you being able to explore it with freshly awakened curiosity.

> i'd love to hear what you've got, though.

Have you read "A Universe From Nothing" by Lawrence Krauss yet?

Krauss is a physicist from the University of Arizona who has become a bit of a rock star in atheist circles over the past few years. His book explores what our modern understanding of particle physics might tell us about the Big Bang.

http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X

EDIT: Sorry man, someone already recommended this below.

Lawrence Krauss has a new book about this subject. I know, a book is a little much but it's a pretty important question.

Here's the link:

http://www.amazon.com/Universe-Nothing-There-Something-Rather/dp/145162445X

Peace.