Reddit mentions of The Fabric of the Cosmos: Space, Time, and the Texture of Reality

I recommend reading the book; The Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene, numerous people have reported that they don't feel depressed or (as depressed/anxious) after reading it.

Here's a link to buy it on amazon

https://www.amazon.com/Fabric-Cosmos-Space-Texture-Reality/dp/0375727205/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1502668682&sr=8-1&keywords=fabric+of+the+cosmos

Sagan and Tyson aren't even in the same league. Sagan's Cosmos is much better, scientifically, educationally, and from an entertainment perspective.

However, if you're interested in cosmology specifically, neither series will get you very far. They cover a range of topics, some of which are prerequisites for cosmology (like relativity), others which aren't really cosmology (e.g. astronomy, astrophysics, other kinds of physics.)

Some books that are good for an accessible introduction to issues in cosmology are:

• The First Three Minutes
  
• The Fabric of the Cosmos
  
• A Brief History of Time
  

This question gets asked all the time on this sub. I did a search for the term books and compiled this list from the dozens of previous answers:

How to Read the Solar System: A Guide to the Stars and Planets by Christ North and Paul Abel.


A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson.


A Universe from Nothing: Why There is Something Rather than Nothing by Lawrence Krauss.


Cosmos by Carl Sagan.

Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space by Carl Sagan.


Foundations of Astrophysics by Barbara Ryden and Bradley Peterson.


Final Countdown: NASA and the End of the Space Shuttle Program by Pat Duggins.


An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth: What Going to Space Taught Me About Ingenuity, Determination, and Being Prepared for Anything by Chris Hadfield.


You Are Here: Around the World in 92 Minutes: Photographs from the International Space Station by Chris Hadfield.


Space Shuttle: The History of Developing the Space Transportation System by Dennis Jenkins.


Wings in Orbit: Scientific and Engineering Legacies of the Space Shuttle, 1971-2010 by Chapline, Hale, Lane, and Lula.


No Downlink: A Dramatic Narrative About the Challenger Accident and Our Time by Claus Jensen.


Voices from the Moon: Apollo Astronauts Describe Their Lunar Experiences by Andrew Chaikin.


A Man on the Moon: The Voyages of the Apollo Astronauts by Andrew Chaikin.


Breaking the Chains of Gravity: The Story of Spaceflight before NASA by Amy Teitel.


Moon Lander: How We Developed the Apollo Lunar Module by Thomas Kelly.


The Scientific Exploration of Venus by Fredric Taylor.


The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe.


Into the Black: The Extraordinary Untold Story of the First Flight of the Space Shuttle Columbia and the Astronauts Who Flew Her by Rowland White and Richard Truly.


An Introduction to Modern Astrophysics by Bradley Carroll and Dale Ostlie.


Rockets, Missiles, and Men in Space by Willy Ley.


Ignition!: An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants by John Clark.


A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking.


Russia in Space by Anatoly Zak.


Rain Of Iron And Ice: The Very Real Threat Of Comet And Asteroid Bombardment by John Lewis.


Mining the Sky: Untold Riches From The Asteroids, Comets, And Planets by John Lewis.


Asteroid Mining: Wealth for the New Space Economy by John Lewis.


Coming of Age in the Milky Way by Timothy Ferris.


The Whole Shebang: A State of the Universe Report by Timothy Ferris.


Death by Black Hole: And Other Cosmic Quandries by Neil deGrasse Tyson.


Origins: Fourteen Billion Years of Cosmic Evolution by Neil deGrasse Tyson.


Rocket Men: The Epic Story of the First Men on the Moon by Craig Nelson.


The Martian by Andy Weir.


Packing for Mars:The Curious Science of Life in the Void by Mary Roach.


The Overview Effect: Space Exploration and Human Evolution by Frank White.


Gravitation by Misner, Thorne, and Wheeler.


The Science of Interstellar by Kip Thorne.


Entering Space: An Astronaut’s Oddyssey by Joseph Allen.


International Reference Guide to Space Launch Systems by Hopkins, Hopkins, and Isakowitz.


The Fabric of the Cosmos: Space, Time, and the Texture of Reality by Brian Greene.


How the Universe Got Its Spots: Diary of a Finite Time in a Finite Space by Janna Levin.


This New Ocean: The Story of the First Space Age by William Burrows.


The Last Man on the Moon by Eugene Cernan.


Failure is Not an Option: Mission Control from Mercury to Apollo 13 and Beyond by Eugene Cernan.


Apollo 13 by Jim Lovell and Jeffrey Kluger.


The end

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!

I like pretty much anything Brian Greene writes. He's a layman's physicist, and is very good at explaining exactly what you are asking for. Try The Fabric of the Cosmos. In fact, I think there was a PBS Nova series of the same name that he hosted.

Some of my favorites:

Brian Greene -- The Fabric of the Cosmos, The Elegant Universe, and The Hidden Reality. Greene is, to my mind, very similar to Hawking in his ability to take complex subjects and make them understandable for the physics layman.

Hawking -- I see you've read A Brief History of Time, but Hawking has a couple of other books that are great. The Grand Design, The Universe in a Nutshell, and A Briefer History of Time.

Same thing applies to Brian Cox. Here's his Amazon page.

Leonard Susskind -- The Black Hole Wars. Here's the basic idea behind this book. One of the basic tenets of physics is that "information" is never lost. Stephen Hawking delivered a presentation that apparently showed that when matter falls into a black hole, information is lost. This set the physics world on edge. Susskind (and his partner Gerard T'Hooft) set out to prove Hawking wrong. Spoilers: they do so. And in doing so, they apparently proved that what we see as 3 dimensions is probably similar to those 2-D stickers that project a hologram. It's called the Holographic Principle.

Lee Smolin -- The Trouble with Physics. If you read the aforementioned books and/or keep up with physics through pop science sources, you'll probably recognize that string theory is pretty dang popular. Smolin's book is a criticism of string theory. He's also got a book that's on my to-read list called Three Roads to Quantum Gravity.

Joao Magueijo -- Faster Than the Speed of Light. This is another physics book that cuts against the prevailing academic grain. Physics says that the speed of light is a universal speed limit. Nothing can travel faster than the speed of light. Magueijo's book is about his theory that the speed of light is, itself, variable, and it's been different speeds at different times in the universe's history. You may not end up agreeing with Magueijo, but the guy is smart, he's cocky, and he writes well.

>how does the heat death of the universe cycle into a big bang again?

All right, I will take a crack at explaining this. In the heat death of the universe there is no matter present (because eventually it will all decay). This leaves us in the same state we (presumably) were before the big bang, this opens up the possibility of another one happening. In fact there are some who speculate that the big bang was not a special event, but instead a common event that may even happen now that matter is in the unverse. The special thing about our big bang is [inflation](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation_(cosmology) "Sorry there isn't a simple.wiki on this subject, it is a pretty dense topic"). Inflation is pretty hard to wrap our heads around so if you want to know more you might try reading The Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene.

>And would we not have any background radiation from previous big bangs?

Heat death denotes that all matter and energy have decayed so no we would not.

There are of course even modern physicists who have proposed alternatives to the big bang but most of them require quite a few more assumptions about how the universe works so I would not put my money on them.

The claim that "time is exactly like space" is not true. Time is treated as a dimension in Special Relativity (SR) and General Relativity (GR), but it is very different from the "usual" spatial dimensions. (It boils down to "distance" along the time direction being negative, but that statement doesn't really mean anything out of context.) The central idea of relativity is that while the entire four dimensional "thing" (spacetime) just is (is invariant), different observers will have different ideas about which way the time direction points; it turns out to be convenient for our description of nature to respect the natural "democratic" equivalence of all hypothetical observers.

I can point you to a couple of good resources:

This
is a very good, book about SR, and some "other stuff". It's pretty mathematical, and I wouldn't recommend it to someone who isn't totally comfortable with college level intro physics and calculus.

This
is the "standard" text for undergraduate SR; it's less demanding than the above, but uses mathematical language that won't translate immediately if you go on to study GR. (I have not read this myself.)

This is the book that I learned from; I thought it was pretty good.

This is Brian Greene's famous popularization of String Theory. It has chapters in the beginning on SR and Quantum Mechanics that I think are quite good.

This is Einstein's own popularization, only algebra required. All the examples that others use to explain SR pretty much come from here, and sometimes it's good to go right to the source.

This is a collection of the most important works leading up to and including relativity, from Galileo to Einstein, in case you'd like to take a look at the original paper (translated). The SR paper requires more of a conceptual physical background than a mathematical one; the same can't be said of the included GR paper.

I don't know what your background is--the first three options above are textbooks, and that's probably much more than you were hoping to get into. The last three are not; the book by Brian Greene and the collection (edited by Stephen Hawking) are interesting for other reasons besides relativity as well. For SR, though, another book by Greene might be a bit better: this.

Greene's The Fabric of the Cosmos is also really quite good for General Relativity. Even if I personally don't find the appeal in string theory.

Here you go: Brian Greene's The Fabric of the Cosmos

If you think you can read an undergraduate textbook Ryden is a standard.

However, if you think that may be too advanced, start with some popular books on the subject such and The Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene, Parallel Worlds by Michio Kaku or the classic by Hawking A Brief History of Time.

If after reading those you want something more advanced but still not a textbook try The Road to Reality by Penrose. It reads like a popular book but he actually works through math (and the real stuff with like tensors etc...) to make his points so it is more advanced. Also, the Dummies Books are also a more intermediate step and are often decently good at teaching the basics on a lower technical level than a textbook.

Eh, he should have said that their is a negligible, however non-zero, probability that one of the electrons in his body is elsewhere.

Uncertainty Principle

Try this book like this for the information to be distilled in a more understandable fashion.

> Those analogies do not correspond to any actual scientific concepts.

Those analogies does correspond to actual scientific theories. Read this book

http://www.amazon.com/The-Fabric-Cosmos-Texture-Reality/dp/0375727205

and watch this

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/physics/fabric-of-cosmos.html

That series does the best job of explaining it to non-scientists.

Brian Greene is a pretty well known name in the world of Physics

You might like The Fabric of the Cosmos. Greene is a string theorist but this covers a lot of quantum mechanics and various modern physics ideas in a fairly easy to read manor for the layman.

Audio Books are your friend, like seriously pick up something to listen to.

Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! (Adventures of a Curious Character) by Richard P. Feynman


The Pleasure of Finding Things Out: The Best Short Works of Richard P. Feynman

"What Do You Care What Other People Think?": Further Adventures of a Curious Character


The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory by Brian Greene


The Fabric of the Cosmos: Space, Time, and the Texture of Reality by Brian Greene


The Hidden Reality: Parallel Universes and the Deep Laws of the Cosmos by Brian Greene


Physics of the Impossible: A Scientific Exploration by Michio Kaku

Einstein's Cosmos: How Albert Einstein's Vision Transformed Our Understanding of Space and Time: Great Discoveries by Michio Kaku


The Black Hole War: My Battle with Stephen Hawking to Make the World Safe for Quantum Mechanics by Leonard Susskind (This one I recommend on the highest degree, personally I have read it 3 times)


A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking

The Theory of Everything: The Origin and Fate of the Universe by Stephen W. Hawking


Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space by Carl Sagan


Contact by Carl Sagan


Billions & Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millennium by Carl Sagan

All these books I've listened to or read, and I recommend all of them some more then others, I have tons more about Quantum Mechanics, Physics, Biology, Cosmology, Astronomy, Math etc. But I'm to lazy to list all of them here.

I actually see a lot of parallels between your situation and where I found myself at your age. It was 14 or 15 that I really developed an interest in science, because before that I hadn't really been properly exposed before that. Fast forward 6 or 7 years, I'm now a third year university student studying physics and I love it; I'll be applying to PhD programs next fall.

Like you, astronomy (by which I broadly mean astronomy, astrophysics, cosmology, etc.) was what really caught my attention. In school, I liked all the sciences and had always been good at math (calculus was by far one of my favorite high school courses because the science can be pretty watered down).

If you're interested in learning more about astrophysics, I would recommend any one of a number of books. The first book on the topic that I read was Simon Singh's Big Bang; I read a couple Brian Greene books, namely The Elegant Universe and Fabric of the Cosmos; I read Roger Penrose's Cycles of Time, and finally Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything. Also, I bought a book by Hawking and one by Michio Kaku that, to this day, sit on a shelf at my parents' house unread. I would recommend Singh's book as a nice book that should be at your level, and in fact it was the one recommended to me by some professors who I bugged with questions about the universe when I was around your age. Also, Bryson's book is a good survey look at a lot of different scientific topics, not just astrophysics/cosmology specific; I enjoyed it quite a lot.

As far as reaching out to people, I would recommend trying to connect with some scientists via email. That's what I did, and they were more responsive than I expected (realize that some of the people will simply not respond, probably because your email will get buried in their inbox, not out of any ill-will towards you).

At this point, I'll just stop writing because you've more than likely stopped reading, but if you are still reading this, I'd be more than happy to talk with you about science, what parts interest(ed) me, etc.

Physics is very cool and awe-inspiring - I’ve always had a big interest in it as well! Since people have already supplied you with some answers to your question, I thought I’d give you a book suggestion: Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene https://www.amazon.com/Fabric-Cosmos-Space-Texture-Reality/dp/0375727205/ref=asc_df_0375727205/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=266033622375&hvpos=1o2&hvnetw=g&hvrand=2170571332209706386&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=m&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9019289&hvtargid=pla-436179468378&psc=1. This book changed the way I look at the world. Brian Greene does an incredible job at explaining complex topics in an understandable and exciting way (not like a textbook - actually feels like you are reading a story). And there is even pretty extensive notes if you want to take a deeper dive. His TED Talks are great as well - and so are his other books!

The Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene. http://www.amazon.com/Fabric-Cosmos-Space-Texture-Reality/dp/0375727205/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpi_2

Woo!

> Thank you for the attempt at clarification. I am afraid that I still do not understand - it makes more scientific sense to claim that something came from nothing?

This is a common misunderstanding of what the Big Bang is referring to.

The Big Bang is not an event 13.7 billion years ago that created the universe. The Big Bang is the currently happening expansion and evolution of the universe. It is an event that happened after time=0. The Big Bang is not an explosion into spacetime. It is an explosion OF spacetime.

When atheists say things like 'Time didn't exist before the Big Bang, so it's nonsense to ask what happened before the Big Bang' they are not being facetious or evasive.

It really is like asking 'What's north of the North Pole?' If you are standing on the North pole, there is no direction you can face that can be described as being 'north' of your position. Even looking straight up or straight down are not 'north' of your position.

There is no 'before' the Big Bang, because time starts with the Big Bang.

What happened at time=0? "We don't know, and it is possible we CAN NEVER know." In fact, it is possible that the question is meaningless.

What I do know though, is that saying 'God did it' doesn't answer the question, and prevents exploration that may answer the question.

> Matter has always existed a priori, which therefore allowed the chemical reaction of the Big Bang.

The Big Bang was not a chemical reaction. I hope by my brief explanation above you get that now.

> Matter came as a result of the "Big Bang," but we do not know what caused the "Big Bang" in terms of quantifiable, physical evidence. All that is offered is conjecture.

Essentially correct. However, the conjecture has a grounding and does not violate ANY of the known laws of the universe. I HIGHLY recommend watching the lecture by Laurence Krauss, "A Universe From Nothing".

Now, as for how matter came to be, we actually have very good explanations, based on particle accelerator experiments. Very early, the universe was so hot and dense that there was no matter, just a lot of heat and energy. As the universe expanded, it cooled. Once it cooled enough, the energy was able to bundle into discrete particles, when then combined into mostly hydrogen atoms, with a little helium thrown in for variety. The rest of everything in the universe came about by nuclear fusion within the heart of stars. We are literally made from the dust of the stars.

I highly recommend The Fabric of the Cosmos, by Brian Greene and Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe by Simon Singh as a good introduction to the science of cosmology.

> The problem is that if we do not apply the attribute of eternity to God, then we will find ourselves citing an infinite regression of "God X created God Y, who was created by God Z." But, again, I simply point back to the acceptance of either the Big Bang or matter always existing - scientists do not know with absolute certainty, but still make the claim.

Exactly the same issue here on the other side: you believe, but do not KNOW (remember what I said about semantics mattering sometimes?) that God is in fact eternal. You MUST assert the eternal nature of God for precisely the reason you presented; to end the infinite regress. However, you haven't answered the question, you have made an assertion, based on belief, not knowledge.

> Both atheist materialists and Christians have to accept something a priori to defend a premise and a conclusion. First and foremost, of course, is the premise that we really exist. Second is that we can come to know something. Third would be that reality as we see it is real.

Totally agree. And philosophy is useful for thinking about these premises. However, no matter what you think about the situation, if we do not accept these three premises, we can't accomplish much.

First, you have to assume you exist. Trying to operate while assuming anything contrary to that is meaningless. You literally cannot do it. Part of the nature of consciousness is the implied fact that you exist, for without that implication, you would not be conscious. Sure, it's a tautology, but there you go.

Second, obviously we can come to know things, because otherwise we would be a brain in a vat, cut off from all sensory perception. Since we have sensory perception, we have information flowing into our consciousness. If nothing else, we come to know that sensory input. The question becomes how trust worthy is it? Since it is fairly obvious to anyone who has seen an optical illusion that our senses can be tricked, we have developed the scientific method to test our sensory perception.

And that's where we hit the third premise. Science allows us the best way yet found to determine if what we know does in fact reflect the nature of reality. How do we know science is the best way we have found? Because SCIENCE WORKS BITCHES!!! Yes, I am invoking utilitarianism.

> And yet we hold to abstract ideas of non-provable ideals. The human race (in general) holds to concepts of "morality" and "truth" and "goodness" and "badness", but we cannot test or defend those ideas with physical, repeatable, empirical evidence.

Correct. I agree 100%. Science cannot tell us what is good, right, wrong, moral, immoral, bad, evil, etc. Science can only tell us what is. The value judgments are left up to us.

Now, science CAN (and in fact is beginning to) tell us where and how these 'moral ideals' we have came from/developed.

As an atheist, if you follow the the concept to it's logical end, you come to the realization that there is no such thing as objective morality. All morality is subjective. The best I have ever heard it stated:

The difference between good and evil is EXACTLY the difference between the lion and the gazelle.

I don't see a collision between science and philosophy. Generally what I see is a failure to understand how best to integrate the two disciplines.

I love science books. These are all on my bookshelf/around my apt. They aren't all chemistry, but they appeal to my science senses:

I got a coffee table book once as a gift. It's Theodore Gray's The Elements. It's beautiful, but like I said, more of a coffee table book. It's got a ton of very cool info about each atom though.

I tried The Immortal Life of Henrieta Lacks, which is all about the people and family behind HeLa cells. That was a big hit, but I didn't care for it.

I liked The Emperor of all Maladies which took a long time to read, but was super cool. It's essentially a biography of cancer. (Actually I think that's it's subtitle)

The Wizard of Quarks and Alice in Quantumland are both super cute allegories relating to partical physics and quantum physics respectively. I liked them both, though they felt low-level, tying them to high-level physics resulted in a fun read.

Unscientific America I bought on a whim and didn't really enjoy since it wasn't science enough.

The Ghost Map was a suuuper fun read about Cholera. I love reading about mass-epidemics and plague.

The Bell that Rings Light, In Search of Schrödinger's Cat, Schrödinger's Kittens, The Fabric of the Cosmos and Beyond the God Particle are all pleasure reading books that are really primers on Quantum.

I also tend to like anything by Mary Roach, which isn't necessarily chemistry or science, but is amusing and feels informative. I started with Stiff but she has a few others that I also enjoyed.

Have fun!

> So, when we look at Andromeda through an ultra-mega-super powerful telescope - we are seeing something that is 3.5 billion years "old"?

Well, 2 million years old. That's how far away it is.

But the galaxy itself (not it's light) will collide with the milky way in 3.5 billion years. Sorry for combining those two facts in a confusing way.

But there are PLENTY of galaxies we can see today that are many billions of light years away. Which means what we see of them is how they were many billions of years ago, which is crazy.

I'm not really sure what I could recommend. I've been poking around and reading about space for a while just reading stuff I come across. If you aren't watching it I'd recommend the TV series Cosmos running right now with Neil Degrasse Tyson. I also really liked a couple books by Brian Greene (here's a link to one, and another.). The first one I really liked and it helped me to get a grasp on some things that always confused me.

Also, as a mod of ELI5 I'm not afraid to say ELI5 is an awesome source, and most any topic you can think about has been covered in depth here. Just type keywords into the search box and go to town. If there's something you can't find a great explanation for, post and ask and you'll get some great responses. /r/askscience is also great, although they are more sticklers for citation and aren't always as focused on layman explanations as ELI5.

I can here to recommend The Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene.

Pretty much everything that passes by. I love learning new things and expand my knowledge, but here are my biggest passions:

-Music: I'm studying to become a composer and music has been a major part of my life since birth, as I was born into a musical family. It's such a joy when I find a new band or composer and start going through their works and discover many new, exciting works. It's even better when you analyse scores and play then on piano, and everything starts to make sense, the melodies, harmonic structure,... sometimes it gives you the same feeling as when you open your christmas present, except you have been given an insight into a mind of a musical genius from the past.

-Lore: A lot of times I pick up a new game/book/TV series/movie, if I really like it, I go and read as much background lore as possible. The extra information and insight behind the main plot is really interesting to read and I tend to memorize unhealthy amounts of useless information :) So far it spans through Star Wars, Jurassic Park, Harry Potter, Warhammer 40k, Elder Scrolls, and probably a few more I forgot.

-History: It's real life lore :) Big emphasis on Roman empire/Viking culture/WW2.

-Philosophy: Basically discussing everything ranging from old philosophical problems to problems and dilemmas of the today's world.

-Physics: I love reading about space, black holes, wave-particle duality, electricity,... The more experimental it is, the better. I highly recommend this book.

-Motorsports: Rally and F1 mostly, but I love to drive and I am always blown away by the skills these drivers have. Also, the tech behind the cars is amazing and very interesting.

But the best part is if I can explain the above things to somebody else. It's really one of my favorite things to do. I really like to share my enthusiasm with other people and I can go on for hours at the time :)

I teach "Monsters Are Due on Maple Street" every year. My students love it!

This is on the list I keep for my husband. He is kind of a nerd :-)

The Elegant Universe, The Fabric of the Cosmos

Also, The Age of Spiritual Machines discusses theoretical and quantum physics. I'm not saying its the book to read to learn physics but thats what originally got me interested.

Well, one of the books I read that really got me started in cosmology and physics is Brian Greene's The Fabric of the Cosmos. I think it is his best book and talks a lot about the fundamentals of our universe. Brian Greene studies string theory and those bits are interesting, but just know that the theory is far from complete or proven. This one is definitely the most physics heavy suggestion.

Another book that I really enjoy is A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. It is essentially a history of science, and he covers a lot of topics. Many of which I knew almost nothing about when I read it. It puts into perspective how all the things we know came to be.

The next two recommendations are not books, but they still have a lot of great information in them. This first is a Youtube series called Crash Course Astronomy. The host is Phil Plait, one of the programmers involved with the Hubble Space Telescope. There are a lot of videos, so it would keep you busy and learning for a while.

The last recommendation is as close to the upper level undergraduate astronomy courses that I have taken without actually doing any math. It is a bunch of class lectures from Ohio State University that were recorded and released as a podcast about stellar astronomy and planetary astronomy. I found the lecturer's voice a little whiny at first, but I soon got past that because the content was so good. I kid you not, I listened to this ahead of my ASTRO 346 Stellar Astronomy class at my university, and I felt like the class concepts were almost a review.

All of those recommendations require you to do no math, but you only get a glimpse of the concepts that way. If you want to dive in more, you'll need to take a class or read a textbook on your own.

I hope that helps. Let me know if you have any other questions about astronomy as a subject or as a course of study in school :)

In a different vein, I heard that there is a popular science nonfiction Chinese book, called "The Physics of the Three Body Problem Universe,"

I was keen to order it but realized that I probably can't understand it.

But there are several excellent pop-sci books on String Theory, Big Bang that I would have considered abstract, obtuse prior to reading Three Body Problem,

https://www.amazon.com/Elegant-Universe-Superstrings-Dimensions-Ultimate/dp/039333810X/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1486145503&sr=1-6&keywords=Physics

https://www.amazon.com/Fabric-Cosmos-Space-Texture-Reality/dp/0375727205/ref=pd_sim_14_1?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=4FS9WM0HGP79QXBRHDBS

https://www.amazon.com/Brief-History-Time-Stephen-Hawking/dp/0553380168/ref=pd_sim_14_3?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=1MQ7BXTSH2NJK5E0E02Y

the fabric of the cosmos by brian greene.

https://imgur.com/a/YDnnlXI

this is the book that got me into the subject when i was a kid. it builds understanding with terms that are understandable and then builds from there.


https://www.amazon.com/Fabric-Cosmos-Space-Texture-Reality/dp/0375727205

and dont worry, if i opened a paper from anything other than my own specific niche id be just as lost!


.... that said, i dont have a better answer than a five hundred page book. its not a simple topic!

You should read The Fabric of the Cosmos: Space, Time, and the Texture of Reality by Brian Greene, he covers many of the major concepts in physics and string theory in an accessible manner.

For Quantum Physics I cannot recommend Quantum Physics: A Beginner's Guide it has enough maths to make it worth reading, but the equations etc. are in supplemental boxes with explanations and investigations so you can ignore all the maths if you want. It tends to focus on the applications of quantum physics in semiconductors, superconductors which is good to learn about as it is easier to comprehend than the really tricky philosophical implications.

I would also recommend The Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene, because it has more philosophical stuff in it, and although it is broader and not just about quantum physics but includes relativity and stuff too, it is an awesome book and you won't regret reading it.

For evolutionary biology I would recommend The Blind Watchmaker by Richard Dawkins, it is a Science book so don't worry if you don't like his aggressive atheism as if I recall correctly it doesn't rear it's head in the book at all. It is especially good if you enjoy Computer Science as he makes some analogies between life and programs which are obviously easier to appreciate if you have some experience (Dawkins was a programmer for many years).

I don't know what paleo-anthropology is so unfortunately I can't recommend anything there, but I would be extremely happy if you could enlighten me and perhaps recommend some texts. (Not terribly helpful, I know :P )

Fair enough. Didn't know that this was where you were coming from.

No, I haven't read Barrow. But pretty much any popularization of physics recently seems to make this very point. From Brian Greene to Lee Smolin seems to make this point.

I think we were both missing what the other was saying. I agree with your point on why, apologies for the bluntness. I didn't fully see your Devil's Advocate position until now. So I guess we agree to agree?

This one

Edit: Also these:
First
Second

Anything by Brian Greene. His books are aimed at laypeople, and he explains the ideas behind quantum mechanics, relativity and string theory without any mathematics whatsoever.

I would recommend you start with The Elegant Universe and then The Fabric of the Cosmos. These books are easier to follow than Brief History of Time, and explain all of the interesting aspects of physics such as time dilation, warping of space, particles being waves, etc.

'Fabric of the Cosmos' by Brian Greene