Richard Panek

This a highly readable history of the transformation of cosmology from metaphysics to physics, from philosophy and speculation to hard science, and in the process, the discovery of most of the universe.

Historically, astronomy and physics didn't have a great deal to do with each other. Astronomers studied the stars by observation, very patient and detailed observation and record-keeping. Theoretical physicists theorized and calculated, and experimental physicists experimented, and they fed show more each other's work, very occasionally coming up with something, most notably gravity, that made a real difference to astronomy. Then Einstein gave us general relativity, and began a century of ever-deeper entanglement of physics and astronomy, and the transformation of cosmology--the study of the nature and origins of the entire universe--from something utterly beyond the scope of physics into its core. The questions of how big the universe is, whether it is eternal in space and time or had a beginning and might have an end, became real questions.

Edwin Hubble, early in the century, discovered that the universe is expanding, but also that there are other galaxies beyond our own, and that they're all moving away from us. This was a major, exciting, and initially controversial change in our conception of the universe. In the 1960s, Vera Rubin, looking for a research project she could do within the constraints of raising two young children, studied other astronomers' observations and discovered that the galaxies were rotating as well as moving away from us. Also in the mid-1960s, Robert Dicke, Jim Peebles, and a small group of theoretical physicists had a prediction for which they had no supporting data: If the Big Bang theory of the history of the universe were correct, there should be low-level cosmic microwave radiation, at a temperature of about 3 degrees Kelvin. Then two astronomers at Bell Labs, Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson, had data for which they had no explanation: While trying to calibrate the Bell Labs' Crawford Hill antenna to study radio waves from the fringes of the Milky Way, they found they had a tiny background hiss which no amount of calibration would eliminate. They'd found the background cosmic radiation, echo of the Big Bang.

That's one small step along the way, from Einstein to the discovery that most of our universe is invisible. As the back and forth played out between the theoretical physicists and the experimental and observational scientists, increasingly astronomers, each theoretical question drew forth an observation, a find, a discovery that answered that question, and raised another. The most startling of these was the discovery that visible, directly detectable matter is just over 4% of the total make-up of a universe far larger and more complex than ever suspected at the start of the 20th century. If what we see were all there were, the galaxies would not be, could not be, relatively compact, stable spirals (or their other shapes), but should be torn apart by the speed of their rotation. Outside, among, around, the visible matter of the galaxies was dark matter.

Dark matter was soon joined by the even more mysterious dark energy.

The largest part of Panek's book is devoted to the research to detect and identify dark matter and dark energy, He takes us through not only the science, fascinating enough in itself, but also the human drama as two teams, one primarily physicists and the other primarily astronomers, raced against each other to gather enough observations of sufficiently distant (and therefore ancient) supernovae to answer essential questions about the conditions of the early universe. In the answers to those questions, and questions about changes since that early time, would lie the answers to the reality of dark energy, dark matter, and maybe the ultimate fate of the universe.

Highly recommended.

This book is not yet published but can be pre-ordered from Amazon or Barnes & Noble.

I received a free electronic galley of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. show less

I have an amateur’s interest in physics and astronomy. I once took a class (and still have the course book) called Physics for Poets. I’m ok but not brilliant at math, but love the abstract thinking, the scientific deduction and inference, of rigorous attempts to understand the world (at whatever scale). This is the kind of book that is written for someone like me – an understanding, or at least an ability to understand, some pretty complex theoretical concepts if explained well, and show more without too much math.

This book routinely blew my mind. Over and over I had to put it down, walk away, and think about what I had just been told. Some of it is the enormity of scale. Billions of galaxies, hundreds of millions of light-years apart, in an observable universe billions of years old. It’s hard, even for a poet, to get there, to not merely accept but really imagine it. And some of it is the enormity of the implications of these theories about the universe. The analogy Panek makes at the beginning of the book to Copernicus and Galileo is apt: the scientific revolution he describes changes not just what we understand, but our capacity to understand the universe in which we live. And that change is deceptively simple: we can’t see most of what’s out there. Not only can we not see it, we mostly don’t even know what kind of affects to look for. What is unknown, what is dark, is so much more than what is known.

Read the rest: http://alluringlyshort.com/2014/03/23/4-percent-universe-by-richard-panek/ show less

Had my math skills been just a little bit better, my understanding of the cosmos would not rest upon the great works of Douglas Adams, and Monty Python. The names of Oppenheimer, Fermi, Einstein, and Hubble would roll off my tongue as though I knew more about them than just the first two paragraphs of their Wikipedia pages.

Richard Panek’s 4 Percent Universe: Dark Matter, Dark Energy, and the Race to Discover the Rest of Reality certainly enlightens one’s understanding of the infinite show more neighborhood that is our universe, but the real fun is the soap opera surrounding the scientists themselves. Rivaling any episode of As the World Turns, the quantum psychology taking place between these men and women of science as they attempt to explain the laws of the universe, thus attaching their name to the very fabric of existence, is the gravity that held my attention.

In a time long, long ago, in a galaxy that really wasn’t far away at all, the world of cosmological greatness was within my grasp. Renowned Baylor School physics professor, Dr. George Taylor struggled valiantly for much of 1979 and part of 1980 to propel me into the gravitational pull of the science of physics. I don’t know when Dr. Taylor realized the mission would have to be aborted, but for me it was not until the very last day of class. Our comprehensive final exam was held at the laboratory known as “Six Flags Over Georgia”, and consisted of problems requiring the student to demonstrate their knowledge of the Newtonian laws regulating The Great American Scream Machine, or Riverview Carousel.

The bus ride home revealed that my day would have been just as fruitful if I had signed my name to the test, turned it in, and enjoyed the late spring day. Though my grade of 47 accurately measured my understanding of the discoveries of Galileo, Kepler, Einstein and the boys, it in no way captured the awe created in me by viewing the universe through the lens Dr. Taylor called “physics”.

Awe, inspired by Dr. Taylor’s passion for the forces at work in the cosmos, fortunately overpowered my limited understanding, and helped make 4 Percent Universe a fascinating read. Thanks Dr. Taylor! Oh yeah, you too Richard Panek. show less

Richard Panek skillfully helps the reader understand the state of the physics and psychology at the turn of the 20th century. His twin trajectories of the lives of Einstein and Freud help to shape a fun theory that both major discoveries were due to each researcher realizing that their perception of the universe had to change in order to more properly interpret the results they were seeing. A quick but startling read.