Synopsis: How could a single “genesis event” create billions of galaxies, black holes, stars and planets? The nature of our universe is remarkably sensitive to just six numbers, constant values that describe and define everything from the way atoms are held together to the amount of matter in our universe. If any of these values was “untuned,” there would be no stars and life as we know it in our current universe. This realization offers a radically new perspective on our place in the universe, and on the deep forces that shape, quite simply, everything.
About the book author: Martin Rees is a famous astrophysicist and cosmologist from England. He is currently Professor of Cosmology and Astrophysics at Cambridge University; he is also the President of the Royal Society in England. The book is published by Basic Books in 2000.
Book Review
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Tale of Two Cultures and Two Countries – Part I
During the winter of early 1956, a group of members from the El Dorado County Federal Church (a Methodist church) visited our house in Placerville, California to welcome our family as recent immigrants to the U.S. and new attendees of their church. The outside temperature was in the 20’s or 30’s. The inside temperature was in the low 50’s, because we did not have a furnace in our house at that time and the house was poorly insulated. Not being accustomed to such a cold house, our church visitors stayed for only a few minutes. This article recollects selected incidents from a life involving two cultures and two countries.
How did our family end up in Placerville, California, a small town between Sacramento and Lake Tahoe with a population of about 3,000? Placerville was formerly known as Hangtown because it was so lawless during the gold rush days of the 19th century that lawbreakers were first hanged singly and then in pairs. In the center of town today, there is still a replica of the hanging tree. If it weren’t for my father continuing to exchange Christmas cards with his former dormitory roommate at Brown University, we would have settled in Providence, Rhode Island when we immigrated from Hong Kong to the U.S. in October 1955.
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