New Theories of Everything

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Author(s): John D. Barrow
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Date : 2008

I'm a big fan of Oxford's John Barrow.

As a scientist he's distinguished himself among weighty competition like Frank Tipler in formulating the cosmic anthropologic hypothesis (which deals with the question of why we find ourselves in a universe so conducive to our own existence).

As a science writer, he's also distinguished himself by taking weighty concepts like how the universe came to be and how far our science may ever be able to get in helping us understand where it and where it's going. His books Impossibility on the Science of Limits and the Limits of Science and the Constants of Nature occupy two of the most treasured spots on my bookshelf.

And in my opinion Barrow doesn't disappoint in either this book or its 1991 original version.

As observed by other reviewers Barrow endeavors to tell what is the continuing story of science's continuing quest to develop a theory of everything: a theory that explains the basic physical laws of the universe.

A fully formed theory of everything would take us back to the very moment of creation and explain the process by which the universe came to be the way that it is.

Along the way, understanding the way that the universe is has turned out to be a major challenge. That's because by dint of our occupancy on a rather mundane planet in a non significant solar system in what is an average galaxy doesn't exactly give us the best vantage point to view things they way they ultimately are.

For one thing, the very matter of which we are composed according to modern physics is but four percent of the existing mass of the universe. For another thing, even the advanced physics of Albert Einstein is failing to answer some basic questions like why outlying solar systems ours move so orbit the galaxy so quickly.

In other words, our efforts to give discription to the forces that govern our physical world at present seem to suffer from the major defect of not sufficiently understanding the phenomenon we are trying to describe.

As always, Barrow is thorough in his treatment. Yet, and I think fairly, his book reflects the pessimism with which he views the possibility that we will soon come up with a reasonable theory of everything...including even the much bally hooed discussion about string theory.

String theory is a mathematical model of the universe which says that there are eleven dimensions of physical reality (as opposed to the four we easily perceive). It's a mathematical bohemeth and for reasons alluded to by Peter Woit in The Problem with Physics among other recent volumes I think the theory suffers from some insurmountable problems.

Fortunately this Barrow volume gives a fair sense of the pros and cons and as always gives the reader an excellent ring side view of the academic dispute.

So for these reasons and more I highly recommend this book or for that matter pretty much any book by Barrow. He's a great scientist and a great writer.

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