Known Universe: Astronomy Books To Go With The Natural History Museum's Hot Video (PHOTOS, POLL, VIDEO)

"The Known Universe" is becoming a YouTube hot video--we loved it and we love books on astronomy and cosmology. Let us know what you think of the video and other books you'd recommend.

"Universe: The Definitive Visual Guide" (DK)

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Comments

[mammon55]

12:40 PM on 12/29/2009

Has anyone read the book postulating "Sentient-centric" explanation for the universe.
something to the effect that without a actual "being" to make an observation our universe would not exsist using quantum flux as the prime example for this reasoning.

i just wanted to know if it was B.S.
it sounded interesting on the book "overview "
i just wanted to know if it was worth the read?

[ResearchGuy]

01:31 PM on 12/29/2009

Dunno what "quantum flux" is, but it seems pretty clear that of all the conceivable alternative universes, we know (and can know) only of the one that enabled us to be in it. All else is speculation.

[mammon55]

02:08 PM on 12/29/2009

im sorry i mean to say partical duality

[Erzsebet Gilbert]

10:51 AM on 12/29/2009

Brian Greene's works are excellent - also, the cosmologist Lee Smolin puts forth some fascinating postulates - I would also recommend "The Whole Shebang" by Timothy Ferris, or the numerous articles by Max Tegmark of MIT, most of which are available online.

[mammon55]

12:43 PM on 12/29/2009

yes brian green is a very good author and i also love his take on the univers through the eyes of the Simpson family

lol

[totalliberal]

10:31 AM on 12/29/2009

Odd how the religio's just don't get it. I guess it's easier to read the 'one' book.

(Or have it read for you.)

[Dukedraven]

01:36 AM on 12/29/2009

Nice reading list.

[celeritas]

01:01 AM on 12/29/2009

I have 2 great fears:

1) That within my lifetime I will realize that we are the only self aware intelligent life in the universe.

and/or

2) That in about 14.5 billion years we are the best self-aware conscious product the universe can produce.

[Kaila]

07:34 AM on 12/29/2009

I think if we are the only intelligent life in the universe, we're doing just fine. We still have some evolving to do but I think it's a little arrogant to proclaim us all pathetic.

[Hoelder]

08:59 AM on 12/29/2009

I have another fear. That in 14.5 Billion years we are still thinking of ourselves as an intelligent species.

[mammon55]

12:48 PM on 12/29/2009

thats what killed aristotle
he only knew that he knew nothing compared to the god's
pheobus tricked him at the oracle

[mammon55]

12:50 PM on 12/29/2009

gods*

[systemist]

12:17 AM on 12/29/2009

I feel very small.

[hoocheekoo]

11:01 AM on 12/29/2009

Me too.

[GoogleMaster]

10:48 PM on 12/28/2009

I'm all but certain that this little glob of energy and mass that we call "our universe" is but an infinitesimally small, microscopic blob floating in a sea of similarly diminutive so called "universes" where each blob is separated from the next blob by trillions upon trillions of light centuries.

"To infinity and beyond" - Buzz Lightyear

[AtheistUS]

11:53 PM on 12/28/2009

You extrapolate naive views to scale and time that are not just dramatically different, but most probably do not exist as the notions that we know.

[GoogleMaster]

12:01 AM on 12/29/2009

Oops. Sorry .. forget the other infinitesimally small, microscopic blobs. It's just us .. surrounded by infinity.

"Almost to infinity and beyond" - Buzz Lightyear

[Erzsebet Gilbert]

10:50 AM on 12/29/2009

But one of the most enchanting aspects of our consciousness is simply the ability to imagine so many possible realities, and the possibility of realities beyond our comprehension... intrinsic to the scientific hypothesis (along with its vital search for logical, mathematical, or empirical verification) is the ability to dream...

[Skifonzo]

10:40 PM on 12/28/2009

This is a great vid to go with the book I am reading, "The View From The Center of the Universe" by Primack and Abrams. A must read for anyone interested in present day cosmology and how we are the universe.

[BlazeKING]

08:47 PM on 12/28/2009

Eh thats ok, I'll still with the Cosmos series by the great Carl Sagan.

[MorpheusXNYC]

07:19 PM on 12/28/2009

For all you religious people thinking about giving credit to "God" for all that wondrous creation, suddenly, the concept of a god that focused his attention on just one tiny planet within that vast infinite expanse of existence and felt it necessary to create an endless micromanaging list of senseless and contradictory rules regarding our sexual and dietary habits plus a plan to come back later so that some us us will be in heaven and the rest of us will live forever on that one, tiny little overcrowded planet seems downright implausible, doesn't it?

[JustAThought56]

07:40 PM on 12/28/2009

Only to those who have a shred of sanity. Without that, this is just one more minor anomaly easily explained.

[wmholt]

01:18 AM on 12/29/2009

Just to let you know, the magnificence of the cosmos doesn't make me feel insignificant in the sense of being unimportant to God. Seeing myself as small and insignificant somehow makes my troubles seem small as well, and I spend as much time studying the stars and cosmology as possible.

I am not a "religious person", just a believer who is in awe of the Universe, a feeling I can trace back to the time of the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo missions. I still marvel that we could put a man on the moon with computers that had such minuscule memory.

[totalliberal]

10:37 AM on 12/29/2009

Why? We mapped the earth using a pen and paper. There 'was' a world before electronics.

[Erzsebet Gilbert]

11:01 AM on 12/29/2009

I simply want to tell you how much I appreciate your sense of wonder - I feel that this awe is increasingly rare in so many people, but I share that deep astonishment, too! Fanned you!

[Dave24]

06:05 PM on 12/28/2009

Feynman, Gell-Mann, Rees, Bohm, Deutsch, Randall, Sagan, Weinberg, and Lightman are a must.

[celeritas]

01:06 AM on 12/29/2009

In this world, one man's quantum-jump is every man's quantum-field...

[TJCole]

05:46 PM on 12/28/2009

The History Channel Series, The Universe is one of the best things on TV there's been several seasons of it...

I'm descended from a very early family with astronomers in it more than one, hundreds of years ago.. and there's two Galaxies named for us...discovered recently by another descendant...of the same family...

If we just realized how small and temporary and insignificant we are in the totality of all there is...maybe we'd just live a bit differently and appreciate how precious all life and every day is...

[ogbushiban]

06:36 PM on 12/28/2009

I totally agree with you on "The Universe" showing on the history channel. I've been buying all the episodes on Itunes. Seriously one of the best series on television.

[mammon55]

12:45 PM on 12/29/2009

u should check it out on HD if you can

[celeritas]

01:14 AM on 12/29/2009

What a beautiful history. Mine goes back 10 generations, but nothing as rich as yours.

Why, do you suppose, with our understanding of the universe, limited admit-ably that it is, that fear is of such predominance in every respect, throughout our lives.