Origins And Bibliography Of The Big Bang Theory Essays -

Origins and Bibliography of the Big Bang Theory ORIGINS: Background & Bibliography ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Assembled for the PHILOsophy Conference of: Computer Connection PO Box 382 BBS (609) 784-9404 Voorhees, NJ 08043 by T.A. Hare Nov. 13, 1985 Topic: Areas of interaction between philosophy, science, and?religion. Part I - Big Bang (Astronomy) Part II - Unified Field (Particle Physics) Part III - Evolution (Biology). Part IV - Theologic interaction - - - - Part II - Unified Field Theory of Particle Physics: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ And God said, "Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water." (Gen. 1:6) And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so. (Gen. 1:9) - - - - Further reading: 1. John H. Schwartz, "Completing Einstein", SCIENCE 85, vol 6, pp 60-64, 1985. 2. Robert Palmer, "What's a Quark?", SCIENCE 85, VOL 6, pp 66-71, 1985 3. Bruce Schechter, "The Moment of Creation", DISCOVER, April 1983, pp 18-25. 4. Lawrence R. Sulak, "Waiting for the Proton to Decay", AMERICAN SCIENTIST, 70, 616-625, 1982. 5. Mary K. Gaillard, "Toward a Unified Picture of Elementary Particle Interactions", AMERICAN SCIENTIST 70, 506-514. - - - - The following background articles were downloaded from American Adacemic Encyclopedia via Dow Jones News Retrevial Service; Nov 12, 1985 UNIFIED FIELD THEORY Classical attempts at devising a unified field theory, principally those of Einstein, were concerned with the combination of gravitation (the general theory of RELATIVITY) and electromagnetism into the same theoretical framework. Electromagnetism is described by MAXWELL'S EQUATIONS for an antisymmetric tensor, whereas Einstein's theory of gravitation centers about a symmetric metric tensor; Einstein's idea was to combine both descriptions into a single, nonsymmetric tensor, thereby treating both subjects from an essentially geometric point of view. Other attempts to incorporate electromagnetism into the basically geometric formalism of general relativity were made by Hermann Weyl (1918) and more recently by John Wheeler; although some theories are more esthetic than others, all lack the connection with quantum phenomena that is so important for interactions other than gravitation. More-recent attempts at unification have been made from the quite different point of view of merging the quantum field theories that (are supposed to) describe the four FUNDAMENTAL INTERACTIONS of gravity, electromagnetism, and the weak and the strong nuclear interactions. The most palatable unification so far has been given by Steven WEINBERG of Harvard University and independently by Abdus SALAM of Imperial College, London, joining electromagnetism and the weak interactions. In the simplest version of this type of unified gauge theory, forces are transmitted by the exchange of four different types of particles called bosons, which are assumed to be massless. By means of a "broken symmetry" an effective generation of masses occurs, so that the Weinberg-Salam theory envisages the weak interactions as being transmitted by massive "W" mesons, in which one meson, identified with the photon, remains massless, while the other three, identified with the quanta that transmit the weak interaction, are estimated to be quite heavy. Their rest-mass energies are on the order of 50 to 100 times the mass of the proton, and their observation should become possible with the next generation of high-energy accelerators. So far, the Weinberg-Salam theory has passed every unambiguous test to which it has been subjected. Weinberg and Salam shared the 1979 Nobel Prize for physics for their model. Many other unified theories, involving strong interaction and even gravitation, have recently been proposed. Such grand unification schemes to date have unavoidable and questionable consequences, such as the removal of the separate conservation of baryon and lepton number; they predict a proton could decay into a lepton plus pions--an improbable event that is actively being searched for at present. Recent grand unification schemes require the existence of magnetic MONOPOLES. These hypothetical particles, also called grand unification monopoles (GUMs), are thought to be very massive, with a mass ranging from 10 to the 16th power to 10 to the 19th power GeV. No experimental evidence of monopoles has yet been found. H. M. FRIED Bibliography Bergmann, Peter G., Introduction to the Theory of Relativity (1942; repr. 1976) Einstein, Albert, The Meaning of Relativity, 5th ed. (1956) Hadlock, Charles, Field Theory and Its Classical Problems (1979) Tonnelat, Marie A., Einstein's Theory of Unified Fields (1966). - - - - RELATIVITY Albert Einstein's theory of relativity has caused major revolutions in physics and astronomy during the 20th century. It introduced to science the concept of "relativity"--the notion that there is no absolute motion