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The Universe Within
From Quantum to Cosmos
The most anticipated nonfiction book of the season, this year’s Massey Lectures is a visionary look at the way the human mind can shape the future by world-renowned physicist Neil Turok. Every technology we rely on today was created by the human mind, seeking to understand the universe around us. Scientific knowledge is our most precious possession, and our future will be shaped by the breakthroughs to come. In this personal, visionary, and fascinating work, Neil Turok, Director of the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, explores the transformative scientific discoveries of the past three centuries — from classical mechanics, to the nature of light, to the bizarre world of the quantum, and the evolution of the cosmos. Each new discovery has, over time, yielded new technologies causing paradigm shifts in the organization of society. Now, he argues, we are on the cusp of another major transformation: the coming quantum revolution that will supplant our current, dissatisfying digital age. Facing this brave new world, Turok calls for creatively re-inventing the way advanced knowledge is developed and shared, and opening access to the vast, untapped pools of intellectual talent in the developing world. Scientific research, training, and outreach are vital to our future economy, as well as powerful forces for peaceful global progress.
Contributors
Neil Turkok
Neil Turok is one of the world's top physicists and founder of the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS), a centre for education and research based in Cape Town, South Africa. Currently the Director of the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, he was formerly the Chair of Mathematical Physics at Cambridge University and Professor of Physics at Princeton. With Stephen Hawking he developed the Hawking-Turok instanton solutions, which describe the birth of inflationary universes. He is the co-author, with Paul J. Steinhardt, of the critically acclaimed book Endless Universe: Beyond the Big Bang — Rewriting Cosmic History. He was awarded the 1992 James Clerk Maxwell medal of the U.K. Institute of Physics, and was recently honoured with a prestigious TED Prize and a "Most Innovative People" award at the 2008 World Summit on Innovation and Entrepreneurship (WSIE). Born in South Africa, Turok now lives in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
