The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning, and the Universe Itself

· Sold by Penguin
4.7
39 reviews
Ebook
480
Pages
Eligible

About this ebook

The instant New York Times bestseller about humanity's place in the universe—and how we understand it.

“Vivid...impressive....Splendidly informative.”The New York Times
Succeeds spectacularly.—Science
A tour de force.Salon

Already internationally acclaimed for his elegant, lucid writing on the most challenging notions in modern physics, Sean Carroll is emerging as one of the greatest humanist thinkers of his generation as he brings his extraordinary intellect to bear not only on Higgs bosons and extra dimensions but now also on our deepest personal questions: Where are we? Who are we? Are our emotions, our beliefs, and our hopes and dreams ultimately meaningless out there in the void? Do human purpose and meaning fit into a scientific worldview?

In short chapters filled with intriguing historical anecdotes, personal asides, and rigorous exposition, readers learn the difference between how the world works at the quantum level, the cosmic level, and the human leveland then how each connects to the other. Carroll's presentation of the principles that have guided the scientific revolution from Darwin and Einstein to the origins of life, consciousness, and the universe is dazzlingly unique.  

Carroll shows how an avalanche of discoveries in the past few hundred years has changed our world and what really matters to us. Our lives are dwarfed like never before by the immensity of space and time, but they are redeemed by our capacity to comprehend it and give it meaning.

The Big Picture is an unprecedented scientific worldview, a tour de force that will sit on shelves alongside the works of Stephen Hawking, Carl Sagan, Daniel Dennett, and E. O. Wilson for years to come.

Ratings and reviews

4.7
39 reviews
J H
November 5, 2016
It would be hard for anyone to deliver on the bold promise suggested by the cover, which carries the text: "On the origin of life, meaning and the universe itself". Any of those three items could, on their own, be the subject of a book, have in fact been the subjects of multitudes of books and the work of generations of philosophers and scientists. It's hard to imagine how Carroll can deliver on that promise in a way that isn't breezy, cursory and unsatisfying. And yet it manages unimaginably well.
16 people found this review helpful
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Ryan Huang
January 27, 2017
Well I haven't read it yet but I know it's gonna be a really good book☺ (Only 10 years old love science)
3 people found this review helpful
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bruh
March 2, 2017
I loved this book because it has to do with sience and im only 10 years old and I LOVE SIENCE science all the way.
14 people found this review helpful
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About the author

SEAN CARROLL is a theoretical physicist at the California Institute of Technology. He received his PhD in 1993 from Harvard University. Recently, Carroll has worked on the foundations of quantum mechanics, the arrow of time, and the emergence of complexity. He has been awarded prizes and fellowships by the National Science Foundation, NASA, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, the American Physical Society, the American Institute of Physics, and the Royal Society of London. His most recent award, in 2014, was from the Freedom From Religion Foundation. Carroll has appeared on The Colbert Report (twice), PBS’s NOVA, and Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman, and he frequently serves as a science consultant for film and television. He has been interviewed by various NPR shows, Scientific American, Wired, and The New York Times. He has given a TED talk on the multiverse that has more than one million views, and he has participated in a number of well-attended public debates concerning material in his new book, including one in New York City in 2014 with Eben Alexander.

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