Hello to everyone in the science forum
I would normally post this in the "Books & Media" section, but instead I thought I would throw this one across the Science section as I've added some extra bits. Carl, if I haven't explained myself well enough, go easy on me, but I welcome clarification. I, after all, do not talk the science "lingo", for I am a mere beginner trying to grasp a very complicated area in science. Actually, I guess that goes to all you wolves here in the science section too
. The Science Forum is highly informative and entertaining (!) area within IIS, but blinking heck, can be be a scary one too.
I find String Theory fascinating, but the the problem with me is I am the worst at maths, and here I am trying to learn physics. I'm trying to run before I can walk, and therefore I've had to go back and try and grasp the basics of physics. A lot of this stuff just won't stay in my head because I can't break it down to comprehend it, all the same I enjoy learning about it. On top of that, I'm now trying to grasp how stars work so am studying that as well. Then, every clear night I can get (rare of late), I am there with my telescope observing. Now, I'm also trying to learn to sketch. My brain is going into overload.
It is just incredible how diverse an area of Astronomy is. I've had to buy so many different types of astro books (and they are on the expensive side) to try and cover this area.
I've just added a new one to my collection, Patrick Moore's Practical Astronomy Series, "Physics Made Easy" by Mike Ingliss. He said in the book review, that learning the maths exercises given in the book was purely optional and the reader can skip past it. I reckon I'll will be skipping those bits.
For the beginner learning this stuff, it gets even more confusing when there are all these different theories out there and what you have just learned can change as quickly as picking up another book. Be it different perceptions of current theory or new information that comes to hand (floodsville for the latter).
For instance, with string theory, they talk of 10 dimensions, but another source tells me 11. Hawkins seems to think the universe started with a black hole. If I have misinterpreted this, please let me know, but that's what I took from it. And then there are Branes. Branes weren't mentioned in the show "Hawkings Universe". I have his book (yet to read), "A Brief History of Time". Is it mentioned in there?
The other day when I was watching the new Foxtel series, "How The Universe Was Made", the episode being "Big Bang". I learned quite a bit. I watched the episode twice, and then the third time I hand wrote out half the show. I'm embarrassed to say, that by writing it down in simple english in the way that the presenters explained it, as opposed to the complicated word use in books, I can grasp it sooo much easier.
Theoretical science is definitely a confusing one to learn, especially for the beginner. Some stays in my head, and some I forget.
In this episode, they go on talk about, and I quote all of the following from the Foxtel show mentioned above:
The Perfect amount of gravity. If it's too weak, no galaxies can form. too much, and everything will end up in black holes.
A fraction of a second after the big band, a shockwave of energy erupted and expanded the universe in all directions at incredible speed. "We think that in a millionth, of a millionth, of a millionth, of a millionth of a second, space expanded by a factor bigger than a millionth, of a millionth, of a millionth, of a millionth times. Faster than the speed of light, scientists think that it took less than a millionth, of a millionth, of a millionth, of a millionth of a second for the universe to expand from the size of an atom to a baseball. It's like a golf ball expanding to the same size of Earth in the same amount of time.
Regarding mater & anti matter.... Equal amounts will inialate back into pure radiation, and there will be no stars and galaxies. For every billion particles of anti matter, there is a billion and one of matter. That was the moment of creation. The one extra particle of matter in each little volume survives enough to form all the matter that we see in the stars and the galaxies today. One in a billionth may not sound like much, but its enough to build a universe. Michlo Kaku went onto say, "We're the left overs, so believe it or not, everything you see around you, the atoms of your body, the atoms of the stars are nothing but left overs. Left overs from this ancient collision between matter and anti matter." Lucky for us, there was enough left over to make all the stars and planets. And the universe is till less than one second old.
In the first three minutes, everything interesting that was going to happen, happened.
Crikey all this stuff is certainly awesome, but yet so much to take in. I wonder if most amateur astronomers get into learning the astro physics side of things. Be kind of hard not to - wouldn't it...
Kind regards,
Suzy.