1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910818081903321

Autore

Lockwood Michael

Titolo

The labyrinth of time : introducing the universe / / Michael Lockwood

Pubbl/distr/stampa

New York, : Oxford University Press, 2005

ISBN

1-280-75383-8

0-19-153045-X

1-4294-6003-2

Edizione

[1st ed.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (416 p.)

Disciplina

530.1

Soggetti

Space and time

Physics

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Description based upon print version of record.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographic references (p. [383]-397) and index.

Nota di contenuto

Contents; 1. Two Concepts of Time; 2. Time and Space: A Marriage is Arranged; 3. Taking Space-Time Seriously; 4. From Flat to Curved Space-Time; 5. Weaving the Cosmic Tapestry; 6. Closed Timelike Curves: Science Fact or Science Fiction?; 7. Classical Time Travel: The Toils of Paradox; 8. Hamilton's Legacy: Physical Systems and their State Spaces; 9. Time Asymmetry and the Second Law; 10. Entropy, Electrodynamics, and the Role of Gravity; 11. 'Drawn through Life Backwards'; 12. The Unyielding Past; 13. The Emergence of Order; 14. From Quantum Jumps to Schrödinger's Cat

15. Schrödinger's Time-Traveller16. Space, Time, and Quantum Gravity: Physics at the Frontier; 17. The Time of our Lives; References; Index

Sommario/riassunto

Modern physics has revealed the universe as a much stranger place than we could have imagined. The puzzle at the centre of our knowledge of the universe is time. Michael Lockwood takes the reader on a fascinating journey into the nature of things. He investigates philosophical questions about past, present, and future, our experience of time, and the possibility of time travel. And he provides the most careful, lively, and up-to-date introduction to the physics of time and the. structure of the universe. His aim is not just to boggle the mind, but to lead the reader towards an understanding of