Questions for Chapter 1 - Bryson

Questions for Chapter 1 - Bryson

1. What does the author mean when he writes “from nothing, our universe begins”?

2. Describe the discovery of the cosmic background radiation. How does this radiation support the Big Bang Theory?

3. What evidence of the big bang was inadvertently discovered by Penzias and Wilson in 1965? Had this evidence been predicted? Who got the Nobel prize for this, the discoverers or the predictor?

4. Who was Alan Guth? Explain his theory.

5. What is the “Goldilocks effect” and how are the three different types of universes described?

6. How is the concept of an “edge” or “center” of the universe not meaningful?

7. How big is the universe?

8. Who coined the term “big bang”? What did that person think of the theory?