Book Review: In Search of the Multiverse

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Hi Folks!

Just got done with this one, John Gribbin is a masterful writer, but the lad could use a little help with titles! The full title is: In Search of the Multiverse: Parallel Worlds, Hidden Dimensions, and the Ultimate Quest for the Frontiers of Reality... try saying that three times fast!

For those of you who have wondered about reading 'something beyond the big bang theory' - here you go! Gribbin will take you on quite a tour of the frontiers of thinking about cosmology and astrophysics. Gribbin takes the Big Bang as a given, but the book seeks to explain the birth of the Universe in the context of the multiverse. For those of you unfamiliar with it, 'multiverse' is an idea that there may be other 'universes' either serially (Big Bang followed by Big Crunch, and then Bang again!), or in parallel. The evidence for the existence of the multiverse is really quite strong, and is fully supported by Everett's 'many worlds' interpretation of quantum theory as well as by experimental evidence.

String theory, brane theory, and David Deutch's information theory are all brought along for the ride, and M-theory (the 11-dimensional, 5-fold version of string theory) is also tossed into the mix. To read my little review, you might think that this was WAAAAY beyond what the average back yard stargazing bloke could absorb, but Gribbin does a masterful job of explaining the concepts without bringing in the "hated maths" that give so many of us the shivers.

A wonderful, mind stretching read that is rather like very strong Scotch - it is best absorbed in small sips without mixing or diluting. You take a gulp, then sit back and feel it start to work inside your head! The nice thing is that Gribbin doesn't just take you up to the bang event and leave you hanging - you get to see what we think happens before, and after the bang!

It will really put things in perspective for you.

Dan