The First Three Minutes - 2nd Edition by Steven Weinberg (Paperback)

About the Book

Now featuring a major new epilogue that brings the story up to date, this classic work by a Nobel Prize-winning physicist is "science writing at its best" (New York Review of Books). Translated in 18 languages.

Book Synopsis

A Nobel Prize-winning physicist explains what happened at the very beginning of the universe, and how we know, in this popular science classic.

Our universe has been growing for nearly 14 billion years. But almost everything about it, from the elements that forged stars, planets, and lifeforms, to the fundamental forces of physics, can be traced back to what happened in just the first three minutes of its existence.

In this book, Nobel Laureate Steven Weinberg describes in wonderful detail what happened in these first three minutes. It is an exhilarating journey that begins with the Planck Epoch - the earliest period of time in the history of the universe - and goes through Einstein's Theory of Relativity, the Hubble Red Shift, and the detection of the Cosmic Microwave Background. These incredible discoveries all form the foundation for what we now understand as the "standard model" of the origin of the universe. The First Three Minutes examines not only what this model looks like, but also tells the exciting story of the bold thinkers who put it together.

Clearly and accessibly written, The First Three Minutes is a modern-day classic, an unsurpassed explanation of where it is that everything really comes from.

Review Quotes

"A most remarkable achievement...presented with clarity...and great scientific accuracy."
--T.D. Lee, Nobel Laureate in Physics

"His book is science writing at its best."
--Martin Gardner, New York Review of Books

"The book is the first I have seen to put the details, both historical and conceptual, of the origin of the Universe within the grasp of the general reader... As such, it is a tremendous service to us all."
--Isaac Asimov

"Weinberg builds such a convincing case...that one comes away from his book feeling not only that the idea of an original cosmic explosion is not crazy but that any other theory appears scientifically irrational."
--Jeremy Bernstein, New Yorker

About the Author

Steven Weinberg won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1979 as well as the National Medal of Science and the Lewis Thomas Prize for the Scientist as Poet, among other honors. He was the Josey Regental Professor of Science at the University of Texas in Austin and the author of many books, including Dreams of a Final Theory and To Explain the World.