CLICK ON ANY LABEL BELOW TO JUMP TO THAT TOPIC FROM HERE.
1. Scientific Theories and Laws
2. The First Decade (1936-1946)
4. The Second Decade (1946-1956)
6. The Third Decade (1956-1966)
8. The Fourth Decade (1966-1976)
10. The Fifth Decade (1976-1986)
12. The Sixth Decade (1986-1996)
14. The Seventh Decade (1996-2006)
15. The Theory of More than Everything
16. The Eighth Decade (2006-2016)
18. The Ninth Decade (2016-2026)
Appendix A Paintings
Appendix B Caps and Bunnies
Appendix E A Googolplex Universe
Appendix F Acknowledgements
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That means this study is too important to trust to only one side of the brain, so the book approaches the subject from two directions: science and life. The odd-numbered chapters cover the science side with titles like "Relativity" and "The Big Bang." It's surprising how far science has left our so-called common sense behind, so these chapters are meant to soften up your thinking as we go. By the time we get close to the answer, your brain should be suitably squishy.
The even-numbered chapters, labeled "The First decade," "The Second decade," etc. contain personal anecdotes. These stories also lead to Appendix E with clues scattered amongst seemingly random events. As you will see, I didn't spend all of my waking hours trying to figure out why the world is the way it is because of the many sidetracks that come along (for example, trying to find a date for the prom).
An open mind will be invaluable throughout the book, but so is one that's skeptical. The open mind helps us give up an old idea when a better one comes along while being skeptical makes us think first before we jump to an attractive, wrong idea.
Once upon a time, a little boy had a very open mind. However, he learned an important lesson from one of his uncles while they walked together out in the pasture one fine, sunny day. As the little kid (OK, it was I) gazed off into the distance, my uncle took off his cap and carefully put it over some small horse droppings on the ground. In a half whisper, he announced, "Jimmy, I caught a little bunny!" I ran over, all excited, and he said, "Now careful. When I lift my cap, you grab him." It was this kind of trick that taught me skepticism (although I did spend three summers grabbing for a bunny).
And the Light Said covers nothing less than the whole physical universe, also called the cosmos. The cosmos includes the Earth, sun, moon, stars, and anything else we can see out there (and some things we can't). Astronomers spend their time staring at it all, cosmologists try to explain what the astronomers see, and mathematicians come up with nifty formulas for predicting what happens next.
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