Table of Contents

Preface

1. Scientific Theories and Laws

2. The First Decade (1936-1946)

3. Relativity

4. The Second Decade (1946-1956)

5. Quantum Mechanics

6. The Third Decade (1956-1966)

7. The Big Bang

8. The Fourth Decade (1966-1976)

9. The Non-Bang

10. The Fifth Decade (1976-1986)

11. The Never-Bang

12. The Sixth Decade (1986-1996)

13. Evolution

14. The Seventh Decade (1996-2006)

15. The Theory of More than Everything

16. The Eighth Decade (2006-2016)

17. Now What?

18. The Ninth Decade (2016-2026)

Appendix A Paintings

Appendix B TTOMTE and a Steady State Universe

Appendix C Musical Compositions

Bibliography

6. One likely story: The land pieces drift together into one huge continent⁴⁴, mostly over the South Pole. Soot from gigantic volcanoes in Siberia fills the sky blotting out the sun. A terrible ice age hits the Earth.
7. Those plants with hard-covered seeds survive better than those with spores, and the plants grow stronger. Some of our favorite trees in Minnesota developed because of the calamity: pines and spruces, and they have those redwoods in California. What happened to all the dying trees and plants? We use them in our stoves and power plants today as coal.
8. If you don't like the freezing idea, we have an alternative, but you won't enjoy it much either. The carbon dioxide from the volcanoes causes a greenhouse effect warming the oceans. Warm water cannot hold oxygen as well as cold water, so the lack of oxygen allows bacteria to bubble out of the oceans in terrible gasses and kill almost everything. Take your pick. Either way, it doesn't matter how bad things get; a disaster only forces nature to come out fighting even stronger.

Chance affects life at the lowest level (genes), and cause and effect take over at the highest level (Earth changes).

EVOLUTION OF ANIMAL LIFE

Animals have to eat something alive (or not dead too long) to survive. Let's back up to 3,800,000,000 years ago. Mutation after mutation will improve the basic design. We'll describe the path as if the creatures can make their own decisions, but we know gene accidents hide behind it all.

Sections

WHAT IS A SPECIES

IS THERE EVOLUTION EVIDENCE

EVIDENCE FOR EVOLUTION

WHY DOES ANYTHING EVOLVE

WHAT IS PURE CHANCE

WHAT TWO STEPS IN EVOLUTION

WHERE DID LIFE COME FROM

EVOLUTION TOWARDS LIFE

EVOLUTION OF LIFE

EVOLUTION OF PLANT LIFE

EVOLUTION OF ANIMAL LIFE

EVOLUTION OF US

FINAL THOUGHTS

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