Intelligent Universe

Book Description

This volume contains papers presented at an international conference to celebrate Fred Hoyle's monumental contributions to astronomy, astrophysics and astrobiology and more generally to humanity and culture. The contributed articles highlight the important aspects of his scientific life and show how much of an example and inspiration he has been for over three generations in the 20th century.
There are a few people of whom it could be said they changed the way we perceive the world. Galileo Galilei, Nicholas Copernicus and Isaac Newton were amongst these. The inclusion of Fred Hoyle in this elite group may be contentious at the moment for the reason that in challenging the most cherished of Holy Grails in science he unwittingly offended many. But once the dust has settled over the many disputes that were raised and in the fullness of time there can be little doubt that Fred Hoyle will be ranked alongside these figures of history.
Hoyle perceived science with an indomitable passion and an obsessive desire to find the truth wherever it lay. His singleness of purpose in this great mission and his deep suspicion of orthodoxy, his powerful intellect and imagination set him apart from most of his contemporaries in the last century.
This volume includes papers presented at a commemorative conference held in Cardiff in June 2002. The material divides naturally into several sections: Personal Reminiscences, Stellar Structure and Evolution, Cosmology, Interstellar Matter, Comets and finally Panspermia. Each article pays its own tribute to Fred Hoyle for his inspiration and guidance that led to major breakthroughs in astrophysics and space science throughout the 20th century.

Conflict in the Cosmos: Fred Hoyle's Life in Science

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Thorough, engaging, chock full of insider detail!
a very fine book about a great scientist
Mitton's Hoyle The Stuff Of Which Standard Lives Are Made
Not so wrong
The best way to write about science

Conflict in the Cosmos: Fred Hoyle's Life in Science
Simon Mitton
Manufacturer: Joseph Henry Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0309093139

Book Description

A veritable cult figure to many, Sir Fred Hoyle was one of the most important, famous, and controversial figures of 20th-century astronomy. He coined the term "Big Bang" and earned himself scientific celebrity by enthusiastically endorsing theories that ran counter to conventional wisdom.

Fred Hoyle's prolific career spanned more than 60 years. During that time, he made major contributions in fundamental areas of astronomy. His most important work focused on the evolution of stars, the origin of the chemical elements, the nature of gravitational forces, and the origin of life on Earth. But he is perhaps best remembered for his rare talent as a science communicator. He hosted one of the first radio programs that focused on science and then moved his show to the new medium of television, making him a household name long before such science luminaries as Patrick Moore or Carl Sagan rose to prominence.

A man of ceaseless intellectual activity, Hoyle pushed the boundaries of our knowledge by being both right and wrong. When he was right, his contributions were of Nobel Laureate quality. Indeed, even when he was wrong, he stimulated his exasperated opponents to work that much more furiously to produce damning evidence against him, thus yielding additional discoveries and leading to more knowledge on a topic.

Simon Mitton's sensitive biography tells the story of Hoyle's life as well as his science. Structuring each chapter around an intellectual puzzle, the science is framed within the context of the knowledge available to Hoyle at the time. Drawing on his personal knowledge of Fred Hoyle, Mitton vividly recreates the many public clashes between Hoyle and his critics, and at the same time he clearly explains the science underlying the conflict.

Customer Reviews:

Thorough, engaging, chock full of insider detail!.......2007-08-08

Author Simon Mitton is himself an astrophysicist, educated at Oxford where Fred Hoyle worked for so many years. This gives him the ability to write about Fred Hoyle with a level of insight and scientific judgement that a lay author would not be able to bring. Mitton traces Hoyle's life in detail, which is what you would expect from any good biography. But here we also learn about not only the things that made Fred Hoyle famous, like the Steady State theory, his science fiction work such as "The Black Cloud," Julie Christie (!), but also his greatest contributions to physics--stellar processes and evolution--unknown to most people (certainly to me). Hoyle was virtually an idea machine, churning out an amazing number of ideas during his life--some of them decidedly crackpot, but many of them utterly brilliant. We're also treated to a detailed view of the Oxford bureaucracy, and how Fred brought it to at least some kind of truce--for a while. This is a remarkably detailed, fascinating view of an unique man, presenting Hoyle as whole person, brilliant yet flawed. Most of all, though, it is a compelling read. When I finished the book I was actually sad that the experience was over.

a very fine book about a great scientist.......2005-09-29

this is an excellent book about a fascinating scientist, fred hoyle. it is well written and almost anyone with a smattering of knowledge of physics and astronomy can follow and learn from this biography. mitton lays out hoyle's ideas clearly and shows how they differ from other theories and how they advanced science.

also, unerlying it all is a theme that it is more than ok to think beyond the accepted knowledge, and that is how science develops. hoyle may have been wrong on some subjects but he also developed much of what is now basic astrophysics. while hoyle is often referred to as wrong about the big bang et al, time may well show that he was right after all. big bang leads down some dead ends, whereas recent discoveries and theories algin more with hoyle's steady state theory. newton and others thought so too.

a good read and a good buy.

dgs

Mitton's Hoyle The Stuff Of Which Standard Lives Are Made.......2005-09-24

Reading through CONFLICT IN THE COSMOS, the biography of British astronomer Fred Hoyle, I enjoyed finding out things I never knew before, about science and about Hoyle's own fiction writing. Everyone with an interest in movies knows that the divine Julie Christie emerged during a period of UK filmmaking in the early 1960s that marked a revival of world interest in British cinema, playing very much the contemporary, disaffected "chick" of so-called swinging London. Her subsequent sppearance in Truffaut's FAHRENHEIT 451 was widely regarded as a mis-step, that science fiction wa snot her metier. But as Mitton shows, Christie made her first big breakthrough in a BBC version of Hoyle's "The Nature of the Universe." This series was re-titled A FOR ANDROMEDA, and Hoyle personally selected Julie Christie from a number of pretty girls he viewed at RADA. "That's her!" he exclaimed, and a star was born! So for Christie, FAHRENHEIT 45` was not such an anomaly after all. Mitton treats the matter of Hoyle's relations with film companies with the same cool accuracy with which he handles the more controversial aspects of Hoyle's life.

It was a wonderful life in which he sought to bring back international interest in and prestige for British astronomy after a sorry period in the immediate postwar era. CONFLICT IN THE COSMOS suffers from one fault, a nationalism which perhaps never even occurs to author Mitton, an underlying assumption that what's good for Britain is good for astrophysics and the two things to me don't seem that equivalent.

We see Hoyle as a man with irrational bursts of confidence and indeed over-confidence, with sort of a big mouth that got him into trouble now and again. Mitton carefully details the events of the scandal surrounding Hoyle's ill-timed remarks on the 1974 Nobel award for physics to Martin Ryle and Antony Hewish. When Hoyle publicly stated that "the girl" Jocelyn Bell had been cheated of a third share in the Prize, the fat was really in the fire and an enormous hoopla ignited. Hoyle himself might have lost his chance for a Nobel himself, and as Mitton hints he might very well have had a chance to win it in 1983, had not his intemperate remarks put his hopes in purdah.

And yet he had courage, vision, a brilliance of mind and perception that come along (in astronomy) once every thirty or forty years, and he was unafraid to put his ass on the line when it came to speaking up for causes he believed in. We won't see his like again, and the world is a sadder place since he folded up his telescope and disappeared into starlight.

Not so wrong.......2005-06-21

Fred Hoyle is famously remembered for being wrong about the origin of he Universe. But one of the most intriguing things About Simon Mitton's book is the suggestion that he may not have been very wrong, since the math of his steady state theory matches the math of the now-fashionable inflation theory. Mitton is good at giving such unexpected insights, although he dwells a little too long on the politics of British science in the 1970s. His story of a man who went his own way through the scientific world would make a great basis for a documentary.

The best way to write about science.......2005-04-12

This is the best way to write about science! Although Simon Mitton is a distinguished astronomer, this is science written for anyone intelligent, regardless of background - those of us in the humanities as well as sciences can read this fascinating book with equal enjoyment.

Fred Hoyle was probably wrong on how the universe began, holding to steady state rather than the Big Bang, in which most scientists now believe. But his reasons were perfectly cogent, as Mitton points out. He was also the first true communicator of science to a wide audience, including his brilliant science fiction plays for children that I can still recall over 40 years later. If astronomy is now a cutting edge subject, with considerable lay interest (especially after Mitton and Hoyle's Cambridge colleague Stephe Hawking) it is all because Hoyle was there first.

In short, Mitton has written an outstanding book for all of us. I should also add that the mistakes pointed out in the Publisher's Weekly review have been corrected by the final version - they must have seen proof copies.

Buy this book! Science has become fun for all of us, and Hoyle's pioneering research and communication skills set that ball in motion. Simon Mitton is a worthy follower of his old master, and this book is proof of that.

Christopher Catherwood (author of CHURCHILL'S FOLLY: HOW WINSTON CHURCHILL CREATED MODERN IRAQ: Carroll and Graf, 2004)

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The Nature of the Universe.
Fred. Hoyle
Manufacturer: HarperCollins
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Astronomy and Cosmology: A Modern Course

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Astronomy and Cosmology: A Modern Course
Fred Hoyle
Manufacturer: W H Freeman & Co (Sd)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Astronomy - a History of Man's Investigation of the Universe

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Astronomy - a History of Man's Investigation of the Universe
Fred Hoyle
Manufacturer: Crescent
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000O6321O

A Different Approach to Cosmology: From a Static Universe through the Big Bang towards Reality

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Strictly for the credulous.
An excelent book.
Seeing the Universe in a different light...
Compelling! the cosmology paradigm debates ended too soon!

A Different Approach to Cosmology: From a Static Universe through the Big Bang towards Reality
F. Hoyle , G. Burbidge , J. V. Narlikar , Fred Hoyle , Geoffrey Burbidge , and Jayant V. Narlikar
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0521662230

Book Description

The astronomical community is wrongly interpreting cosmological data by using the standard Big Bang Model. In this highly controversial volume, three distinguished cosmologists argue this premise with persuasion and conviction. Starting with the beginnings of modern cosmology, they conduct a deep and wide review of the observations made from 1945 to the present, explaining what they regard as the defects and inconsistencies that exist within the interpretation of cosmological data. This is followed by an extensive presentation of the authors' own alternative view of the status of observations and how they should be explained. Along the way, the book touches on the most fundamental questions, including the origin, age, structure, and properties of the Universe. Writing from the heart, with passion and punch, Hoyle, Burbidge, and Narlikar, make a powerful case for viewing the universe in a different light, which will be of great interest to graduate students, researchers, and professionals in astronomy, cosmology, and physics.

Customer Reviews:

Strictly for the credulous........2003-10-05

Earth to cultists: Hoyle's steady-state theory was discredited forty years ago. Give it up already.

An excelent book........2003-02-28

Having read what the other gentlements said about the book. I have not much to say. It pretty much gives a better cosmological model for our Universe than the standart model for it brings commum sense and simple logic back to the field. However, I would like to comment a sentence wrote by the Scientific American editors:

"Seemingly plausible ideas can have subtle flaws, and it takes a collective effort of problem solving to find them out."

I wonder that what is going on with mainstream Science nowadays is even worse than I thought. It look likes they assume that standart models can NOT possible be wrong and that any other models MUST fail in order to keep the standart one.

Plausible ideas are the BEST ideas in Science. Of course it still can have flaws, but as they pointed out, the flaws are often subtle. But in the illogical and nonsensical big-bang model, the flaws are OBVIOUS. Also, if you read this book or "Seeing Red" by Alton Harp or "Dark Matter, missing planets and new comets" by Tom V. Flandern, you will find out (in spite of what the Scientific American are trying to tell you) that in fact the standart model IS durty.

I strongly recommend this book because I have found a logical truth and I'd like you find it by yourself as well: The Universe is infinity in space and time and the so-called Big-Bang actually NEVER happened.

Seeing the Universe in a different light..........2000-04-16

A rare and well balanced scientific discussion of the relative merits of the new Quasi Steady State versus Big Bang concept of the Universe. This book gives the reader a feel for the basis of our understanding of the Universe. A feeling for the vast uncertainties concerning our interpretation of distant objects, such as Quasars.

Please note: This book is for serious students of cosmology. The authors presume the reader has an understanding of general relativity.

Compelling! the cosmology paradigm debates ended too soon!.......2000-03-23

Sir Fred Hoyle and fellow authors, Geoffrey Burbidge and Jayant Narlikar show why the paradigm debates in modern cosmology ended too soon! Their sweeping analysis includes the early static universe concepts, the Einstein, de Sitter, and Friedmann-Lemaitre relativistic models, the controversy of the classic Steady-State vs. the Big Bang, and the contemporary Big Bang paradigm. As participants, they discuss the controversies over interpretation of the Hubble velocity-distance relation, light element origins, the radio sources and their fabled distributions, the quasars, the cosmic microwave background, and large-scale matter distribution.

They summarize the accumulating evidences for intrinsic-peculiar redshifts, and ejection of compact X-ray and optical sources from active galactic nuclei. The Big Bang is found wanting both in theoretical assumption and observationally. Building on their Quasi-Steady-State cosmology, the authors propose that both observation and scale-invariant gravitational equations require us to consider an ongoing-episodic creation of matter within the universe. . . .

Don't let prevailing theory (or episodic mathematical equations) keep you from reading this important book!

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Interesting fringe of science

bad science fiction

A classic Darwin critique

Evolution from Space: A Theory of Cosmic Creationism
Fred Hoyle
Manufacturer: Simon & Schuster (Paper)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0671492632

Customer Reviews:

Interesting fringe of science.......2004-07-31

Astronomer and maverick Fred Hoyle is once reported to have said, 'Space isn't remote at all. ... It's only an hour's drive away if your car could go straight upwards.' Hoyle was a world-renowned astronomer, and a very creative scientist who didn't let convention or popular opinion sway his views. He is often credited with coining the term 'Big Bang', a bit ironic, given that he used this term in a bit of scorn -- he never accepted the Big Bang theory of universal creation and evolution, preferring a Steady State Theory, never fully developed, as the astronomical community as a whole was far more interested in the Big Bang theory.

Hoyle's first claim to fame came from his work in stellar evolution and structure. He developed the theories of chemical element formation in the stars, commonly accepted by scientists today. Whenever you hear an astronomer or another waxing philosophic that we are all made of stardust or star-stuff, you are hearing an echo of Hoyle. While he did not win the Nobel Prize (many scientists think that he should have for this stellar work, no pun intended), he did with the Crafoord Prize, an award given by the Swedish Academy in recognition for fields not covered by Nobel Prizes.

In collaboration with Chandra Wickramasinghe, Hoyle was a champion of the modern theory of panspermia. Panspermia is essentially the theory that life comes from off the earth -- it has developed into a theory entitled 'Cosmic Ancestry' now, and includes many more environmental ideas. It argues that the Earth is not a biologically closed ecosystem -- apart from the fact that human-made spacecraft have propelled genetical material beyond the earth notwithstanding, Panspermia and such theories argue that the universe has, indeed, may be full of spores and other types of genetic 'pieces', viruses and the like, that occasionally find their way to earth, and rarely but occasionally survive the entry and become grafted onto the genetic structures on Earth.

This text with Wickramasinghe covers the range of ideas, including early theories from the late nineteenth century. Hoyle and Wickramasinghe also argue for an Anthropic Principle of Cosmology here -- that there is a purpose to the universe, and that human beings have a special place. Hoyle asks the question, why should we not believe there is a guiding principle in biology by intelligences beyond our own? Why is it that people are accepting of a God-principle, but not of intelligences that might fall between God and our own? These are rather dramatic and controversial ideas, to say the least. Hoyle and Wickramasinghe argue for a scientific pantheism, with God as the universe.

Hoyle's ideas are interesting, and backed up with impressive science (chemistry, physics, and biology). However, it is still very cutting-edge and beyond the mainstream thinking -- Hoyle prods the more Darwinian theories for evidence, while accepting that there is in fact no more evidence for Panspermia.

An interesting text for the edge of science. This is not what I believe, either scientifically nor as a theologian, but it is fascinating to see how such ideas are developed.

bad science fiction.......2003-10-05

Re: "Noone realizes it but this work is a classic on the issue of Darwinism. It has been 'refuted' so many times and still survives one must wonder if it doesn't scare Darwinists."

So does astrology survive. Guess what? Astrology doesn't "scare" astronomers. It is sad to see someone of Fred Hoyle's former stature reject the scientific method and embrace mysticism. ("No one" is spelled "no one", not "noone".)

A classic Darwin critique.......2003-07-28

Noone realizes it but this work is a classic on the issue of Darwinism. It has been 'refuted' so many times and still survives one must wonder if it doesn't scare Darwinists. One doesn't have to accept their perspective to see that the statistical difficulties of the original Darwinian theory were fatal, and should have been seen all along.
Attempts to deal with statistics in the Darwinian field have left a generation confused on the subject. The paradigm, to survive, has to keep the troops muddled.

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Well Written Book About a Fascinating Scientist

Fred Hoyle's Universe
Jane Gregory
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0198507917

Book Description

Fred Hoyle was one of the most widely acclaimed and colourful scientists of the twentieth century, a down-to-earth Yorkshireman who combined a brilliant scientific mind with a relish for communication and controversy. Best known for his steady-state theory of cosmology, he described a universe with both an infinite past and an infinite future. He coined the phrase 'big bang' to describe the main competing theory, and sustained a long-running, sometimes ill-tempered, and typically public debate with his scientific rivals. He showed how the elements are formed by nuclear reactions inside stars, and explained how we are therefore all formed from stardust. He also claimed that diseases fall from the sky, attacked Darwinism, and branded the famous fossil of the feathered Archaeopteryx a fake. Throughout his career, Hoyle played a major role in the popularization of science. Through his radio broadcasts and his highly successful science fiction novels he became a household name, though his outspokenness and support for increasingly outlandish causes later in life at times antagonized the scientific community. Jane Gregory builds up a vivid picture of Hoyle's role in the ideas, the organization, and the popularization of astronomy in post-war Britain, and provides a fascinating examination of the relationship between a maverick scientist, the scientific establishment, and the public. Through the life of Hoyle, this book chronicles the triumphs, jealousies, rewards, and feuds of a rapidly developing scientific field, in a narrative animated by a cast of colourful astronomers, keeping secrets, losing their tempers, and building their careers here on Earth while contemplating the nature of the stars.

Customer Reviews:

Well Written Book About a Fascinating Scientist.......2006-01-22

Fred Hoyle was one of the most distinguished and at the same time the most controversial scientists of the twentieth century. He was also a quite popular author of science fiction novels, a popular radio announcer on the BBC -- a true renaissance man.

His scientific achievements consisted of pioneering work in areas like the radioactivity in stars that produce all of the heavy elements which when subsequently blown into space and collected into planets become the stuff out of which we are all made. He also did fundamental research into some of the practical problems facing the use of Radar during World War II.

The biggest controversy came from his support of the steady state theory of the cosmos rather than the Big Bang. Not only did he support steady state, he continued his support long after it became discarded by the mainstream of science. In fact, his last book, published just before his death continued steady state support and further annoyed most of the scientists with a photograph of a flock of geese blindly following one another representing the failure of the big-banger's to even consider an alternate approach.

This book is essentially a biography, but it also gives a good look into the world of science in the last century. Good Reading!

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