The Dancing Universe: From Creation Myths to the Big Bang

Index

Absolute space, definition of, 134 Absolute time, 134, 205 Accademia dei Lincei, 103 Action at a distance, 139, 175, 182 “Adulatio Perniciosa,” 112 Advancement of Learning (Bacon), 23 Aether (Aristotelian), 48 Albert of Brudzewo, 69 Alchemy, 123 Newton and, 123, 124, 130, 131 Allegheny Observatory, 272 Almagest, The (Ptolemy), 55, 66 Alpha rays, 223 Alpher, Ralph, 296–99, 300–301 American Medical Association, 263 Ammizaduga, Venus tables of, 24 Ampère, André-Marie, 176 Anaximander, 26–27, 32, 37 Anaximenes, 27, 37 Andromeda nebula, 55, 262, 273, 274 Annals of Philosophy, 178 Anne, Queen of England, 143 Apollodorus, 25 Apollonius of Perga, 53–54 Apologia doctae ignorantiae (Nicholas of Cusa), 68 Aquinas, St. Thomas, 47, 66 Archimedes, 51, 54, 59, 69, 70 Aristarchus, 50–51, 52, 54, 69 Aristotelian thought, 85 Catholic Church and, 47, 49, 66, 97 Galileo’s challenge to, 97, 102, 104–17 geocentric Universe, 50, 52–53, 71 persistence of, 47, 52, 59, 123 Aristotle, 25, 36, 46–49, 59, 65, 110 De Caelo, 26 division of the Universe into two realms, 48–49, 59, 78 Metaphysics, 26 Assyrian creation myths, 8, 14 Astrolabe, 55 Astrology: development of astronomy and, 57–58 Islamic world and, 57 Kepler and, 58, 78 repression by Christianity, 57 Astronomia nova (Kepler), 75, 82, 91–92 Astronomy, 66, 271 astrology and development of, 57–58 the Catholic Church, and the Scriptures, 63, 105–106, 107, 108, 110, 115 Greek contributions to, see Greeks, the during Middle Ages, 59 physics and, 79, 82, 133 Astrophysical Journal, 300 Astrophysics, 160 Atomic bomb, 195, 291, 292 Atomic (corpuscular) theory of matter, 130, 169–70, 217, 218 divisibility of atoms, 224 Atomic physics, 38, 158, 291 Atomists, 37–42, 43, 123–24, 171 Atoms, 38, 224–28, 292–94 Bohr’s atomic theory, 224–28 electrons, see Electrons Gamow’s big-bang model and, 298–99 modern picture of, 225 neutrons, 291, 292–93 nucleus of, 225, 226, 292–94 protons, 292–94, 299 quantum mechanics, see Quantum mechanics Attila the Hun, 64 Augustine, Saint, 47, 57, 63, 64–65 Awe in scientific and religious process, 4, 22, 310 INDEX Baade, Walter, 284, 290 Babylonia: astronomers of, 24, 57 creation myth, 24 Bacon, Roger, 66–67, 68 Bacon, Sir Francis, 23, 123 Barberini, Cardinal Francesco, 116 Barberini, Cardinal Maffeo, see Urban VIII, Pope Barrow, Isaac, 126, 129, 130 Becquerel, Henri, 222–23 Beginnings, see Origin of the Universe Belinsky, V. A., 307 Bellarmine, Lord Cardinal, 103, 107–108, 110–11, 116 Bentley, Richard, 140, 142 Berlin, Isaiah, 120 Berlin Physical Society, 215 Bernoulli, Daniel, 168–69 Bessel, Friedrich, 52 Beta rays, 223 Bethe, Hans, 292, 294 Big-bang model, 287, 296–99, 300–301, 304 Binding energy, 293–94 Biology, 187, 310 Aristotle and, 47 Blackbody, 214–15, 218, 299 Blackbody spectrum, 214–15 Black holes, 252 Bohr, Niels, 233–34, 235 atomic theory of, 225–28 Einstein’s debates with, 195, 236–38 Boltzmann, Ludwig, 170–71, 187, 217, 218, 225 Bondi, Hermann, 288–90, 302 Borges, Jorge Luis, 243 Born, Max, 234, 235 Boscaglia, Dr., 105 Boyle, Robert, 123 Bragg, W. H., 222 Brahe, Tycho, 82–89, 94, 95 cosmos according to, 85, 86, 104–105 De nova stella, 84–85 Kepler and, 82, 87–89 Brief History of Time, A (Hawking), 301 Brown, Robert, 217 Brownian motion, 217 Bruno, Giordano, 59, 98, 261 Bunsen, Robert, 158 Buys-Ballot, Christopher, 265 Byzantine empire, 64 Caccini, Tommaso, 106 Calculus, 125, 127, 174 Calendar: of astrological forecasts, 78 reforming the, 73 Callippus of Cyzicus, 46 Caloric hypothesis, 162, 167, 168 Carnegie, Andrew, 271 Carnot, Nicolas-Léonard-Sadi, 162–64 Carroll, Lewis, 6 Cassiopeia, constellation, 84 Castelli, Father Benedetto, 105 Cathode tubes, 221 Catholic Church: Aristotelian thought and, 47, 66, 97 Copernicus and, 73 cosmology and astronomy defined by the Scriptures for, 63, 105–106, 107, 108, 110, 115 Galileo and, xii, 73, 97–99, 103, 104–18 Index of Forbidden Books, 95, 99 Inquisition, see Inquisition observational science and, 49 Protestant faiths, schism with, 97, 107 sensorial experience and, 64–65 Cavendish, Henry, 174, 224 Centripetal force, 127–28, 134, 136 Cepheid variable, 273–74, 275 Change: the Atomists and, 37–38 ever-changing, nature as, 28–29, 37 as illusory, 29–30, 37 Charlemagne, 65 Chemical table of elements, 292 Chinese creation myths, 16, 17 Christianity: astrology suppressed by, 57 Catholic Church, see Catholic Church Darwin’s discoveries and, 187 Christian IV, king of Denmark, 87 Christina of Lorraine, Grand...