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    The Grand Design
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    The Grand Design
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    The Grand Design
    Audiobook4 hours

    The Grand Design

    Written by Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow

    Narrated by Steve West

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    THE FIRST MAJOR WORK IN NEARLY A DECADE BY ONE OF THE WORLD'S GREAT THINKERS-A MARVELOUSLY CONCISE BOOK WITH NEW ANSWERS TO THE ULTIMATE QUESTIONS OF LIFE

    When and how did the universe begin? Why are we here? Why is there something rather than nothing? What is the nature of reality? Why are the laws of nature so finely tuned as to allow for the existence of beings like ourselves? And, finally, is the apparent "grand design" of our universe evidence of a benevolent creator who set things in motion-or does science offer another explanation?

    The most fundamental questions about the origins of the universe and of life itself, once the province of philosophy, now occupy the territory where scientists, philosophers, and theologians meet-if only to disagree. In their new book, Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow present the most recent scientific thinking about the mysteries of the universe, in nontechnical language marked by both brilliance and simplicity.

    In The Grand Design they explain that according to quantum theory, the cosmos does not have just a single existence or history, but rather that every possible history of the universe exists simultaneously. When applied to the universe as a whole, this idea calls into question the very notion of cause and effect. But the "top-down" approach to cosmology that Hawking and Mlodinow describe would say that the fact that the past takes no definite form means that we create history by observing it, rather than that history creates us. The authors further explain that we ourselves are the product of quantum fluctuations in the very early universe, and show how quantum theory predicts the "multiverse"-the idea that ours is just one of many universes that appeared spontaneously out of nothing, each with different laws of nature.

    Along the way Hawking and Mlodinow question the conventional concept of reality, posing a "model-dependent" theory of reality as the best we can hope to find. And they conclude with a riveting assessment of M-theory, an explanation of the laws governing us and our universe that is currently the only viable candidate for a complete "theory of everything." If confirmed, they write, it will be the unified theory that Einstein was looking for, and the ultimate triumph of human reason.

    A succinct, startling guide to discoveries that are altering our understanding and threatening some of our most cherished belief systems, The Grand Design is a book that will inform-and provoke-like no other.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateSep 7, 2010
    ISBN9781415966624
    Unavailable
    The Grand Design
    Author

    Stephen Hawking

    Stephen Hawking was a brilliant theoretical physicist and is generally considered to have been one of the world’s greatest thinkers. He held the position of Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge for thirty years and is the author of A Brief History of Time, which was an international bestseller. His other books for general readers include A Briefer History of Time, the essay collection Black Holes and Baby Universes, The Universe in a Nutshell, The Grand Design, and Black Holes: The BBC Reith Lectures, as well as the books in the George’s Secret Key series. He died in 2018.

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    Reviews for The Grand Design

    3.5/5

    672 ratings63 reviews

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    • 3/5
      This was waaaay more accessible than I thought it would be. I remember the embolism I had trying to read A Brief History of Time years ago (still need to finish that), so it was quite a pleasant surprise to be able to read this and not cry (the extent of my scientific knowledge is that Caesium does groovy things in a bowl of water and makes science teachers nervous when children instantly become incredibly feral on noticing this wonderful attribute). Also, this was a very short and quick read, so I wonder if I actually read it at all...

      I suppose, the gist of it is that the universe is filled with many things that can't be seen, are hard to measure and might not actually exist at all, but in order to theorise about our universe, we need to believe they are there and can be found wherever they are hiding...

      Maybe I was reading a book on another subject...

      In any case, it's a small mind that isn't completely blown away by the fact that we exist at all, for what seems to be no real reason. Somewhere a spark was lit, a chain reaction happened and like mold on an orange, here we are. It's as amazing as it is terrifying. Mostly amazing.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      As a layperson, this book was incredibly interesting and relatively easy to comprehend and follow. However, the lay reader will benefit from multiple readings of the book; or, in the very least, select portions of the text. The hardcover edition is incredibly nice, with dozens of glossy images. The images help to communicate the ideas pitched in the book. I will revisit this book in the future.
    • 3/5
      I keep reading books like this in the hopes that one day I will grasp the subject, but so far, no such luck. (I get bits and pieces, but I can't picture folded-up space, or separated particles with apparent ESP, etc.)

      I liked the explanation of how models are essentially reality (unless I misunderstood that), but I wished that they had discussed less (I started to tune out / get dizzy by 2/3 through) but had gone into greater detail about what they were discussing.

      For instance, I'm quite keen on the idea of multiple universes, but can there really be an infinity of them, can every possible universe possibly exist? It doesn't seem logical. I mean, imagine a world that's identical to ours, except in our world Hamilton wasn't a big success. But how could that be? If everything were identical, then all the people who see Hamilton would be the same ones in both worlds, with the same likes and dislikes, so they'd, on the whole, really like it. If they didn't, then something must have differed prior to that. Or in a simpler case, there's no universe that's just like ours but where elephants if they choose to can float. Can there be? I really don't get it.

      Oh well. Back to philosophy maybe, as physics and I, no matter how hard I try, are not a good fit!

      (Note: 5 stars = rare and amazing, 4 = quite good book, 3 = a decent read, 2 = disappointing, 1 = awful, just awful. There are a lot of 4s and 3s in the world!)
    • 4/5
      Nice, easy read...certainly not nearly as controversial as the press made it out to be when it was published. Hawking and Mlodinow get bashed for oversimplifying, but I think that translating cosmology to be accessible to the masses is admirable. If you want more math or science, those books are out there. If you want a general overview that you can lend your friends, this serves well.

      I like their reference to David Hume, silencing the "but how do we know what is real?" waste of time crowd: although we have no rational grounds for believing in an objective reality, we also have no choice but to act as if it is true.

      We really don't have much choice but to act as if what we perceive is real...we are macroscopic beings and travel at far less than relativistic speeds, so the classic equations govern.

    • 5/5
      Stephen W. Hawking is a brilliant scientist and a great writer.You do not need to be an scientist to understand this book.The book is is well written, clear and comprehensive.This book makes me want to study physics.It was a fascinating read.
    • 3/5
      Hawking's theory is that the universe spontaneously created itself out of "nothing" because of gravity? But I ask, where did gravity come from?
    • 5/5
      This books goes to my virtual list: "Books I wish I had read before I started studying my Physics Degree", so far only some books from MIR Publisher had done it to this list. It is simply superb, they way Hawking introduces some of the most complex concepts of Physics is amazing. Anyway this book is definitely NOT for the intermediate science lover, you will need some background or lots of patience, but still in hardly 200 pages Hawking and Mlodinow present very clearly the sate of the art of Physics and Science in one of its last frontiers. Great great book.
    • 4/5
      Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow describe our current understanding of physics - general and special relativity, gravity, quantum theory, Feynman's sum over histories - in a relatively brief (under 200 pages) and accessible way for the layman, using tons of visuals and often humorous analogies.I never took high school physics or calculus so while I can't understand the math, I occasionally read science books intended for folks like me that simply blow my mind with what we know and don't know about the universe we live in. The first half of the book was pretty basic and covered ground I already knew from other books I've read. Much of the book describes what we know of "the grand design" of the universe, both arguing for a theory or network of theories ("M-theory") that will one day better describe our universe and that we could mathematically and scientifically come up with a theory that will not have a need for a designer, that is God. Their theory, from what I understand - and this was the part that got a little dicey for me, I admit - argues that much like the earth is not the center of the universe nor even a particularly unique planet orbiting a star, so our universe may end up being only one of millions upon millions of universes that would all be spontaneously created and simultaneously operate with different laws of nature. I'm not sure that would ever personally satisfy me with how something could come from nothing - and as I said, I'm not conversant in the math that models this - but I enjoy stretching my brain cells nonetheless.
    • 5/5
      I am not a science person. I failed my freshman science courses in college and never looked back. Having said that, this is a great book for people who are interested in science, but are not necessarily that quick to understand everything about it. The authors put together an interesting book that was also manageable to read. I really enjoyed this book.
    • 3/5
      Good, but not great. This is now the second book that I've read of Hawking's. He is not Carl Sagan. I'm sure he has important ideas to convey, but he is not a popularizer of scientific concepts. Perhaps he could stick with scientific articles and short articles in Science or something like that. The book was really just a way to lay out the case for the multiverse. An important idea, for sure, but it had enough detail to be boring but not enough vision to be interesting. Split the difference and didn't quite suit either need.
    • 4/5
      Not sure this book quite accomplishes what Mr. Hawking set out to do, but it is a good read and I learned a great deal by reading this. It was worth the purchase and time spent reading.
    • 4/5
      Another great book by Hawking. Once again Hawking is able to bring the the the common man the grandest theories in physics so that they are able to understand.
    • 4/5
      So I was in an airport with very little time to spare before my flight, but knowing I had hours of transit yet before I'd be home and I'd just run out of book. The only airport bookstore I found was tiny and the books on the shelvers were all titles I could only imagine reading under extreme duress (or, rather, wouldn't want to be seen reading unless under extreme duress -- I'm such a snob), and I was on my way out of the store, despairing of having anything to entertain myself but my own over-active and troublesome imagination, but especially no shield against strangers and the rest of the world, when I saw the name Stephen Hawking in big, stark letters and I knew I was saved.

      Just for background, without the influence of Stephen Hawking, I might not have a master's degree in physics. Really. I count four main influences (other than my parents) in my choice of a physics degree. The other three were teachers/professors. A boy who was enamored of me once sent me a copy of A Brief History of Time. It was a really good gift. Probably the best gift I ever got from a boyfriend before I met my husband, who buys me bookshelves. (I just checked, because I couldn't remember, and the book wasn't inscribed. That boy was kind of an idiot.)

      This is a book of grand ideas on the nature of the universe -- that tries to establish an understanding of the scientific theories on the most basic and fundamental questions underlying the universe. So, you know, big. From grand unified theories to the big bang to string theory, with multi-verses, alternate histories, and the probability of a Chinese pope along the way. It goes about explaining all this with humor, some fabulous illustrations, and Hawking's trademark straight-forwardness, which assures that "all of this is understandable."

      That said, I had my usual complaint about this book that I have about all science books written for a lay audience. That is, my understanding is always deepened when I can see the math. It's just how my brain works. Most lay readers, however, are terrified of equations, so it will remain a problem for me. It only really bothered me in the section on Feynman's sum over histories -- something never really covered in any of my classes, but which I'd like to understand better. Time to get myself a textbook?

      I would say there is no better place to look for a small, easy-to-understand (but intelligent!) book on the current scientific understanding of the history and structure of the universe, were it not for the recent (maybe) discovery of the Higgs boson -- there's not so much on elementary particles here. Still recommended, anyway.
    • 4/5
      In the first few chapters, I had this amazing feeling that I just might be able to understand it all. This dissipated in the later chapters, as physics well beyond my severely limited knowledge was explored...yet it was fascinating and engaging even to this layperson. Explores the interesting nexus of the creation and implementation of scientific models (science has long ago left behind the "you have to see it to believe it" attitude) and how one creates meaning from such models.
    • 3/5
      Too light-weight; I was able to read this in a few hours total. I was hoping for something more... detailed, I guess. I realize the math is beyond any mere dilettante, but this book was *very* high level.
    • 3/5
      Forgettable to the point that if I hadn't written it down in my book ledger I wouldn't even know I read it. I had to look at the book description to spark my memories. Essentially, this is about the forces that rule the universe and the quests to create a grand unifying theory of everything. It only gave the slightest depth to each concept and really wasn't half as good as the Brief History of the Universe books.
    • 4/5
      I read this immediately after reading The Universe in a Nutshell (2001). I read Black Holes and Baby Universes a few years ago. I have read Brian Greene's works, so felt rather up-to-date on where quantum physics was at. I found this book to be more accessible than Greene's work, and a more interesting read than Nutshell since Hawking is contemplating theoretical physics' meaning for philosophy. That philosophical bent is a real problem for physics since the scientific method, which Hawking holds favorably in The Grand Design, requires hypothesis testing. For more on these problems, and a large criticism of Hawking I plan to read Lee Smolin's The Trouble with Physics.

      The author begins by stating that philosophy has not kept up with science, particularly modern physics. Hawking gives a brief history of science with an emphasis on physics and a look at how philosophy looking at science developed from Aristotle (rejected atoms b/c soulless) to Descartes (believed that the body was machine governed by laws, but the soul was not) to Newton (discovered many laws of the universe but held that God was free to intervene against them).

      If there are natural laws, can/does God violate them to perform miracles? That's an important question, as is the question of free will and determinism. Where does free will come from? If physicists nail down a Theory of Everything, will everything be deterministic henceforth?

      Hawking writes the laws of (this) universe arose from the big bang, and lengthily establishes what those laws are. But the universe has an infinite number of histories and contingencies. Wrap your head around this:
      "the probability amplitude that the universe is now in a particular state is arrived at by adding up the contributions from all the histories that satisfy the no-boundary condition and end in the state in question. In cosmology, in other words, one shouldn't follow the history of the universe from the bottom up because that assumes there's a single history, with a well-defined starting point and evolution. Instead, one should trace the histories from the top down, backward from the present time...The histories that contribute to the Feynman sum don't have an independent existence, but depend on what is being measured. We create history by our observation, rather than our history creating us...histories in which the moon is made of cheese do not contribute to the present state of our universe, though they might contribute to others. That might sound like science fiction, but it isn't."

      Hawking explains M-theory, p-branes, and other developments in quantum physics. The last pages of the book are the most important as Hawking contends that M theory explains how a universe can arise from nothing. But it does not lead to determinism in the sense that it would be mathematically impossible to calculate the movements of any one being. So, a theory of everything that is not what Hawking desired to find in Black Holes and Baby Universes.

      This book seems much more consequential than Nutshell. I found it more entertaining and thought-provoking throughout. I would very much like to read Lee Smolin's The Trouble with Physics, a critique of Hawking's work. For now, 4 stars out of 5
    • 3/5
      Liked it right up until the last few pages, when the authors quickly wrapped up with an unsupported assertion that M-theory explains it all. Huh?
    • 4/5
      a very readable book about the philosophy of science
    • 3/5
      This book was nothing like the hype it brought. I enjoyed the book, but as a whole the best parts were the first couple of chapters and the last couple of chapters.
    • 3/5
      A lot of circular logic and simplistic language really made me feel Mr. Hawking just doesn't think his readers are smart enough to understand.
    • 4/5
      A concise and fairly well-written summary of the current state of the search for a concise theory of everything. Hawking does a good job during the first 2/3 of the book walking the reader along the path of complex theories and providing well-written examples. However, I felt like during the last 1/3 of the book, where he was getting to the crux of his exposition, that he got tired of writing and just wanted to finish it up so he stopped trying to make things understandable. All-in-all a decent book to get someone started on the path of the grand theories of the universe.
    • 3/5
      Yuck. I loved Hawking's 'Brief History of Time', but I found this one thin (content-wise) and inconclusive. To call it the Grand Design, and then simply present work that says "there's lots of theories that all together form a cool picture" is disappointing. I realize I'm probably not the audience for this book, as I've read a LOT of popular science books, and I love this stuff, so maybe I should relax into this.If you've never read Hawking, or you don't have other pop physics books on your shelf, this would be a good read.
    • 5/5
      An accessible survey of the present state of the universe. A must.
    • 3/5
      Book was too short, could have used much more info. Very interesting nonetheless, got me thinking about my masters again
    • 2/5
      Interesting mixture of science and conjecture. Frankly, I came away a bit disappointed. Maybe I have read too many similar books. It did not seem to offer anything particularly new.
    • 5/5
      The book attempts to explain what scientists think are the laws of universe, and in particular what the M theory is. The M theory is an attempt at a theory of 'everything' meaning a theory fit to unify laws governing both subatomic particles, energy fields and big bodies, so far an unattainable feat for physicists. It's based on superstring theory and unifies quantum mechanics, general and special theory of relativity, and supports the view that our universe is a part of multiverse- an infinite collection of universes like ours. The book itself is extremely readable, clear and to the point peppered with Hawking signature quirky humour. It has an very clear explanation of quantum mechanics laws and why god is not needed in the creation of the universe.
    • 4/5
      This is one of those books general readers use to give themselves a glimpse of how great minds perceive reality. It's not too long, has humor and easy-to-understand illustrations, and creeps closer and closer to the author's conclusion so gently that as each chapter ends you realize you may not understand the science all that well, but the argument makes sense, at least within it's own logic, and you can actually follow the line of thought. Here Hawking explains his reasoning for promoting M-theory as a candidate for the "Theory of Everything". Using a lucid history of scientific theory, he traces the work of Kepler, Newton, Maxwell, Einstein, Feynman and others to lead readers out of their familiar paths of understanding and into theories which to our senses seem impossible. Even as readers might be thinking, OK, I've lost the thread, Hawking changes tactics enough to let the reader pause and be ready to go on with just enough comprehension to keep up. It's quite a feat, I think, for him to be able to know what mere mortals (and I'm not being sarcastic here) can tolerate and understand in order for him to not only give us some idea what he's talking about but to get us to trust that it's worth continuing to read.
    • 4/5
      Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time reportedly was one of the most purchased, most displayed, and least read scientific books of the late 1980s. Although the book contained no mathematics and minimal technical vocabulary, many readers found its concepts difficult to comprehend. (In fact, none other than a spokesman for the Pope mistakenly proclaimed that it demonstrated the necessity for a belief in God as the divine entity that began the universe). The Grand Design succeeds where that book arguably did not, and what's more, brings to a general readership the stunning implications of contemporary physics and cosmology. The book is clearly written, contains helpful diagrams, and enough corny humor to keep things light. Any difficulties in comprehension reflect the fact that the concepts themselves are counter-intuitive and far from easy to grasp. The universe turns out to be a very strange place indeed; and in fact, if the authors are correct, ours is but one of an infinite number of universes, in which every conceivable event has happened. Given that The Grand Design removes the necessity for a divine creator, one may feel compelled to ask: what percentage of the infinite number of universes would include a god or gods? And then, an unrelated question. With an infinite number of universes (many of which apparently lasted no more than a few seconds), do we not have a process of natural selection operating on a cosmic scale, such that our universe exists because it has succeeded where others have failed? Wouldn't it be both funny and ironic if our universe's persistence for the past 13.7 billion years (just like our presence on this small planet in a tiny solar system) reflects a form of cosmic evolution and natural selection? The Grand Design is a book that raises as many questions as it answers. It is a book that deserves to be read and understood, and if its radical implications take a while to sink in, we can take heart in the likelihood that our particular universe seems unlikely to disappear anytime soon. So far, at least, we're one of the lucky ones.
    • 4/5
      The Grand Design by Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow mostly succeeds at being accessible to the average reader given the academic subject matter. Still, it was hard to wrap my mind around some of the concepts. The examples were clear, but like physics itself, understanding them often required thinking in multiple dimensions.This book, as others like it, is a welcomed continual plea to bring scientific thinking to the greater public. The world surprisingly still leans heavily on superstition in trying to make sense of this mysterious space called the universe.