The Grand Design

This is one of the prettiest books that has come across my desk in a long time: well-bound, slick paper, gorgeous pictures. All in all, it is an excellent example of the book-maker's art. Unfortunately, the actual text is so slight that I was disappointed from cover to index.

My first disappointment was right on the cover. I understand that Stephen Hawking is a world famous scientist (and one whom I admire) but was he the primary writer of the text? I hope so, because why else does Leonard Mlodinow have his name in one-third the font size? Mlodinow's book on geometry (Euclid's Window) is a truly great book while Hawking's books, though interesting, are not nearly as well written. I understand that this likely has much to do with marketing but I'm always put off by "ghostwriting."

Then there's the fact that we're being fooled into thinking this is a full-sized hardcover when, in fact, at normal font size and spacing, this book would be a third of its size. Essentially, it is nothing more than a longish essay. As a teacher, I couldn't help but be reminded of students who play around with font size, spacing, and picture inserts to try to appear to reach the required length of an assignment. Disappointing.

Most importantly, however, is the fact that the argument these two highly intelligent men are trying to make is simply unconvincing. Joining the ranks of scientists out to convince everyone that there is no need for god, they are arguing that "M-theory is the only candidate for a complete theory of the universe" which means (among other things) that there are multiple universes that can spontaneously generate from nothing. Beyond that fact that I'm always cautious when any scientist proclaims absolutes and predicts the end of science, as this has happened as often as pastors predicting the end of the world with the same result, there's not enough depth to their development here to make their sweeping conclusions plausible.

In fact, I couldn't help feeling that this was something of an exercise in ego. That Hawking, in particular, is relying on the power of his fame to be convincing rather than the power of his argument. This book simply isn't detailed enough to be a fully-formed argument. I have a degree in physics, know its history, am familiar with Feynman's work, and understand the basics of string theory, but I couldn't see how someone without this kind of background would be able to follow much of this. I don't feel I came away with a clear view of what they were trying to say.

Still, they deserve credit for promoting their atheism without being strident or condescending to believers, and there are some interesting things here. I like some of the history, particularly in the early parts of the book. I like the hints at the difference between model-independent and model-dependent theories, though I thought they could have made more of this. I like the description of the "Game of Life" and what it might mean for the development of a "universe" based on a set of simple rules, though this seems to contradict the main assertion of the book, that an entire sequence of complicated theories is necessary to describe the universe.

In the end, however, it suffers from the same problem as many books of this type. In its most important conclusions, it is all speculation masquerading as certainty. I don't mind speculation, and Hawking and Mlodinow may turn out to be perfectly correct in many or all of their conclusions. But I think the door is a long way from being closed on the debate here, and this book didn't bring me any closer to being convinced.

The media hype is just that--hype. The Grand Design is a very disappointing performance by these elite minds. I expected much more substance from these authors. The essence of their thesis is covered in the final three chapters, a thesis weakly argued with unclear logic and minimal substantiation. I think a more authentic forum would have been an essay in Reader's Digest or Time Magazine.

The authors seek to answer three philosophical/religious questions, seeming to assert that physicists are the new priests with physics as the new religion, because "philosophy is dead". Their modality is application of the suppositions (unproven ideas) of theoretical physics to arrive at a conclusion that M-theory can prove the universe spontaneously erupted from nothing and if proved "will be a model of the universe that creates itself." If the critics of "psi" accept these authors' example of argument I will lose faith in the critics' objectivity when it comes to their evaluation of theories on paranormal phenomenon.

There is little that is new here. Proposing M-Theory as the basis for describing the origin of the universe is certainly not a new idea. Arguing for M-Theory describing a universe's spontaneous generation from nothing is a new proposal in the world of cosmology--but not for the realm of non-Greek based philosophy. Thousands of years ago the Taoist described the universe as self generated from nothing. It's nice to see cosmology is catching up to thousands-of-years-old philosophy, contrary to the authors' opposing assertion in their opening remarks.

I will grant the book will stir thought and argument, which may be the authors' primary goal, since after 30 years of effort string theory /M-theory is wallowing in a quagmire due to its failure to simplify into the grand design. The authors' assert that the disjointed complexity of the M-theory is as good as it gets, just compromise and don't waste any more time on trying to make it better--it is already The Grand Design. Hmmmmm, what was the basis of that argument again?

I hope the authors will take on the rigor of producing a mathematical model, derived from current work that has some validation from Cosmic Ray Background measurements to demonstrate their conclusions. That will at least, allow others to check their work and bring authenticity to the proposal. Maybe they've done that work and neglected to mention it--one can only hope?

I for one, as a professional physicist and engineer, am not convinced by their arguments and do not see that they answered the three philosophical questions proposed in the first chapter. By the end of reading the second chapter I added a fourth question...should cosmologist attempt to become philosophers?

Welcoming your responses,
Bob Lindberg

The only good thing I can say about this book is that it is beatifully illustrated. It is very rare that I give a popular physics book such a poor rating. In fact, this is the first time I think I have ever told people not to read one!

As a professional physicist, I think it is very important to understand the basis for all claims in science, proceed with metaphysical statements only when the scientist is fully cognizant of the limitations of such statements, and to keep in perspective the importance of philosophy in the sciences, as well as its role. It is then no wonder why I hated one of the first statements made in the book, namely, that philosophy is dead and has no role in science. Of course it does! Every act of interpreting data is a philosophical act. The formal act of developing a theory is itself an act of philosophy. The only thing I found more mind-boggling than this statement was that Hawking went on to spend the rest of the book talking about realism and anti-realism, which is a central debate in the philosophy of science. Hawking says nothing new about this debate, and I am not entirely sure what final point he was driving at because, as far as I can tell, the conclusion that would most support his position was undermined by numerous statements he made earlier on. His closing statements about working toward a final theory were undermined by the fact that he says that phenomena may have multiple theories attached to it and that no single theory is more correct than the other; it is simply a matter of which is more useful. This is strictly an anti-realist statement, yet it seems that Hawking believes a final theory is, somehow (although he doesn't state "how" this somehow could be, still possible.

I think that this book can only be the result of one of two things: 1) Apathy toward the topic, in which case I don't know why he wrote or 2) This book repesents the waning and utterly diminished mind of a once brilliant theorist. I would hope it is the former.

My biggest complaint about the book is that Hawking refuses to accept that the world is governed by cause and effect. He cites Feynman's idea of sum over histories, but this is taking a theoretical tool and proposing that this is the way the universe is, in-itself. There has been a huge push in the 20th century toward randomness in physics. I think the reason for this is that physicists are despairing over Hume's problem of "What constitutes a necessary causal connection?" Moreover, physicists are also despairing over a question formally posed in the 19th century "What constitutes a necessary statistical inference?" The lack of progress on these two questions have, in my opinion, induced despair and, consequently, indolence. Rather than try to proceed on the natural assumption of physical science, that all physical phenomena are induced by prior physical phenomena, they are simply saying that there is no cause and effect, only randomness that is loosely governed by laws of physics. This a position that Hawking holds to in his book, which is an ironically philosophical one for someone who thinks that philosophy is dead.

If you decide to read this book, be sure to ask at every turn "Is this statement a testable one?" This will provide you with a test to decide whether a statement is a scientific one or a philosophical one.

While there is beginning to be a build up of negative reviews for this book, I want to preface my review by saying that Dr. Hawking is still one of the top players in his field and that his views hold considerable weight given his track record. That being said, I found this book to mirror what most of the reviews have already noted. Nothing new is presented here that wasn't already said in Hawking's earlier book A Brief History of Time. Hawking begins the book by saying that philosophy is dead and that scientists must answer the tough questions about life....then launches into philosophy for a good part of the book. While Hawking has done much work with quantum mechanics, there are reasons to be skeptical of his conclusions given what other prominent people in his field have to say and the current state of knowns and unknowns about quantum mechanics. The best I can say is that the book is interesting at times but highly speculative and the conclusions drawn are questionable. I would suggest reading Roger Penrose's review of the book to get an idea of what his colleagues (Penrose is certainly of the same stature as Hawking, just not as much of a name outside of the scientific field) had to say. Hawking so far as I know, has not really responded to some of the challenges from those within his community.

Conclusion: Don't buy the book unless you're a really big Hawking fan or are doing research on the subject and want Hawking's thoughts on quantum mechanics and scientific determinism. The book is rather short and can be read in just a few days. Perhaps there was a letdown because people expected more from a Stephen Hawking book ( I may be guilty of this )but it feels like Hawking is going over familiar territory and did not do enough to substantiate his position on the subject. Regardless of your feelings about Hawking's atheistic conclusions I would say that theists, agnostics, and atheists alike will not find the challenging, cutting edge book that many had hope for or expected.

Disappointing. I read the book in just a few hours - it is definitely lightweight reading. Most of the book is, as others have noted, a review of introductory modern physics, but not with much depth. I too was stunned at the ending which sort of pulled a rabbit out of a hat with "Bodies such as stars or black holes cannot appear out of nothing. But a whole universe can." It may well be that M-theory leads to that, but I didn't feel prepared at all for that leap. The missing preparation is the book's problem for me.

This book has gotten plenty of news coverage due to its theological discussions, so let's just get this out of the way: Hawking does not claim that God does not exist. Rather, he and his co-author claim that it is not necessary to invoke a God to explain the existence of our universe. Of course this is not a new or particularly controversial idea in modern physics, and Hawking has already made similar claims over 20 years ago in A Brief History of Time. So, those reviewers who are so hung up on this issue should simply take a few deep breaths and realize that science has long since moved past the traditional ideas of creation.

Now, the book itself is very short and easy to read. At under 200 pages and with some beautifully designed graphics, reading this book probably wont be an exhaustive task. On the other hand, I'm sure many of the concepts will sound a bit crazy to those not familiar with the craziness of quantum mechanics. Nevertheless, Hawking and Mledinow do a great job at explaining why there are very good reasons to think that the implications of quantum mechanics are true - namely, that they've been experimentally verified.

As far as pop-physics books go, you could do better (the length of the book doesn't allow the authors to go into much detail). But you could also do a hell of a lot worse; A Brief History of Time, even though it's one of the most popular physics books of all time, is much more tedious and boring. The Grand Design, on the other hand, certainly has the best explanations of Hawking's ideas that I've read.

To summarize, a person buying this book because of the media hype will almost certainly be disappointed. Hawking doesn't attempt to disprove God or anything like that, but he does give a pretty good account for how we can understand the universe without appealing to a creator. But if you're mildly interested in the subject of theoretical physics, this book is perfect.

"...there is no guarantee that competence within a specialized discipline carries with it automatically the ability to form an undistorted picture of the relation of the specialized discipline to other human and intellectual concerns. In fact the special competence may prove a special kind of handicap."
- "Analysis and Metaphysics", P. F. Strawson

Five stars for physics and zero star for philosophy, especially for the claim "Philosophy is dead".

Synopsis

Two famous physicists set out to demonstrate that `philosophy is dead' and that physics can explain the entire universe.

Structure

This is a well-presented and beautifully illustrated book. It begins with the assertion that physics can explain all of mankind's important questions, such as `Where did the universe come from?' and `What is the nature of reality?' As a consequence, and in their opinion, philosophy is dead. Such a statement fails to recognise the significance of any questions which can't be addressed by physicists. `What is a good life?' and `How should I live?' spring immediately to mind.

I quite enjoy a bit of arrogance and dramatic overstatement sometimes but this smacks of ignorance. It dismisses the value of anything which can't be understood by physicists and diminishes the impact of the book.

The book then provides a rapid and well-written overview of our understanding of physical laws, beginning with Newton and Maxwell and moving through to Einstein, Feynman and beyond. At this point I began to lose the plot, since I'm not a physicist. For example, an explanation of Feynman's sum-over histories of particles in the two slit experiment suggested that each particle takes every possible path in the universe between the slit and the screen. How this can happen in a finite time, given that the speed of light isn't infinite, wasn't touched upon and I for one was left uncertain of how this explanation improves the understanding of Young's famous experiment.

The book then describes something called M-theory but it's done in such an opaque fashion that I was left uninformed by the explanation. The most informative passage in the book, for me, was an illustration of why time has no meaning before the big bang. Just as you can't travel further north than the North Pole on the curved surface of the Earth, so you can't look further back in curved space-time than the instant the whole thing started. Finally we move to the answer to the questions posed at the beginning of the book. There are an infinite number of universes and we just happen to inhabit one of the many in which the physical laws permit our existence. That's fine, and may well be true, but this explanation hardly constitutes the answer to all of the questions of philosophy.

Strengths

This is a well produced, well written and attractive book which includes a good summary of the major physical laws of the universe.

Weaknesses

The book failed to adequately explain M-theory and confused the inquiries of moral philosophy with those of theoretical physics. The authors demonstrate a degree of hubris and arrogance which doesn't engage the sympathy of this reader.

Conclusion

I enjoyed reading the book, even though I felt that it failed to achieve its purpose and convince me that physics can now provide an explanation of the universe. I think that the authors would benefit from getting out of their physics labs and maybe listening to some Beethoven.

I bought this book with an expectation to see some new ideas and new insights into the understanding of modern physics and creation of the universe. Every single idea in the book is old and have been covered before. The book simply restates those ideas without giving any new insights. If you already know "sum over histories" understanding of quantum, model dependent reality, anthropic principal, and multiple universes (multiverse) hypothesis you already know everything in the book. All these subjects have been covered in many other popular science books.
On the last two pages the authors state that individual matter can not exist by itself but the whole universe can exist. This is the claim they should be spending time on to explain; however they merely cover it in one and a half pages without giving adequate explanation why that is. They simply state that gravity has negative energy therefore "done". I expected a more detailed explanation about why the universe can exist without any external energy.
I am wondering if I can claim my money back from Amazon.

This book was a big disappointment. Written by one of the most brilliant theoretical physics of our time, Stephen Hawking, together with Leonard Mlodinow (also known as a science popularizer), one would expect much better.
The book is superficial and without a strong guideline. Theories such as Inflation, Relativity and String Theory/M-Theory are only briefly and superficially described. Quantum Mechanics is described in a little more detail, but only in the light of Feynman's "sum of all stories" interpretation.

Based on Feynman's "sum of all histories" model, Hawking brings up the Multiverse model, but in a confusing way, that leaves you questioning whether Hawking believes in "real" (existing) multiple universes or if those multiple universes are only mathmatical identities - histories of the "sum of all histories" Feynman's model applied to Universe as a quantum entity.

Based on the "sum of all histories" model, applied to the Universe, Hawking seems to defend the strong anthropic principle: the universe is the way we see it, because by observing it, we eliminate all the histories that would lead to a different universe, and so we are left with just a few histories of the universe which, using Feynman's path integral, would lead to the universe we observe.

Hawking finishes the book by strongly defending that the M-theory is the only candidate to the complete physics theory, even though he gave no strong arguments why M-theory is, to start with, a good theory - and, even less, why it is better or even the only one. It looks as if the main goal of Hawking was to declare M-theory as the theory to be considered in the next years, and the 160 pages that preceded that declaration were nothing but an incoherent set of excuses for that final declaration.

However, I can't say that I learnt nothing from this book, because there was a new thing (at least to me): the "Game of Life", by John Conway. This is a (computer) model of a two-dimension rule where, with a few simple (fundamental) rules, we can see it generating structure and (apparent) complex laws. This maybe the (almost) perfect analogy on why we should, in the midst of all the complexity of the universe, try to find simple (more fundamental) laws and explanations (even though Hawking does not say it with so many words). This almost saved the book...

The current book of sensational discussion is Stephen Hawking's "The Grand Design," written with fellow physicist Leonard Mlodinow. Hawking is the Superstar of Science, and Mlodinow wrote scripts for "Star Trek." The book's release has fueled resurgent discussions about the question of God's existence, owing to the authors' claim that the existence of the universe, including the "why" questions formerly reserved for philosophy and theology, require no positing of a divine, creative intelligence.

The book is filled with fascinating descriptions of the strange and wonderful ways of nature. Although the discussion is "dumbed down" for the sake of generating a lay-audience for the book, it is still difficult for the non-specialist to get a wrap on some of the more weird aspects of Quantum physics. This review will attempt a dumbed-down interpretation of my own tenuous grasp of what Hawking and Mlodinow are saying.

Hawking and Mlodinow are very smart guys, for sure, and they know lots and lots about physics. As I understand their presentation, we exist in a universe that is just one of an unimaginable number of universes (10/500) that have been created spontaneously and simultaneously out of Gravity. Out of so many universes, it is highly likely that at least one of them would support life, and we just happen to be in that one (or one of those). In this context, it should not surprise us that the universe we are in should look like it was designed especially for us and our understanding.

This vision constitutes what Hawking/Mlodinow identify as "M-theory," which stands for the idea of multiple universes (or a "multiverse.")

The authors make interesting and provocative claims, such as: "the universe does not have just a single existence or history, but rather every possible version of the universe exists simultaneously in what is called a quantum superposition." And this "has passed every experimental text to which it has ever been subjected."

What I get out of this is that just about anything is possible somewhere in the universe or somewhere in the multiverse, because different sets of laws would pertain, depending on where you were (if, in fact, you could exist at all). What is certain, however, is that the reality of God is unnecessary to explain any of this.

I'll concede that the authors unfold in entertaining fashion a vision of "how" things came to be, but I am not at all convinced that they have handled the "why" questions very well at all ("why is there something rather than nothing," "why are we here?") What I did notice is that along the way, Hawking/Mlodinow resort (rather typically, in discussions of this sort) to rather unscientific concepts, like "luck," "lucky," and "good fortune" when addressing the apparent "fine-tuning" of our universe to the support of intelligent, carbon-based life. We've seen all that before, from lesser minds than Hawking's. But where does it all come from in the first place? Hawking's and Mlodinow's answer is Gravity, which seems to be an ultimate, eternally existing reality that allows something to proceed from nothing. That Gravity is a "something," however, seems to be skipped over, and "why" there should be that power is not explained. It is the given law, eternally and absolutely existing. "Because there is a law like gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist."

But this is not the sense in which human beings ask these existential questions, which come from meditation on the human condition. This rootedness of the "why" question provides the context for the significance of the question in the first place, but the authors seem not to recognize or even realize this. The authors here smuggle a "how" in as an explanation of a "why" question, all the time rather arrogantly declaring that "philosophy is dead." Their final shot at this is to say that "we human beings . . . are ourselves mere collections of fundamental particles of nature." But we already have that from Bertrand Russell and Jacques Monod, et. al. It's just that now, with The Grand Design, we get it with less pathos, accompanied rather by some amusing cartoons, colorful pictures, and some very flat attempts at humor in the narrative.

I respect the authors, but M-Theory has been around since the 1990's. The book doesn't seem to introduce anything new, but does simplify the issues for the casual physicist and shows, perhaps, that M-Theory is gaining support from the larger brains in the scientific community.

I am under the impression that the book has been written in hurry. Especially, the last - and the most important chapter of the book - the chapter discussing the concept of the Grand Design of the universe. In fact, this was the main reason I have purchased this book - to understand the latest thoughts of Stephen Hawking on science, God, the universe, and on other important questions.

I had enjoyed the beginning of the book, which talked about the history and the evolution of science. I was very disappointed with the ending and with the overall level of logic and reasoning used towards the end of the book. "Sloppy" - is the right word for it.
Anyway, the book doesn't really offer the answer or anything reasonably believable in terms of the idea of the Grand Design. It focuses much more on the old and known and spends relatively little time on the very subject of the book. It turns philosophical at times, but most of the arguments it offers are superfluous and incomplete.

And, I am not even going to comment on the quality of humor used. This is just one example: "Ten dimensions might sound exciting, but they would cause real problems if you forgot where you parked your car".

Funny?

This is a great sequel to the 2001 bestseller "The Universe In A Nutshell" by Stephen Hawking titled "Grand Design". Stephen Hawking expands/solidifies & summarises where he left of in his previous book "The Universe In A Nutshell" on the "Theory Of Everything" (ToE) also known as the M-Theory to explain the existence of life, the Universe & everything (what he calls 'The Ultimate Question of Being') : the Universe was created by gravity from nothing (spontaneous creation) [The total energy of the Universe is Zero], and thus "God didn't create the Universe", he argues.

Gravity in the form of curved space permeates the whole bulk of higher-dimensional space-time. The M-Theory suggests there are 11 space-time dimensions & not 10 : these are very small & their numbers may be more. The Brane world is a four-dimensional surface & brane itself with 11 dimensional space-time. The Uncertainity Principle would allow spontaneous world to appear from nothing like bubbles, with brane forming the surface of the bubble & the interior being the 11 dimensional space-time due to gravity.

The discovery of "new planets" since 1992 suggests the existence of "multiverses" (not just our own Universe) and that our planet may not be unique as against what Isaac Newton alluded to a very long time ago. But not everybody agrees with Stephen Hawking on "God didn't create the Universe" theory, even at his own University of Cambridge : Religious groups argue that Science may provide the narrative on how existence may occur, but religion addresses the meaning of that narrative!

"Grand Design" book is a very interesting book, will be controversial in some religious circles, but is a good summary of the current status of scientific knowledge in the quest for the origin of the Universe & its complexities, highly recommended reading. The book is well written in simple language for the general public, humerous way in some areas & is well illustrated : no wonder Stephen Hawking is an academic celebrity!

A Brief History of Time had me all excited for Hawking's "next" book. I pre-ordered The Grand Design prior to its release I was so excited. He dumbed this up to the level it was a great sleep aid. I'm sorry, I still will pre-order his next book based on my old memories of his writing, but this one missed the mark.

Stephen Hawking's Theology Revealed in The Grand Design
By John H. Calvert

The title of Stephen Hawking's latest book, "The Grand Design," implies that the universe arose from an intelligence. But, the message inside is the opposite. For Hawking the apparent design of our universe and of life is an illusion, explained by unguided natural causes. So, he doesn't "need" a Creator to relate our lives to the world.

He claims everything just naturally arose out of a quantum event that has no pre-history or antecedent such as God. All that followed was determined by the mindless laws of physics and chemistry that have no author. Even our free will is an illusion.

Like an oracle, Hawking is revered as the high priest of modern science. He admits these conclusions seem absurd, for which he blames quantum physics. The absurdity of quantum theory is true for him but unknowable to us.

So, what can a lay person make of this "scientific" answer to the ultimate question of life: Where do we come from? Should we too believe we don't need God?

I am like a skeptic who eons ago got advice from a Roman High Priest derived from his "readings" of the entrails of a gutted calf. How can I, lacking the ability to read entrails or understand quantum theory, trust the Priest's explanations?

Perhaps we should ask the Priest: "Are you required to provide an atheistic explanation for the origin of the universe and life? Can you ever entertain the alternative suggested by much of the evidence and the title of your book that the apparent design of the universe and of life may be real?"

The questions are answered on pages 29-34. For Hawking, "Modern science" does not allow any intervention in the natural world by an intelligent cause. Only an atheistic answer may be given by the "modern scientist" to the ultimate question. Richard Lewontin, another "modern scientist," explains that this Dogma or commitment to "materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door."

Oddly, Hawking asks if the universe "needs a creator," when he knows his Dogma doesn't permit it. This is weird, because the Dogma suppresses critical thinking and open-minded inquiry, the core value of true science. Why does he even write the book or engage in the inquiry if the answer is specified in advance?

Imagine a coroner sent to the ascertain the cause of a death. He finds the deceased hanging by the neck from a tree, hands tied behind his back, and five tightly spaced arrows buried in his heart. An autopsy shows an arrow caused the death when it stopped the heart.

The prosecutor looks at the coroner's report, which classifies the death as "accidental," and says: "This is absurd, the data shows a homicide." The coroner, responds: "Well the rules don't allow an intelligent cause, so the only ones left are natural or accidental. The death was not natural, so it must be accidental."

I read on with growing skepticism. In Chapter 7 - "The Apparent Miracle," Hawking details significant evidence that the Universe and the properties of the matter, energy and forces that constrain it have been "fine-tuned" or designed for life. Life would not exist if any of the values of these physical features had been set differently by just a small amount. So, the data "suggests" a "miracle" accounts for life.

The only way to show the miracle to be an illusion is to show it happened by chance. But a single universe doesn't provide enough chances. So to not "need" God, he needs more chances, which he artfully acquires by pulling 10500 additional "parallel" universes out of a quantum hat.

But we can't observe any of these other universes, count them or know how they arose, if they did.

There is an additional problem with this seemingly contrived explanation. It rests on the false assumption, explained on page 32, that once the laws of physics and chemistry are in place, they determine life, just as they determine "the orbits of the planets." This is not the case, as biochemists have known for fifty years that the laws of physics and chemistry do not determine the content of the messages in DNA that drive life. The sequences of the four genetic symbols that carry the messages of life per a "code" are arbitrary and not determined by law. Otherwise, DNA could not carry the functional information necessary to generate and control life.

This misunderstanding undermines the no-God conclusion, for even if a quantum event can explain the laws of our Universe, those laws have not been shown adequate to explain the origin of life.

Hawking's theology also uses an incorrect definition of "religion" when he seeks to exclude it from science.

He admits the question his book addresses is "The Ultimate Question of Life." But, that is a religious as well as a scientific question. Legally and functionally, religion includes Atheism and other non-theistic beliefs, about ultimate questions - "matters of ultimate concern." Thus, his dogmatic no-God response to this religious question promotes the religion of Atheism, not an agnostic, open-minded science.

So, whether or not intended, the effect of The Grand Design, is a misleading theology that promotes the religion of Atheism. It is not an objective discussion of the state of our scientific knowledge about origins. Atheists will love it, but they are not the only patrons and beneficiaries of science.

The title of the book, "The Grand Design", belies the actual content between the covers. This work is an elementary description of current cosmologic thought on the origins of the universe in terms readily understandable by most layman. However, Hawkings and Mlodinow seem to make this their holy grail quest to disprove the existence of God. The proof of God is a philosophic argument without direct observations available for comment by the scientific community. The same can be said for the M-theory. As the authors point out, the "theory" has yet to be confirmed by observations. The history of the development of this theory is nicely laid out by the authors, making note of the fact that it requires "renormalization" to make the possible answers fit the observations. This is what is otherwise known as fudging. The lack of direct observations, required by scientific determinism rather than faith, seems to pose no problem to the authors in having the world accept M-theory as the equation describing the "Grand Design". The authors attempt to solve the greatest philosophic question of the universe by having the readers believe mathematics is the universal truth rather than being a means to an end. This is the crux of the problem with this work. As Fodor and Palmarini pointed out in their book, "What Darwin Got Wrong", it is not that the science behind the apparent evidence is wrong, but that the conclusions drawn from those observations are misinterpreted and misapplied. I would have enjoyed the book more if it had dealt more with the history and science of cosmology, rather than the philosophic conclusions drawn from the lack of direct observation supporting a theory in need of physical proof.

THE GRAND DESIGN is a provocative work, which addresses a range of tantalizing questions in cosmology, while doing so in an accessible and entertaining fashion. Its view of the universe, I might add, is complemented by another book that came out at roughly the same time: THE SHAPE OF INNER SPACE. While THE GRAND DESIGN takes a large-scale view of the universe, in covering the broad sweep of cosmology, THE SHAPE OF INNER SPACE views things on a much smaller scale, focusing on the inner workings of the universe, which may stem from the geometry of postulated "hidden dimensions," too tiny to be seen. Both books are highly recommended, and the composite picture that one can get from reading them both is quite amazing.

I recommend *The Grand Design* if you like thinking about ultimate questions.

The authors' thesis centers on Feynman path integrals, with parallel universes thrown in for good measure. This is an approach to quantum mechanics one can almost understand. Basically, they say that, just as quantum mechanics makes the future undetermined, so it makes the past undetermined. In the double-slit experiment, a particle hitting the screen at a particular spot does not tell you how it got there. In fact, it got there by taking ALL the paths from its source to the screen, including going through one or both slits one or more times, not one specific path. Likewise, the past of our universe is a collection of a huge number of coexisting universes. In most of them the very laws of nature, including the fundamental constants, are different; the configurations are different; and even the number of large-scale space dimensions is different, so that life did not evolve. There was not even a "Big Bang" (i.e., a sharp beginning) because the paths don't have to go from point A (Big Bang) to point B (the world today), but could go from no particular point to point B. (They call it "no-boundary condition".) And gravity's negative energy is always there to counterbalance the positive energy needed for matter to spontaneously appear. This is a little more than the old anthropic principle (which said that the world is the way it is because if it weren't we wouldn't be here to wonder about it).

I believe their conclusion, in the last few paragraphs, that God is not necessary in the process they describe was put there more to sell books than to present a logical argument, and sure enough that's what the press spotlighted in free-advertisement screaming headlines ("Hawking: God didn't create universe!") They say: "Because there is a law like gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist. It is not necessary to invoke God." Say what? Where is gravity coming from? Who set the entire process they describe in motion? Where is the expected argument that the universe couldn't help itself?

Everything goes. So what else is new?

I thought this book was delightful. The subject matter is fascinating for any armchair physicist, even if it is a little difficult to understand at times. Hawking and Mlodinow have written this book in a very casual, storytelling style. This makes it a lot easier to follow the material. Some have criticized the lack of references, but I would have found endless lists of references pretty distracting given the style of writing. Some minor footnotes regarding certain points might have been nice, but in general, a lot of the stuff that "should" have been cited is either (a) fairly common knowledge that could easily be googled for more info, or (b) personal theoretical work of the authors anyway.

My only complaint is that this book is short. More details in certain sections could have been nice, but at the same time, more detail might have taken away from the accessibility and easy-to-understand writing style that Hawking and Mlodinow used in the book.

For those who are wondering, based on the multitudes debating about this book currently: Hawking does not actually say there is no god. What he says is that it is possible to explain the emergence of the universe and everything we see around us without resorting to a divine source. In other words, he says god is not necessary. That doesn't mean god definitely doesn't exist; it doesn't mean god can't exist - it just means that there is no reason to assume the existence of the universe is "proof" of god, since there are equally valid scientific explanations.

I would definitely recommend reading this book, though, especially if you are interested in theoretical physics & cosmology. The current theories are very elegantly explained in this book, and the occasional humor interjected by the authors makes it an enjoyable read.

I agree with many of the arguments made in the book. Much of current theory was already developed when I was a student in the 1970's and recent theories explain much of what didn't seem to match theory then.

I remember in undergraduate and graduate chemistry quantum mechanics and modern physics classes being puzzled by facts like: when two hydrogen atoms approach each other, their electrons seem to telegraph a signal to each other before contact that they must have the opposite spins in order not to violate the Pauli Exclusion Principle so they can bond and form H2 - the normal way hydrogen gas exists in nature. Extensions of Feynman's work, explained in this book, can account for that.

And I'm not one to claim that a deity is necessary for the existence of the universe as we know it.

But while the theories presented in the book are fascinating and a great read, I still find the arguments in this book to fail in two ways:

The basic conclusion of this book is that one theory explains our universe because it's the only candidate theory that fits. How egotistical! In the 1890's Thomson's "Plum Pudding Model" of the Atom was the only theory that fit but, as Rutherford's Experiment eventually showed, it didn't fit forever and all along other theories were possible but no one had yet thought of them.

Secondly, the book discusses "elegance" in theories early on in the book, and then drifts far from it as the book rolls on! Scientific elegance is based on the idea that nature is basically simple and symmetrical and a theory should be relatively simple and straightforward. The Ptolemaic system of the universe with the Earth in the center relied on complicated wheels upon wheels to explain planetary and star motion. It was too complicated to make sense. Yet, the book wants us to believe that a combination of overlapping theories -each of which only explains a small part of the overall universe- is elegant???

Personally, I've always felt the current theories of sub-atomic matter are NOT elegant and we have therefore probably missed some very important and simplifying point and I've wished a concept would occur to me that would generate a new theory. It hasn't, so I don't claim current theories are wrong, simply that they are theories -not scientific laws! Perhaps a similar conclusion should have been made by this book - which would not diminish its arguments in any way except to say the authors, like J.J. Thomson, don't know it all!

This is an attractive glossy book, but irritatingly simplistic, and worse, outdated - it could well have been written ten years ago. Egregiously missing are any mentions - even to challenge them - of Bell's Theorem, Alain Aspect, quantum entanglement and nonlocality, and the radical reinvisioning of physics, and indeed our world view, that these developments have necessitated.

I was very interested to learn that the universe may, in fact, exist in 10 or 11 different dimensions and that this situation may present certain problems in the event you can't remember where you parked your car! Seriously though, I am glad that the authors of this delightful little book were not too serious themselves. This is a seriously complex subject but the material is presented in a very light, occasionally humorous way in language suitable for the non-scientist.

I waded throughA Brief History of Time many years ago and I found that I understood the first half of every chapter for the first half or three-quarters of the book and was pretty much lost with the rest. With this book, I was able to come away with a much clearer picture of things. I am not about to advance the latest grand unification theory any time soon but I finished this eminently readable volume with a sense of having grasped quite a lot of what was said. Well done!

Much of the latter portion is written in an authoritarian manner without adequate dialectic to support conclusions. However, early part presents an excellent historical review of significant developments in science.

This book is essentially a review of cosmology technology progress over the last 300 years and the author's spin on what it all means. There are other more satisfying books on the current state of knowledge, such as "The Elegant Universe", for example. "Satisfying" for me is understanding more about the technical details and the logic thereof. So if you want the high level perspective, this book will work for you.

As for Hawking he proclaims that "philosphy is dead." But it seems to me that statement should really be "old philosophy is dead". The new philosophy is that creating mathematical models and other constructs followed by experimentation will determine what really happened 13.7 billion years ago. The current model of choice is "M Theory".

It seems to me that the very thing that Hawking mocks, that is lack of knowledge, is what still is present today. Philosophical and scientific positions were based on what people had to work with. We know more today than they did 300 or even 30 years ago, but we sure don't know everything. We have a long, long way to go in that department.

So don't expect answers in this book. What you will get is the authors' conjecture of what the universe is, a philosophy so to speak.

The Grand Design by Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow is one of those physic books that, even though the authors have tried their best to simplify the concepts, still takes some work to get your mind to understand. I'm still not sure that the universe is comprehensible no mater how hard the scientists try to make it but I find that this book helps! The words are well chosen to lead you through the world of Quantum Theory, Alternative Histories and The Theory of Everything. Whether or not you can understand your surroundings are up to your education, imagination and in a large part your spiritual beliefs. I found the book to be an informative introduction to a wonders of the universe (as we understand them today!)

I agree the physical book itself is a quality production. I have become extremely interested in cosmology in recent years as a way to show how all things taught in science are related. I have read quite a number of texts and each helps with my understanding on one issue or another, so I keep looking for explanations from different perspectives . I found a few explanations of the quantum world in this book very helpful. However, the principle thrust did seem to promote the authors views on God and on M theory. I could find no referencing or suggestions for further reading. To make there case, the authors speak of a number of theories and interpretations of evidence as though they are universally accepted, which I suspect are not. For instance, they rely heavily on the theory of inflation, for which I did not see, on my reading, credit given to Alan H. Guth. I do not know how generally this theory is accepted, but a look at the April 2011 issue of Scientific American provides some idea. I did, however, find the authors personal views interesting. Finally, as another reviewer noted, the size of print used for the authors names raised questions. I too felt this was better written than other Stephen Hawking books.

The Grand Design is an approachable book about quantum physics and the universe(s). The topics in the book are within the grasp of a reader who has taken an introductory physics or astronomy course, but the reader is no more enlightened after completing the book.

For the general public, Death by Black Hole has better content and a more humorous writing style. It is the standard.

1- History of natural sciences covers almost half of the book, this kind of information can easily be reached by any reader in a school text book,
2- Too much emphasis is given to Richard Feynman's views and M-Theory, which both of them is not prooved up to present day and according to many other scientists, are highly speculative.

As someone with a fair background in quantum mechanics, I found this book to be excessive in explaining basic quantum aspects that most people either know, or easily accept without the need for several analogies. The double split experiment was brought up countless times to describe the probabilistic interpretation of a particles position. While that in itself didn't bother me as the book is catered to the masses, when it came to controversial or complex quantum theory like Feynman sums and using them to explain how every possible history that can occur is, has, or will, the authors seemed to either assume people wouldn't get it anyway so "why bother" or they didn't understand it or believe it themselves enough to explain it any further and instead left the reader with a one or two paragraph general statement that often caused me to go back and ask, what? How did they just make that logic leap? Most people read this book to learn how M-theory answers all of the question the previous reviews refer to, me included, but what I got instead was an overly simplified view of quantum mechanics that I already knew.

Stephen Hawking's new book 'The Grand Design' makes an interesting read. It is an informative but popular book about contemporary theoretical physics, stimulating, witty and, with its magnificent artwork, aesthetically as well as intellectually pleasing.

Eight chapters take you on a journey starting with the ancient Greeks and ending with M-theory. On the way complicated ideas such as quantum theory, relativity, super-gravity, the anthropic principle (both weak and strong), as well as questions as to the relevance of God for science and why we exist, are clearly discussed. I recommend this book to those who have a basic background in physics but you might also consider reading Brian Greene's 'The Elegant Universe' which covers the same material with equal clarity but more depth. Finally, as could be expected, 'The Grand Design' does not give a better answer to the meaning of life than that already supplied by Monty Python or Douglas Adams.

Is the book without blemish? Unfortunately not. Regrettably the publishers seem to think that anyone reading a book on quantum and space-time physics will be bewildered by the concept of 10 raised to a power and will feel happier if some temperatures are given in Fahrenheit. Furthermore there are two self-inflicted problems, one minor, the other not quite so. Let us start with the minor problem.

The book starts with a flourish. "Philosophy is dead", we are told; "Scientists have become the bearers of the torch of discovery". This initial lack of modesty is backed-up by an occasional outbreak of Aristotle-bashing. According to the authors the old man with the beard "didn't make definite predictions, and when [he] did, the predictions weren't always in agreement with observation. One of these predictions was that heavier objects should fall faster because their purpose is to fall."

But unfortunately for Messrs Hawking and Mlodinow heavier things do fall faster as any underweight member of a sky-diving group will certify. They know that it is difficult to hold hands in a circle when descending with their more corpulent companions because 'fatties fall faster'. Indeed Newton's equations are adequate to show why. Similarly-shaped objects but of differing mass will fall at equal rates in a vacuum (which neither Aristotle nor the authors believe in) but in air the heavier ones come down quicker. So 1 point to Aristotle, 0 points to the two contemporary physicists. (This is a reason to buy the first edition because such an embarrassing blunder will certainly disappear in revised versions.)

Steven Weinberg described in chapter seven of his book 'Dreams of a Final Theory' the annoyance that philosophy can cause physicists. Unfortunately such explanations are lacking in 'The Grand Design'. Furthermore the demonstration that the authors are capable of scoring home-goals gives the impression of haste and superficiality and make us wary to accept uncritically other statements. And rightly so because the second problem is less trivial.

At the very beginning of the book it is suggested that we should adopt 'model-dependent realism' to understand our universe. According to the authors what is important is that a theory correctly predicts things which can be observed. If two theories "accurately predict the same events, one cannot be said to be more real than the other; rather, we are free to use whichever model is most convenient." If you take them literally then what they are saying is something like:
it does not matter if one theory uses electron, quarks and bosons to predict a result and the other utilizes little green men with bongo sticks; if both methods make accurate predictions which conform to our experiences when tested then both are equally valid and both are equally 'real'.

Now if a theory is real so too must be the entities that that theory uses. By 'real' I mean that there is a correspondence between an entity which we define in our theory (like mass, electron or quark) and something in the world which exists independently of us. For so-called 'scientific realists' electrons are not a convenient fiction: they really do exist. But if everything that makes the correct predictions is equally real, as the authors seem to suggest, then this can only be good news for little green men with bongo sticks. (Even taken literally Messrs Hawking and Mlodinow would not be advocating something new - it's called 'constructive empiricism' - although its followers normally remain agnostic about the possible reality of theoretical entities.)

Of course Hawking and Mlodinow do not believe this, they are full-bloodied scientific realists (like the vast majority of us). They believe there is a real world out there full of stuff that we can comprehend through science and they testify to this in the rest of their book by speaking of electrons, photons, and quarks in the same breath as footballs and rubber ducks on water. For them even when two theories predict the same result one can be superior; for example, even at low velocities Einstein mass is an improvement on Newton's definition because it is a better description of reality, (or - and just to be provocative - what Aristotle would have regarded as the 'essence' of mass).

Much later in the book it becomes clear why the authors attach such importance to a 'model-dependent reality'. We are told "It could be that the physicist's traditional expectation of a single theory of nature is untenable, and there exists no single formulation." Instead of a 'theory of everything' it is suggested we could use the family of theories collectively known as M-theory. Each individual theory successfully predicts observable phenomena in its own domain and each agrees with its neighbors on predictions where they overlap. We are given the impression that M-theory is like one-stop-shopping: a place where you can find the theory that fits your particular, if limited, requirement. (Unfortunately very little else is discussed in the book about M-theory, although we are assured it is the ultimate solution.)

Now it could be that the 'model-dependent reality' approach is appropriate in string theory. This is far removed from the microscopic concepts like electrons and photons we normally use. But its general use, and this is what is advocated in the beginning of the book, is a problem because it is a body-blow to scientific realism. It means that the same entity could be a flat plate in one theory and a tortoise in another. Only where two theories overlap is it turtles all the way down! In other words there is nothing fundamental, nothing thought-independent, about any entity used in these theories. Each time you change theories you get new entities. And the entities are new because they have different properties. Entities are defined through their properties (Newton's mass has different properties than Einstein's) so if the properties change so too does the entity. The plate first becomes a turtle then a tortoise. Everything is metamorphic and everything changes according to the theory you wish to use.


As for God, well the authors' concept seems not to have progressed further than the beginning of Genesis. Einstein was once asked if he believed in God. He replied that he believed in Spinoza's God. However Messrs Hawking and Mlodinow would have to read philosophy to understand why this response might be more profound than their answer.

Some scientists and their published works are celebrated because they articulate a heretofore unknown truth about Nature. These scientists discover something new, and they document their novel findings through the scientific method. Pop celebrities, however, such as Paris Hilton and Stephen Hawking, are celebrated because they are celebrated. They are famous because they are famous, rather than because they have contributed anything substantive. Hawking's appeal to the mass media here is, very sadly and unfairly, similar to the media appeal of Ripley's two-headed calf or to a dead whale's cruising through town on a railroad flatcar. The visual effect is so bizarre that news of the spectacle overshadows other stories of deeper significance and relevance. Our legitimate compassion for a courageous and brilliant scientist, unfairly afflicted, has paralyzed our own objectivity and afflicted our own thinking with "appeals to authority" fallacies whenever Hawking's books are discussed. Publishers Weekly's "starred review" of this book is truly a joke, written by a professional reviewer too timid dare to criticize the work of a celebrity superstar.

This book, The Grand Design, written by Hawking (allegedly) and Leonard Mlodinow, was published solely to cash in on Hawking's celebrity. (Recall Hawking's self-stated reason for writing A Brief History of Time: "I wanted to write a book that would sell in airport bookstalls." ) This book contains nothing new whatever -- as many other Amazon reviewers have already correctly noted -- and it contains no material that hasn't been regurgitated on The Science Channel for years in their never-ending marathon of series on Black Holes. (Just once I'd like to see a program about the periodic table.) Moreover, The Grand Design fails even to adequately address the questions that the promotional material hawks (a form of hawking fallacy) : Why do we exist? Why this particular set of laws and not some other? Is there a unified theory of everything? What is it?

About ninety-five percent of this book is filler: a stale rehashing of the history of science, which, if presented properly, is a story of exciting adventure and profound intrigue. Most of you reading this review, however, could easily have written this book yourselves. Could you write a paragraph or two from memory about Aristotle, Galileo, Copernicus, Newton and Einstein? If not, could you look them up on Wikipedia and rewrite what you read? If so, then you could have written this book. How is it possible that two such brilliant men (i.e., Hawking and Mlodinow) could say so little, and say it in such an unenthusiastic, un-Sagan-like way? I said that this book is a "stale rehashing" because it is not particularly illuminating or entertaining even as a summary of science history. This book in no way compares to Carl Sagan's Cosmos nor to Jacob Bronowski's The Ascent of Man for a recapitulation of man's journey from religious superstition to enlightenment. And there is no airtight logical coherence evident here as in, say, Bertrand Russell's ABC's of Relativity.

The final chapter especially is a disjointed assemblage of unexplained, take-it-or-leave-it, clumsily presented non sequiturs. Only the final three pages of this book -- I repeat, only the final three pages -- even attempt to answer the big questions posed above. After reading these "answers," I thought to myself that the book seemed mysteriously truncated, that there should have been four or five more chapters to flesh-out the last-minute "answers" shoved without comment into the final paragraphs. I wondered whether the authors had suddenly lost interest in the project or perhaps suffered a personal or health setback that caused them to cut the project short. I then read the acknowledgements, which, in this book, are printed at the book's conclusion. There, Hawking and Mlodinow mention their agents, Al Zuckerman and Susan Ginsburg, who repeatedly scolded the authors (and I quote): "It's time to finish the book already." (page 187) Believe me, this rush-job attitude is obvious as the book reaches its fizzling, dry-hump climax.

If you think I'm being cruel, then ask yourself these questions, particularly those of you in the scientific community: If you made an honest list of the top fifty physicists of the last 100 years, would Hawking's "discoveries," as described in this book, earn him a place on that list? If so, then why has he not received a Nobel Prize for these past "discoveries"? The answer is that he has made no such discoveries, at least no verified discoveries. A perfect crystallization of this book is found in the final paragraph (page 181) where Hawking and Mlodinow claim that The Grand Design (of the universe or multiverse) may be found (later, not now) in M-theory. Yet the book comes to an abrupt close without ever detailing M-theory to any degree. And, as unbelievable as it may sound, Hawking and Mlodinow admit that neither they, nor anyone else working on M-theory, even knows what the "M" stands for! (page 117) No, I'm not making that up. Check it out for yourself. We are told in the promotional material for this book that its pages will reveal the Grand Design to us and answer the big questions. Then, after we buy the book, we're told that we won't know these answers until M-theory (whatever that stands for) is completed -- an event which may never occur. A man selling a vacuum cleaner under such false advertising might face legal penalties. But if Stephen Hawking makes an equally dubious claim about vacuum energy, then it must be true. Why? Because Stephen Hawking is a celebrity and the vacuum cleaner salesman is not. Our justified compassion for Hawking has become unjustified credulity. How did his Hawking Paradox pan out? If an unknown author had submitted this identical, verbatim manuscript to his publisher, there is little chance that it would have been published, due to the total dearth of new ideas within its lackluster pages.

On a more specific, scientific note: the "answer" given for why the laws of physics operate as they do in our universe is that there are supposedly billions of other universes, all of which have differing laws of physics. Our own laws are simply one particular manifestation of many possibilities. Even if we charitably concede that Hawking has demonstrated that there are multiple universes -- again without receiving a Nobel Prize for this rather significant "discovery" -- this "multiverse theory" in no way explains why our own universe displays the laws of physics that it does. It's like my asking my neighbor why his house has four windows in the back and none in the front, and he responds that there are many houses in the neighborhood other than his own. That is not a satisfying answer.

Similarly, this book argues, again at the very last moment, that the laws of universal gravitation are partly responsible for the appearance of the universe from nothing. Here's a good question -- at least, I think it's a good question: Isn't gravity a property of mass? How could gravity help to bring the universe into existence without there being an already-operating gravitational field, which itself results from already-existing mass? (This smells of creationist, first-cause crap, I know.) Now I have no doubt whatever that if Hawking and Mlodinow were sitting beside me here, they would have a beautifully reasoned, well-thought-out answer to this question. I'm certain of that. I am equally certain, however, that no such answer was presented in the book. And I don't think this question is so off-the-mark that it should be dismissed without even a passing comment. Sadly, theologians like William Lane Craig (who spout religious drivel at every opportunity) are going to have little trouble, fairly or unfairly, punching holes in this book's arguments. Again, I'm certain that the combined genius of Hawking and Mlodinow could handily win the debate with anyone. But this book does not represent the best that either of them has to offer. Hawking, though, will find another one of his books on (or in) an airport stall.

If I sound irked or emotionally embittered, it's because I feel that I pretty much wasted $28 and, more importantly, a week of my life studying this book in detail. And, by the way, it is confusing to claim that "empty" space is filled with energy. If it's empty space, there's nothing in it. If there's energy present, it's not empty. Please sharpen your use of language. And don't pretend that you're saying something profound about the empirical universe itself when you point out that the laws of physics break down at certain points. What you mean is: We don't have a clue what's going on at certain points. The universe isn't behaving irrationally. Your theories are.

I have a very cynical thought about why this book was written: When A Brief History of Time was written, there were, I'm told, no references to "God" in the original text. At the publisher's suggestion, a few such references were inserted to stir up a little controversy and to increase book sales. It worked. Today, by contrast, with atheist books on the rise, a book directly rebutting religion was seen as a better marketing ploy. It worked again, at least with me. As an atheist, I eagerly purchased this book the moment it became available. While I enthusiastically applaud the authors for their conclusions, rationality forces me to admit that their conclusions are not substantiated by the "evidence" they present, simply because they present no evidence. They may possess this evidence elsewhere. But it is not offered, as advertised, in this book. Moreover, most of their "supporting" arguments seem to be based on the assumption that string theory or M-theory is going to eventually work out, possibly, maybe, allegedly. Only time will tell. I am certainly no expert on the subject. But I strongly suspect that string theory and M-theory will prove to be the grandest scientific boondoggles since the luminiferous ether.

David Mills

I was very much looking forward to this new book by Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow. I was hoping to learn something new about the current state of the art in cosmology. Instead, the book is basically a defense of the anthropic principle as an excuse for the failure of string theory, and it's progeny, M-theory, to predict anything about the properties of our universe.

Basically, the anthropic principle states that we don't need to understand why our universe seems to be uniquely hospitable for the development of sentient life. The logic is that our universe, no matter how improbable, can be explained as long as it is possible. That we are here to ask the question means that, by definition, our particular universe is hospitable, and any theory that makes our universe possible is acceptable. The fact that M-theory predicts an almost limitless number of possible universes (10 E500), and can only predict our universe if all the physical laws and constants are "dialed in" is not a barrier to it's acceptance. All one has to do is postulate a multiverse, in which every universe that is possible will be created eventually, in order to accept M-theory. The fact that M-theory, as well as string theory, have never been supported by a scientific observation, and require 10 spatial dimensions (the 7 we can't see are small and tightly curled up, supposedly) is pushed aside.

The purpose of the book seems to be to counter the idea of "intelligent design". M-theory leads to the conclusion that our universe is certain to be created eventually, therefore God is not necessary in order to explain the peculiar, yet necessary, details of our universe. I am not a fan of the idea of "intelligent design". I believe that it is a thinly veiled attempt by religious fundamentalists to insinuate God into secular world of science. But to pin one's hopes on a theory that is untested seems premature and ill-advised.

I was somewhat off-put by the authors' rather lame attempts at humor. I suppose they were put in there because this book is intended for a more mainstream audience than me, but they seemed condescending. In the book's defense, it is well written, and I thoroughly enjoyed those passages concerned with the history of science. There is no math at all, and it does present the most popular ideas in current physics, some of which are pretty mind-blowing to the uninitiated, in a very accessible fashion.

This book would be a suitable introduction to current mainstream ideas about cosmology for lay audiences, but if you are a physics junkie, you would be better served looking elsewhere.

The following was a short and concise critique that William Lane Craig gave. If someone does decide to attempt to rebut it themselves by leaving a comment, don't expect me to answer. In all honesty, I don't really care too much what online theists and atheists have to argue. I like to read legitimate published material by men and women with doctorate degrees and experience in their fields. That's not to say you shouldn't comment, but don't hope for me to respond! Thanks



The Grand Design and Philosophy

Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow open their book The Grand Design with a series of profound questions: What is the nature of reality? Where did all this come from? Did the universe need a Creator? Then they say, "Traditionally these are questions for philosophy, but philosophy is dead. Philosophy has not kept up with modern developments in science, particularly physics. Scientists have become the bearers of the torch of discovery in our quest for knowledge."1

The professional philosopher can only roll his eyes at the effrontery and condescension of such a statement. Two scientists, who have to all appearances little acquaintance with philosophy, are prepared to pronounce an entire discipline dead and to insult their own faculty colleagues in philosophy at Cal Tech and Cambridge University -- many of whom, such as Michael Redhead and D.H. Mellor, are eminent philosophers of science -- for supposedly failing to keep up.

The professional philosopher will regard their verdict as not merely amazingly condescending but also as outrageously na

The Grand Design - by Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow

Review by Dana

I love, love, love Stephen Hawking. He is a rock star in my world. I loved a Brief History of Time. I loved watching specials where he is asked for his views on humanity, cosmology, black holes, etc...
However, if my love of Hawking's theories and ideas were equitable to a marriage, this book would be grounds for divorce due to infidelity!

The Grand Design came into being with Grand Expectations of answering Grand Questions. In the marketing synopsis for 'The Grand Design', Hawking asserts: "Years ago I wrote A Brief History of Time, to try to explain where the universe came from, and where it is going. But that book left some important questions unanswered. Why is there a universe? Why is there something rather than nothing? Why do we exist? Why are the laws of nature what they are? Did the universe need a designer
and creator?"

In attempting to create further 'buzz' surrounding 'The Grand Design', Hawking declares, "Philosophy is Dead"! I admit, I was confused by that statement, since Hawking's entire life's work has been but a subset of Philosophy! I thought, "What"? Is Hawking going to tell us he is a theist all of a sudden? The answer to the latter is, No. The answer to the former is, declaring philosophy dead WAS a gimmick. But, it was more than that! Philosophy IS the study of all knowledge. All disciplines that seek to answer questions that knowledge would allow is philosophy. HOWEVER, with regard to 'The Grand Design', philosophy IS, in fact, DEAD! Meaning, the book contains little or no new scientific information and the ANSWERS to the BIG QUESTIONS Hawking purports to bestow, are not answers at all. Rather, they are unsupported suppositions, at best. At worst, they are intentional questions formed to sell a book and he does not even bother himself with providing reasoned or logical ANSWERS WHY! I'll save you the time in reading the book by furnishing The Grand Answers, as Hawking tells them, but paraphrased for brevity.

Q. Why is there a universe?
A. Because of M-Theory, which allows for infinite universes (multiverse on steroids) and infinite states of matter and
time/space within each universe. In fact, one of these universes could be strikingly similar to ours, except in that dimension, the moon might truly be made of Roquefort cheese.

Q. Why is there something rather than nothing?
A. The universe can and will create itself from nothing in the manner described by the Feynman sum over histories and M-Theory.

Q. Why do we exist?
A. Because of M-Theory

Q. Why are the laws of nature what they are?
A. Because of M-Theory

Q. Did the universe need a designer and creator?
A. No, the universe does not need a designer. Yes, the universe does need a creator, and that is gravity.

Bonus Question

Q. What does the `M' in `M-Theory' stand for?
A. The M-Theory of everything does not answer this question., in fact, no one seems to know what the "M" stands for, but it may be "master," miracle," or "mystery."

If you don't believe the above are Hawking's answers to these questions, by all means, waste your money and buy the book. I wish I hadn't!

Stephen Hawking, considered one of the most brilliant minds of modern times, has always fascinated me with his insights, his humor, and his intelligence. He does not approach the "there is no God" argument--and believe me, that's what this book centers around--with the sense of bitterness found in Dawkins' or Hitchens' books. He maintains that objectivity that is so important to scientific endeavor, while so hard to truly embrace in human terms.

"The Grand Design" sets out with large ambitions: to explain the hows and whys of creation. Yes, creation. Hawkins accepts that this reality was created from nothing, that it came about due to an inordinate amount of coincidences and variables, that in fact there is ample evidence that something intelligent was behind such a miraculous and mysterious occurrence. But, as the book then points out, M-theory can explain all of this without the need for a god or intelligent being. In Hawking's own words, "No one seems to know what the 'M' stands for, but it may be 'master,' 'miracle,' or 'mystery.'" This theory, he claims, can coalesce all the other theories and unify our understanding of the multiple universes. "Their creation does not require the intervention of some supernatural being or god. Rather, these multiple universes arise naturally from physical law." He concludes his argument at the end of the book in much the same, saying, "Because there is a law like gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing . . . Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something from nothing . . . It is not necessary to invoke God."

I thoroughly enjoyed much of the scientific explanation in this book. Hawking has always had a gift for breaking it down in understandable ways. He is brilliant, no doubt. But he makes leaps of logic that, from a scientific viewpoint, can only be seen as failing to remain objective. He says that time itself has no starting point--which, in fact, is consistent with a biblical view of eternity in both directions--but uses that idea to say emphatically there is no need for a specific point of creation. He says the universe is so large, expanding so far, that it negates any validity to the idea of something special or unique about our planet--aside, of course, from the fact we were the one that produced carbon life forms in this particular version of reality. This is akin to saying God couldn't have created this planet because what is out there is so much bigger, therefore He is too small. If He's God, doesn't that argument turn in on itself, finding that He is even bigger than ever imagined, not limited by our versions of reality and/or space-time? Yes, humans and theologians have come at this from limited viewpoints through history, spouting arguments that were laughable, but scientists have also given us theories that worked in their day and age, considered irrefutable, but later were seen as faulty. We learn as we go.

As a race we are limited, but we have been gifted with minds and curiosity. Hawking employs those gifts with great skill, but in his effort to undermine one particular viewpoint--a God-centered one--he undermines his own theories. For example, he accepts that intelligent design is a very real possibility, but then explains that away through the appearance of physical laws. Where, though, did these physical laws originate? What set them into motion? And, yes, while I agree time is relative, looping, warping, twisting, we do not get any definitive answer from M-theory regarding where space originated. I do believe a big bang started all of this 13 billion years ago. In the biblical account, the earth was formless and void before the creation of mankind, and that could have been so for billions of years. But the big bang, the moment (in my perspective) when God spoke this into existence, required a provision of space in which this creative explosion could take place.

And so we arrive back at the same question. No matter how Hawking tries to dance around it and explore its many beautiful questions, we don't know how something came from nothing. We have no explanation for the God-like abilities that Hawking assigns to gravity and physical laws. Is it really so illogical to believe God established those laws? Hawking offers some thought-provoking concepts, and I enjoyed reading the book, but he decides that he and his colleagues, fellow scientists, are the new lords of creation and that philosophy is dead. In fact, he has not answered the questions of meaning and purpose, of love and charity, or evil or morality. He's simply expanded scientific knowledge, for which I'm grateful, but than called it something it is not.

As a believer in a creator, I do accept, just as Hawking does, that something came from nothing (ex nihilo), that it shows all the signs of intelligent design and patterns, and that it is truly beyond mathematical comprehension to have sustained life. Instead of calling that gravity and physical laws, I call that God and His laws at work.

Is it possible that M-theory is just that, Master, Miracle, and Mystery? These are three names given to God in Scripture. Could this be an example of the three-in-one? My reasons may vary slightly from Hawking's, but I, too, am in wonder of "the grand design."

I always appreciated Hawking's ideas and works, this book is an amazing berief conclusion of the last discoveries and theories of science, a better way to know our universe and a good base for people almost with any degree od knowledge to take over the ignorance and false beliefs.

I truly recommend this book to creationists, strong reasoning and the smooth, simple and clear text let everybody to gain knowledge without any pre-judgement.