How the Universe Got Its Spots: Diary of a Finite Time in a Finite Space

Is the universe infinite or just in point of fact big? With this question, the gifted young cosmologist Janna Levin not only announces the central theme of her intriguing and controversial new book but establishes herself as one of the direct and unorthodox voices in latest science. For at the same time as she sets out to resolve how big “in point of fact big” could also be, Levin gives us an intimate take a look at the day by day life of a globe-trotting physicist, complete with jet lag and romantic disturbances.

Nimbly synthesizing geometry, topology, chaos and string theories, Levin shows how the pattern of cold and warm spots left over from the big bang may in the future reveal the size and shape of the cosmos. She does so with such originality, lucidity—and even poetry—that How the Universe Got Its Spots becomes a thrilling and deeply personal communication between a scientist and the lay reader.