Word: big
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...comes to a stop inside black holes, regions of space-time that are so warped that light cannot escape them. But both the beginning and the end of time are places where the equations of general relativity fall apart. Thus the theory cannot predict what should emerge from the Big Bang. Some see this as an indication of God's freedom to start the universe off any way God wanted. Others (myself included) feel that the beginning of the universe should be governed by the same laws that hold at all other times. We have made some progress toward this...
...reason general relativity broke down at the Big Bang was that it was not compatible with quantum theory, the other great conceptual revolution of the early 20th century. The first step toward quantum theory came in 1900, when Max Planck, working in Berlin, discovered that the radiation from a body that was glowing red hot could be explained if light came only in packets of a certain size, called quanta. It was as if radiation were packaged like sugar; you cannot buy an arbitrary amount of loose sugar in a supermarket but can only buy it in 1-lb. bags...
...believe that if they pulled together, everything would turn out all right. The source of this remarkable confidence can be traced to his earliest days. "All that is in me goes back to the Hudson," Roosevelt liked to say, meaning not simply the peaceful, slow-moving river and the big, comfortable clapboard house but the ambiance of boundless devotion that encompassed him as a child. Growing up in an atmosphere in which affection and respect were plentiful, where the discipline was fair and loving, and the opportunities for self-expression were abundant, he came to trust that the world...
...results were epoch making. In both the New World and the Old World, within a mere 5,000 years of the inception of farming, there were dazzling technological advances, including monumental temples, big dams and, above all, a whole new information technology: writing...
...enough of the night itself. The big question: What if those predictions were right, and Saddam takes advantage of the post-Y2Khaos to lob a few bio-bombs our way? For a preview of life after a biological apocalypse, check out The Omega Man, Chuck Heston vs. a lot of zombies in a ruined LA, and ponder your options. Or better yet, find the Simpsons parody, The Homega Man, with Homer in the Heston role, and giggle your troubles away...