J.V. Narlikar - Böcker

This volume contains papers presented at an international conference to celebrate Fred Hoyle's contributions to astronomy, astrophysics and astrobiology and - more generally - to humanity and culture. The contributed articles highlight the important aspects of his scientific life and show how much of an example and inspiration he has been for over three generations in the 20th century. There are few people of whom it could be said they changed the way we perceive the world. Galileo Galilei, Nicholas Copernicus and Isaac Newton were amongst these. The inclusion of Fred Hoyle in this elite group may be contentious at the moment for the reason that in challenging the most cherished of Holy Grails in science he unwittingly offended many. But once the dust has settled over the many disputes that were raised and in the fullness of time there can be little doubt that Fred Hoyle will be ranked alongside these figures of history. Hoyle perceived science with an indomitable passion and an obsessive desire to find the truth wherever it lay.His singleness of purpose in this great mission and his deep suspicion of orthodoxy, his powerful intellect and imagination set him apart from most of his contemporaries in the last century. This volume includes papers presented at a commemorative conference held in Cardiff in June 2002. The material divides naturally into several sections: "Personal Reminiscences", "Stellar Structure" and "Evolution", "Cosmology", "Interstellar Matter", "Comets" and finally "Panspermia". Each article pays its own tribute to Fred Hoyle for his inspiration and guidance that led to major breakthroughs in astrophysics and space science throughout the 20th century.

For several decades since its inception, Einstein's general theory of relativity stood somewhat aloof from the rest of physics. Paradoxically, the attributes which normally boost a physical theory - namely, its perfection as a theoreti­ cal framework and the extraordinary intellectual achievement underlying i- prevented the general theory from being assimilated in the mainstream of physics. It was as if theoreticians hesitated to tamper with something that is manifestly so beautiful. Happily, two developments in the 1970s have narrowed the gap. In 1974 Stephen Hawking arrived at the remarkable result that black holes radiate after all. And in the second half of the decade, particle physicists discovered that the only scenario for applying their grand unified theories was offered by the very early phase in the history of the Big Bang universe. In both cases, it was necessary to discuss the ideas of quantum field theory in the background of curved spacetime that is basic to general relativity. This is, however, only half the total story. If gravity is to be brought into the general fold of theoretical physics we have to know how to quantize it. To date this has proved a formidable task although most physicists would agree that, as in the case of grand unified theories, quantum gravity will have applications to cosmology, in the very early stages of the Big Bang universe. In fact, the present picture of the Big Bang universe necessarily forces us to think of quantum cosmology.

This volume contains papers presented at an international conference to celebrate Fred Hoyle's monumental contributions to astronomy, astrophysics and astrobiology and more generally to humanity and culture. The contributed articles highlight the important aspects of his scientific life and show how much of an example and inspiration he has been for over three generations in the 20th century.