A Journey with Fred Hoyle (2nd Edition)

摘要

Fred Hoyle was undoubtedly among the most original thinkers of his time and one of the leading figures of 20th-century physics. From the purely scientific viewpoint, his name is associated with at least three ideas: the synthesis of heavy nuclear elements in the cores of supernovae (developed in collaboration with William Fowler, Margaret and Geoffrey Burbidge); the steady-state model of the universe (formulated together with Hermann Bondi and Thomas Gold); and some of the early applications of anthropic arguments to astrophysics and cosmology. Hoyle also contributed to many other fields - such as stellar structure, planetary formation, galactic dynamics and the origin of large-scale magnetism - where his creative imagination often made the difference.