The Search for the Meaning of Space, Time, and Matter

About the Book

The book gives a comprehensive introduction for interested general readers, into the development and structure of concepts, ideas and theory formation about the elementary building blocks of matter, the forces with which these particles interact and about the fundamental nature of space itself. Einstein’s theory of the cosmos and the recent discovery of the presence of a dark energy which leads to an accelerated expansion of cosmic space, provide the background for the most astonishing recent developments in the search for the origin of space and matter. The String-Theory revolution has led to the notion that nature may not follow one unique set of laws to build worlds, but that innumerable many possible universes may exist, that worlds may be emerging and disappearing like biological species and that our existence may be extraordinarily rare and therefore precious. An introduction to the concept of emergence in self-organizing systems is given to make the connection to the idea that Emergence may be the inherent creative property of space and matter at the quantum level.

About the Author

Dr. Kai Woehler received his undergraduate degree in physics from Bonn University in Germany, a graduate degree at the Technical Hochschule Aachen, Germany, and after some years in industry, working in electronics, he worked in the Max Planck Institute for Physics under the direction of Werner Heisenberg, leading discoverer of quantum mechanics, and he received his doctorate from the University of Munich, Germany. In 1962 he immigrated to the United States, where for the next forty-six years he taught graduate-level physics over a wide range of subjects at the United States Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. He has given general and technical lectures on quantum mechanics, particle physics, general relativity, cosmology, string theory, and on complex systems dynamics. He is an avid traveler and has visited some of the remotest places on earth.