Creation Revisited

by Peter Atkins

Book Overview

In this investigation into the nature of the cosmos, P.W. Atkins explores the fundamental questions of modern science: the existence of the universe, time, chance, life and consciousness. Once we... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0716745003
• ISBN13: 9780716745006
• Release Date: January 1993
• Publisher: W.H. Freeman & Company
• Length: 163 Pages
• Weight: 0.99 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.4" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Christian's Are Ignorant! Blind Faith is getting us nowhere.

This is not what the author intended to convey in this book this is my personal response to all the negative reviews, When are Christians going to realize that all this arguing about the existence of God is just pissing in the pope's hat. Who F@#?ing cares!. If we were better than an animal I haven't yet experienced it: Humans s#!t like them, p!$$ like them, we smell like hell when we don't bathe, we feel pain, feel happy and playful like them, sleep, eat, and mate like them, we get diseases like them, we fart like them, we make noises to communicate, and we kill and die like them. So if you think you can come up with a better argument that makes us so superior to the animal, then by all means...I do like abstract humor. Better yet! why don't you do us all a favor and go out and live among the animals...weaponless! and see if God will protect you, I wonder how long you will last. Self Righteous Pigs! not one Christian has come up with any proof that God exists, well...maybe except for a crusty old book of tall tales written by Jews (100's of yrs. after the fact I might add and rewritten a half dozen times) and if any of it made any sense The Bible would have been translated so any moron could understand it!. Why else do we have so many dangerous religious offshoots/cults from one fictitious book. SEE! even the Intellectual Pygmies can't agree what any of it stands for. If you consider yourself a smart person (Christians aside) please read this great book by a brilliant scientist/writer and don't let one of the ignorant fools that condemn evolution or advanced thinking sway you otherwise. You know the Christians didn't even read this book before they attacked it, which is so typical of these nihilistic clowns!, they still think Dinosaurs never existed...can you believe it?!...isn't that funny!...Terribly Sad...but funny.

If you want to know what's REALLY going on, buy it. Now.

WOW!This review is biased, because for about ten years, I've considered this the best book I've ever read. In fact, I bought two copies for my friends and gave mine away. I'm here to find a used copy of this elegant masterpiece.And that's not because it told me any *facts* about biological or cosmic evolution that I didn't already know, it's because Creation Revisited brings all the disparate elements together to gives the reader "the big AHA!".Adkins starts off with "I'm going to take your mind on a journey". Well, he got THAT right. He presents a tree of reasoning, beginning with the leaves and proceding to the shocking root.The "leaves" are elephants. Adkins: "Our belief in elephants needs no explaination. We can see them lumbering across the plains".But where did the elephants we observe come from? Adkins is (putatively) willing to believe that God made them. BUT... God didn't need to make ALL the living elephants. He only had to make the parents of the ones we see.He goes on to suppose that God is a "lazy" God, who only bothers to create things which can't arise naturally (like the elephants we seehaving come from their parents). He takes this back to the first mammals, to life per se, and to the big bang. It turns out that God really didn't have to do ANYTHING AT ALL, and even HE can be eliminated. The "root" of the tree is exactly: nothing. Zero.The final chapter, after that revelation, is about the mathematics of clouds of theoretical points. It alone is worth getting the book for.=======Since my writing pales in comparison to Dr. Adkins', I'm afraid that this simplistic summary of his book will induce you NOT to buy it.Buy it. Buy it and buy copies for any of your friends who want to understand what's REALLY going on.

Deep, straightforward, perspicuous, exciting.

In this little book, the author takes us on a journey of mind to the view that nothing cannot be understood, and therefore, ultimately, there is nothing to explain. It is a delightful journey, given the simple and direct writing style of the author. I was attracted from the very beginning, and in the end, I was not disappointed.At the outset, the author says that a great deal of the universe does not need an explanation by argument from design. It can be understood as natural results of evolution. Having thus left the vast majority of phenomena to the appropriate scientific disciplines, the author comes down to the essential fabric of the universe: Why is there space? Why is there time? Why is there matter? Why are there forces? Why are there physical laws? And even why is there mathematics? The author cogently leads us to imagine that all these can come into existence out of nothing. Not every detail is presented. The author admits that a comprehensive theory awaits future completion. But he does erect an entire conceptual framework with clear contour.It is gratifying to know that the issue has been so well thought out. It is more gratifying that Atkins did such a good job in elucidating it and its possible answer for the general audience. It is most gratifying to suspect that his line of reasoning may be on the right track to a full account of that ultimate question of humanity: Why is there something rather than nothing?

THE BEST NONFICTION BOOK I EVER READ

period.("Hitchhiker's guide" is the best fiction,and 2001 is the best movie).I've bought 4 copies of Creation Revisited so far and sent them to my friends, well-marked with underlines in the text and comments in the margins. I wrote my own subtitle under the name of each chapter.I'm SO sorry to see it out of print.He starts off his logic tree with the leaves: "some things need no explaination. Elephants, for instance".But god didn't have to create ALL the elephants. he only had to create TWO...Atkins then moves along this logical tree to it's root, the MINIMUM that god must have started with, the minimum which must exist.The ending, the root of the tree, is a suprise, but I'll TELL you:The entirity of the universe consists of: exactly NOTHING. There isn't actually anything at all. If you can percieve EVERYTHING at once, you understand that NOTHING WHATSOEVER has to exist or ever have existed, or exists now, to explain the universe, including elephants.There only APPEARS to be "something" (i.e. anything, e.g. elephants) because we can only percieve PART of the universe. This is a TRULY AMAZING book.I salute you, Peter Atkins!--d