The Big Bang Never Happened: A Startling Refutation of the Dominant Theory of the Origin of the Universe [Paperback]

Eric Lerner (Author)

Book Description

Release date: October 27, 1992

A mesmerizing challenge to orthodox cosmology with powerful implications not only for cosmology itself but also for our notions of time, God, and human nature -- with a new Preface addressing the latest developments in the field.

Far-ranging and provocative, The Big Bang Never Happened is more than a critique of one of the primary theories of astronomy -- that the universe appeared out of nothingness in a single cataclysmic explosion ten to twenty billion years ago. Drawing on new discoveries in particle physics and thermodynamics as well as on readings in history and philosophy, Eric J. Lerner confronts the values behind the Big Bang theory: the belief that mathematical formulae are superior to empirical observation; that the universe is finite and decaying; and that it could only come into being through some outside force. With inspiring boldness and scientific rigor, he offers a brilliantly orchestrated argument that generates explosive intellectual debate.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Plasma physicist Lerner opens one of science's inner rooms to a popular audience in this headline-making history of time, space and the humanistic sociology of science. Illustrated.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

From Steven Weinberg's The First Three Minutes (Basic, 1976. o.p.; 1988. pap.) to Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time ( LJ 4/15/88), numerous science popularizations have expounded the Big Bang Theory for the origin of the universe as indisputable fact. Readers of those books will find this one startling and intriguing. Lerner, a plasma physicist, points out flaws in the Big Bang model and proposes an alternative theory: an eternal, self-sustaining "plasma" universe where electromagnetic fields within conducting gases provide other, simpler explanations for observed phenomena. His contention that the Big Bang is merely a repackaged creation myth is presumptuous, but well argued. To present a current scientific controversy to a general audience risks, on one hand, misleading the public and, on the other, circumventing the peer review process. This book, however, makes valid points in a convincing manner and does neither. Recommended for general science collections.
- Gregg Sapp, Montana State Univ. Libs., Bozeman
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 496 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (October 27, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 067974049X
• ISBN-13: 978-0679740490
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 1 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (68 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #447,049 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

186 of 192 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars You'd think the fate of the universe was at stake August 20, 1999

By A Customer

Format:Paperback

Here's another sensational statement for you: There's no need to become hysterical when attacking or defending this book. I have some problems with Lerner's style and conclusions, but I think he successfully makes the point that the role of plasma physics in the formation of galaxies is deserving of further consideration. And his objections to the Big Bang are neither new nor shocking; with the exception of the age of the "Great Wall," they comprise the same problems that cosmologists have been working indefatigably to explain since the Big Bang theory gained mass acceptance. His heresy is simply in seeking outside the parameters of the Big Bang for a solution. One reviewer, who finds Lerner's conclusions--and perhaps even his search--unjustifiable, says that this book "deserves to be burned." There are several unflattering names for this approach to debate.

Apropos of reviewers, a couple of them recommend that prospective readers seek out the works of Nobel laureates, who "know what they're talking about." The "obscure Lerner" based his book on the work of Hannes Alfven, who won the Nobel prize in 1970 for his work in plasma physics and is considered the father of that discipline. (Alfven took another heretical position when he claimed that electrical currents could pass through space. Both his idea and the proofs he offered were met with howling derision, but oddly enough he turned out to be right!)

Another reviewer complains that Lerner offers no explanation for the uniformity of background microwave radiation. In fact, he offers an explanation based on a diffusion effect caused by the absorption and emission of microwaves by "black bodies." Right or wrong, it's in the book and can thus be subjected to rational inquiry.

Plasma cosmology may someday be proven to be dead wrong. Until then, it's an elegant, exciting theory that deserves open-minded discussion rather than the largely subliterate polemics--pro and con--afforded it in this forum of eBay amateurs. No one should feel so secure in the accuracy of a human conception as to be unwilling to at least read a dissenting viewpoint.

50 of 53 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Modern-day Epicycles June 13, 2001

By Ritchie Annand

Format:Paperback

I remember the (greatly simplified for school consumption) story of Kepler and his ellipses replacing the convoluted, yet working, system of epicycles used to explain retrograde and irregular motion in the skies.

I remember the argument being between the "big bang", "steady state" and "oscillating". Big Bang has been winning, but I have been watching in dismay over the years as correction after correction has been plugged into the theory and the equations. When you start having to tweak a fine balance between time frames of superluminal spatial expansion, "real" mass of the neutrino, unobserved-yet-needed for the theory supermassive one-dimensional cosmic strings in order to get just the right homogeneity and 'roughness' of the universe... it starts to feel like epicycles all over again.

Lerner's treatise is pretty nice in spots. I like the presentation of an alternative plasma cosmology. It's not 'extraordinary'; in fact, it's quite ordinary in many ways. Disappointing to the fanciful who want to strap on a Higgs field mass disintegrator in one hundred years, but, like evolution, there's much to be said for what ordinary processes can do, given an extraordinary amount of time to do it in.

I find Lerner's historicopolitical rants informative historically, but he obviously has a lot of big beefs to rant about, and it seemed a bit inappropriate to me to choose so much volume of book to rant in.

Still, it's enough to get the gears going. There are testable hypotheses in alternative cosmologies - once the Big Bang's infallibility complex wanes a bit, then perhaps we can have some proper discussions again, and who knows, perhaps the Big Bang theory will come out stronger for it, but I doubt very much that it will remain unchanged.

Look around the 'Net - there are other valid and interesting critiques of the Big Bang theory around, some with rather interesting implications, should they turn out to be true. The 'Compton Effect' is a *very* interesting possibility that could turn redshifts on their heads. The jury's still out on that for me, but that presents some testable predictions, and some interesting explanations of observations (quasars, for one) and it just boggles my mind to think that perhaps, just perhaps, the universe isn't flying apart quite as fast as it might seem.

I just hope the Big Bang theory stays together long enough for them to discover something nifty and new in the particle accelerators :)

23 of 26 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Enlightening Contrarian View of the Universe June 17, 2007

By R. Schultz VINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

Evidence has been accumulating that suggests The Big Bang DID happen. However that in no way diminishes Eric Lerner's insights here. In fact, this book makes recent discoveries all the more comprehensible and puts them in context. Every subject Lerner touches on, he clarifies by contrast with his own more rebel view.

Then again, Lerner might still be correct even in his basic premise that any signs of a "Big Bang" are just local effects in a universe that's much vaster than we yet understand.

In either case, this book poses the right sorts of questions and presents an alternative to prevailing ideas about how the universe was formed. Lerner elaborates on the theories of Hannes Alven and makes the stunning suggestion that electromagnetic effects might have been more instrumental than gravitational effects in shaping the galaxies. I had always taken it for granted that Newton's large-scale laws of mass and force were the key operators at work. But of course! There are other forces that might have played a role, even in the vacuum of interstellar space, which is really not such a vacuum after all. Lerner opened my mind to a whole new realm of possibility.

One section of his explanation of Alven's work on electromagnetic forces was a little opaque to me. But almost all the rest of this book was clearly written, providing lucid, remarkable insights into some of the great debates and theories of physics and astronomy in general.

For example, Lerner gave me one of the best insights into the value of chaos theory that I've run across. All I'd previously been able to garner about chaos theory was the idea that small effects can produce large, unpredictable consequences - something that seemed self-evident. But Lerner makes the significance of chaos theory clear, showing why it doesn't reduce to just household commonsense.

Then he provides some overall insight into how much of modern physics has become a matter of adjusting "the facts" to conform to the requirements of a priori equations. He demonstrates with specifics how physics has become a matter of building pyramids of mathematical abstraction, then positing reality to be what the highest point of mathematical construction concludes it must be. He suggests this process should be reversed to conform to the original practice of the scientific method. In this traditional method, observation informs the inputs to equations - not the other-way-around. So for example, he criticizes the way in which "dark matter" was considered to be a reality simply because its existence was demanded in order to make the latest round of equations balance.

Along the course of all these discussions, Lerner provides clear historical accounts of discoveries made from Archimedes to Einstein. So right or wrong about The Big Bang, he offers the reader an intelligent, highly accessible grounding in some of the fundamentals of physics and astronomy.

If you like informed, but controversial and contrarian scientific views - you might want to go on to read Elaine Morgan's work on evolution, starting with "The Descent of Woman." She believes that many of the traits that distinguish humans from other apes came about, not as adaptations to a masculine hunting lifestyle, but more as mother-child adaptations to a semi-aquatic habitat.