Book Review: the Elegant Universe by Brian Greene

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By ROBERT WOODSON/for The Herald — Warning – this will make your brain hurt if you put any effort at all into understanding

Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the quest for the Ultimate Theory or what Mr. Greene calls T.O.E. – THE THERORY OF EVERYTHING.

The copyright on this publication is 1999 and a lot has happened in the 23 year since then. Our space telescopes are far more powerful now bringing us closer and closer to the Big Bang. But some things have not changed from the late 1800’s. The speed of light is still 186,000 miles per second or 670,000,000 miles per hour. For you techno-geeks, that is 6.7 x 10Exp8. Even harder to grasp is the notion that those photons are always moving at that speed – coming at us or going away from us.

Around 1900, Albert Einstein, as a teenager, put forward that theory which spelled the downfall of Newtonian physics.

Just to impress your friends step outside our next clear night and go; wow those photons from Orion’s Belt have been coming at us for a long, long time. Maybe a few billion years.

I will lighten up my next book review with THE BOTANY OF DESIRE by Michael Pollan, a plant’s eye view of the world.

Woodcrafter Robert Woodson sits on one of his creations at the Oakridge Arts Council’s Gallery. He is an enthusiastic, if not reluctant contributor to The Herald Tara Kennedy photo

George Custer

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George Custer lives in Oakridge with his wife Sayre. George is a former smokejumper from his hometown of Cave Junction, a former captain in the U.S. Marine Corps. and ran a construction company in Southern California. George assumed the volunteer duties as the Editor of the Highway 58 Herald in 2022. He loves riding his Harley-Davidson motorcycle, building all things wood, and playing drums on the weekends in his office.

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