This book is quite good if you want to know about what the theories about the origin of the universe had been, and what is the prevailing line of quest of the current genre of scientists is.
This book is essentially a collection of lectures of Stephen Hawking, where he tries to explain about the the origins and the expected future of the universe. Here, he points out in layman terms the role of mathematical tools and Physical Laws used to arrive at the conclusions.
Man! even though I am an engineer, I couldn’t have fathomed it was possible to make PHYSICAL predictions based on EQUATIONS!! AND get quite a few of them right, too! It gives you an insight on the workings of the scientific community, how they interact, and you get a slight whiff of the intense competition that goes on among these physicist blokes! It is co-operative, and healthy, but a race, nonetheless. Of who gets closest to the ’’Unified Theory’’ first. At instances, the reasonings and conclusions were a bit much for me. Too involved, to say the least, and seemed foggey, at times. But the fog was in my understanding, I guess. I mean, when one starts to say that the pulsating radio waves some chaps were receiving from space proved there was a star 10 mi in radius, hence black holes can exist, I start losing the connections.
Anyway, it is an interesting book, overall, for those inclined that way. A fitting companion to a Brief History of Time. The book is not too long, and I was able to finish it in two long sittings.