The importance of being wrong: the Big Bang and precision cosmology - Professor Richard Easther

This sounds interesting. I hope to get to to his inaugural lecture as found Richard’s Auckland Skeptics in the Pub cosmology talk (October 2011) and the discussion after really interesting.

Although my Physics education ended at High School, so probably won’t understand much, i still enjoy learning what I can.

Inaugural lecture by Professor Richard Easther Department of Physics

A generation ago, “precision cosmology” was an oxymoron. Since then, advances in observational astrophysics let us measure global properties of the universe -- age, expansion rate, composition, temperature, smoothness -- to within a few percent, or even better.

This newfound clarity allows us to test competing cosmological models and rule out those which do not match what we see in the sky.  I will describe recent advances in observational astrophysics, and explain how I use this data to explore the properties of the universe a trillion, trillion, trillionth of a second after the Big Bang.

All are welcome to this public lecture.

5.30pm, Tuesday 14 May Large Chemistry Lecture Theatre Building 301, 23 Symonds Street The University of Auckland

www.physics.auckland.ac.nz