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A breakout bestseller in Italy, Genesis: The Story of How Everything Began is a short, humanistic tour of the origins of the universe, Earth, and life-drawing on the latest discoveries in physics to explain the seven most significant moments in the creation of the cosmos.
Curiosity and wonderment about the origins of the universe are at the heart of our experience of the world. From Hesiod's Chaos, described in his poem about the origins of the Greek gods, Theogony, to today's mind-bending theories of the multiverse, humans have been consumed by the relentless pursuit of an answer to one awe-inspiring question: What exactly happened during those first moments?
Guido Tonelli, the acclaimed, award-winning particle physicist and a central figure in the discovery of the Higgs boson (the "God particle"), reveals the extraordinary story of our genesis-from the origins of the universe, to the emergence of life on Earth, to the birth of human language with its power to describe the world. Evoking the seven days of biblical creation, Tonelli takes us on a brisk, lively tour through the evolution of our cosmos and considers the incredible challenges scientists face in exploring its mysteries. Genesis both explains the fundamental physics of our universe and marvels at the profound wonder of our existence.
About the author
Guido Tonelli is an Italian particle physicist who played a key role in the discovery of the Higgs boson, the so-called God particle, which earned François Englert and Peter Higgs the 2013 Nobel Prize in Physics. For his contributions to the field, Tonelli was made a commendatore of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic in 2012 and was awarded the Enrico Fermi Prize from the Italian Physical Society and the $3 million Special Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics. He is a professor of general physics at the University of Pisa and a visiting scientist at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN).
