figure 5

George Smoot, the leader of the project, announced the results and displayed the map at a conference organized by the American Physical Society in April 1992. It was the final step in proving the Big Bang theory. Stephen Hawking said, "It's the discovery of the century, if not all time." At a press conference Smoot said, "Well, if you're religious, it's like seeing the face of God.

figure 6

Here is a three-dimensional graph that starts with all energy and matter (the two are interchangeable) crowded into a very small space. This suddenly expands in a Big Bang and then more slowly expands to the point where atoms form. With further expansion atoms coalesce into young stars, which kindle nuclear reactions that emit light and that create the elements we know. The graph illustrates the now almost universally accepted scientific story of the natural universe.

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