原文开头
The universe is everything. It is all of space and time, all of matter and energy, and all of the laws of physics that govern them. It is the grandest of all subjects, and the most humbling. When you look up at the night sky, you are looking across vast distances, and back in time, to see the light from stars and galaxies that may no longer exist. The universe is a place of extremes: unimaginable heat and cold, crushing gravity and near-perfect vacuum, and scales of size and time that defy human intuition. Our story begins with the Big Bang, the moment about 13.8 billion years ago when the universe as we know it began. …
摘自《科学美国人》(Scientific American)第335卷 第1期 · 2026年7月刊,Phil Plait。仅引用开头一小段供了解文章,版权归原刊所有,全文请阅读原刊。