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THE FABRIC of the COSMOS, Brian Greene, 2004
```(annotated and with added bold highlights by Epsilon=One)
```(annotated and with added bold highlights by Epsilon=One)
Chapter 11 - Quanta in the Sky with Diamonds
Inflation, Quantum Jitters, and the Arrow of Time
The discovery of the inflationary framework launched a new era in cosmological research, and in the decades since, many thousands of papers have been written on the subject. Scientists have explored just about every nook and cranny of the theory you could possibly imagine. 'While many of these works have focused on details of technical importance, others have gone further and shown how inflation not only solves specific cosmological problems beyond the reach of the standard big bang, but also provides powerful new approaches to a number of age-old questions. Of these, there are three developments — having to do with the formation of clumpy structures such as galaxies; the amount of energy required to spawn the universe we see; and (of prime importance to our story) the origin of time's arrow — on which inflation has ushered in substantial and, some would say, spectacular progress.
Let's take a look.
Let's take a look.