1
Introduction
What is this world made of? Where did life come from? How did we get to
where we are? Galaxies, planets, stars shining at night; water, trees, and a whole
world of animals; how did they originate? Why does time so regularly repeat
day into night and night into day, turning summer to winter and winter to
summer in endless succession for billions of years, not missing a beat? Will it
continue like this forever or stop and fall to a different rhythm? What, then,
will happen to life and to the universe? When will that happen, if that happens?
How much time do we have? What is time anyway? Does it move only in one
direction or it also goes back and forth in a cycle similar to day and night? These
were likely some of the questions that came to the minds of wise humans who
came many centuries before us. Through their perseverance and deep intellect,
they gave some of the answers that are at the heart of modern science. The story
however remained incomplete then and it remains incomplete now.
The ancient Greek philosophers, and the Hindu philosophers thousands
of years before them, were known to be among the earliest to think seriously
about the universe and understand as much about it as possible. Few concepts
had appeared then: the concept of infinity may have been in the Vedas of
ancient Hindus, as may have been the concept of atoms. In ancient Greece,
philosophers like Thales of Miletus, Aristotle, Pythagoras, Zeno, and Socrates
tried to make their mark with new ideas, some of which have been built upon
in subsequent centuries. Democritus postulated that all matter were composed
of tiny particles, a concept which has endured the test of time and still remains
at the foundation of physics. The famous Archimedes principle, which says
that objects have apparent weight in water (or any liquid) that is less than their
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer
Nature Switzerland AG 2021
R. N. Mohapatra, The Neutrino Story: One Tiny Particle’s Grand Role in the Cosmos,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51846-2_1
3
Introduction
What is this world made of? Where did life come from? How did we get to
where we are? Galaxies, planets, stars shining at night; water, trees, and a whole
world of animals; how did they originate? Why does time so regularly repeat
day into night and night into day, turning summer to winter and winter to
summer in endless succession for billions of years, not missing a beat? Will it
continue like this forever or stop and fall to a different rhythm? What, then,
will happen to life and to the universe? When will that happen, if that happens?
How much time do we have? What is time anyway? Does it move only in one
direction or it also goes back and forth in a cycle similar to day and night? These
were likely some of the questions that came to the minds of wise humans who
came many centuries before us. Through their perseverance and deep intellect,
they gave some of the answers that are at the heart of modern science. The story
however remained incomplete then and it remains incomplete now.
The ancient Greek philosophers, and the Hindu philosophers thousands
of years before them, were known to be among the earliest to think seriously
about the universe and understand as much about it as possible. Few concepts
had appeared then: the concept of infinity may have been in the Vedas of
ancient Hindus, as may have been the concept of atoms. In ancient Greece,
philosophers like Thales of Miletus, Aristotle, Pythagoras, Zeno, and Socrates
tried to make their mark with new ideas, some of which have been built upon
in subsequent centuries. Democritus postulated that all matter were composed
of tiny particles, a concept which has endured the test of time and still remains
at the foundation of physics. The famous Archimedes principle, which says
that objects have apparent weight in water (or any liquid) that is less than their
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer
Nature Switzerland AG 2021
R. N. Mohapatra, The Neutrino Story: One Tiny Particle’s Grand Role in the Cosmos,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51846-2_1
3