A Brief History of Time

Chapter 1  Our Picture of the Universe

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1.spherical  球形的

SYNONYM:ball-shaped,globular, rotund, round,

2.hull

the part of a ship or boat that floats on the water. 船壳

The front part is called the bow and the back part is called the stern .

3.heretic 异教徒

4.Copernicus 哥白尼

5.repugnant

 extremely unpleasant or offensive  令人厌恶的

6.reconcile

使……一致，和谐

    to find a way to make ideas, beliefs, needs etc that are opposed to each other capable of existing together

    There seems to be no possibility of reconciling the two versions of what happened.

    Management and labour are attempting to reconcile their differences.

    reconcile something with something:

    Research is being undertaken in how to reconcile conservation needs with growing demand for water.

7.postulate  假定

    to claim or imagine that something is true or that it exists

    The theory postulates two reasons for the spread of the disease.

8.The story that Newton was inspired by an apple hitting his head is almost certainly apocryphal.

a‘pocryphal

probably not true, but believed by a lot of people to be true

不足凭信的

9.But he reasoned that if, on the other hand, there were an infinite number of stars, distributed more or less uniformly over infinite space, this would not happen, because there would not be any central point for them to fall to.

uniform

adj. the same everywhere

The policy ensures a uniform standard of health care throughout the country.

10.It is an interesting reflection on the general climate of thought before the twentieth century that no one had suggested that the universe was expanding or contracting.

    climate: the general situation or attitudes that people have at a particular time

    economic/​political/​moral/​intellectual climate:

    We are unable to increase wages in the current economic climate.

    climate of: The election is being organized in a climate of fear and mistrust.

    the climate of opinion: The climate of opinion is now changing on that subject.

11.repulsive  排斥的，斥力的

12.ascribe to

   1. to believe something is the cause of something else

    Their defeat was ascribed to a poor defence.

    2.to believe that a particular person wrote a book or a piece of music, painted a picture etc so that people generally accept this to be true

    Another objection to an infinite static universe is normally ascribed to the German philosopher Heinrich Olbers, who wrote about this theory in 1823.

13.Hubble’s observations suggested that there was a time, called the big bang, when the universe was infini'tesimally极小地 small and infinitely dense.

14.preclude

    if one thing precludes another, the first thing prevents the second one from happening

    This policy precludes the routine use of chemicals.

    Tercek’s interviewing style precluded any long-winded answers.

15.Any physical theory is always provisional, in the sense that it is only a hypothesis: you can never prove it.

provisional

    intended to be temporary, and likely to be changed when other arrangements are made

    a provisional government

16.The eventual goal of science is to provide a single theory that describes the whole universe.

17.quantum mechanics 量子力学 ：extremely small scales, such as a millionth of a millionth of an inch.

The general theory of relativity 广义相对论 ：from only a few miles to as large as a million million million million (1 with twenty-four zeros after it) miles

Unfortunately, however, these two theories are known to be inconsistent with each other – they cannot both be correct.

quantum theory of gravity

18.inexplicable：impossible to explain