In 1962 there were competing cosmologies: steady state and big bang, two completely different pictures of the universe and its origin. After 1965 and the almost fortuitous discovery of universal background radiation, there is only the big bang, full of outstanding problems pursued as normal science. In 1962 high-energy physics seemed to be an endless collection of more and more particles. What is called the standard model brought order out of chaos. It is unbelievably accurate in its predictions, even if we have no idea how to fit it together with gravity. Perhaps there will not be another
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