First Principles of Cosmology is a new textbook designed for upper undergraduate and beginning graduate students in phyics and astronomy. It was published by Addison-Wesley in January 1997.
First Principles of Cosmology was created with a strong emphasis on the basic principles familiar to students from their undergraduate courses. A premium is placed on clarity and simplicity of explanation as the students are shown how they can apply mechanics, thermodynamics, and particle physics to questions about the universe as a whole. Abundant use is made of analogies to situations arising in other branches of physics and highlighted examples illustrate special cases of the general principles learned. There are over 70 exercises or ``Think About'' problems at both a standard and more advanced level to give students practical experience in calculation and to develop and guide their physical intuition.
The text comprises three parts: Part 1 presents a broad overview of the fundamental concepts, cosmological models and observational tests, and the history, evolution, and fate of the universe. Part 2 is a detailed assessment of the physics of the hot Big Bang model, including a rigorous examination of the ``three cornerstones'': Hubble expansion, primordial nucleosynthesis, and cosmic microwave background radiation, while Part 3 introduces some of the concepts of ongoing research into the formation of structure in the universe. A conscious effort has been made to cultivate the text to a length that fits realistic class use in a one term course.
Besides its pedagogical clarity and concentration on basic, accessible physical principles it incorporates several important and unique approaches. These include the emphasis on general equations of state, unifying the treatment of dust, radiation, cosmological constant, or exotic components, the treatment of local inhomogeneities (``clumpy universe'') and their important effects on observations, and the critical appraisal of observational tests to determine cosmological parameters. Perhaps most important, however, is the clear and detailed presentation of the Big Bang cosmological model, and alternative explanations, so students can learn to judge for themselves the significance of new discoveries, apart from media cries of the ``doom of the theory''.