Paradox

Copyright © 2012 by Jim Al-Khalili All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Broadway Paperbacks, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York. www.crownpublishing.com Broadway Paperbacks and its logo, a letter B bisected on the diagonal, are trademarks of Random House, Inc. Originally published in the United Kingdom by Transworld Publishers, a division of The Random House Group, Ltd., London. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Al-Khalili, Jim, 1962- Paradox: the nine greatest enigmas in physics / Jim Al-Khalili. — 1st ed. p. cm. 1. Science—Miscellanea. I. Title. Q173.A395 2012 500—dc23 2012005011 eISBN: 978-0-307-98680-1 Illustrations: Patrick Mulrey Cover design: Kyle Kolker Cover photography: istockphoto v3.1 To Julie, David, and Kate Contents Cover Title Page Copyright Dedication Preface 1 The Game Show Paradox 2 Achilles and the Tortoise 3 Olbers’ Paradox 4 Maxwell’s Demon 5 The Pole in the Barn Paradox 6 The Paradox of the Twins 7 The Grandfather Paradox 8 The Paradox of Laplace’s Demon 9 The P......