Dr. Brian Keating

Like I always ask people, I'll ask you, I know what the answer is probably, but what's your favorite day on the calendar?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

New Year's Day, exactly. What is that? It's a beginning. It's a new—some people say their birthday, their kid's birthday, if they're smart, their anniversary, right? You don't want to get too out of control with the misses. What are those? Those are beginnings. What's the only event that no entity could even bear witness to? The origin of the universe.

New Year's Day, exactly. What is that? It's a beginning. It's a new—some people say their birthday, their kid's birthday, if they're smart, their anniversary, right? You don't want to get too out of control with the misses. What are those? Those are beginnings. What's the only event that no entity could even bear witness to? The origin of the universe.

New Year's Day, exactly. What is that? It's a beginning. It's a new—some people say their birthday, their kid's birthday, if they're smart, their anniversary, right? You don't want to get too out of control with the misses. What are those? Those are beginnings. What's the only event that no entity could even bear witness to? The origin of the universe.

I think that speaks to something primal in human beings that are curious at least. We want to uncover the secrets of what existed, what came before us. And we don't have any way of seeing that currently. So we have to use the fossils that have made their way throughout all of cosmic time to understand what that was like at the very beginning of time. And perhaps...

I think that speaks to something primal in human beings that are curious at least. We want to uncover the secrets of what existed, what came before us. And we don't have any way of seeing that currently. So we have to use the fossils that have made their way throughout all of cosmic time to understand what that was like at the very beginning of time. And perhaps...

I think that speaks to something primal in human beings that are curious at least. We want to uncover the secrets of what existed, what came before us. And we don't have any way of seeing that currently. So we have to use the fossils that have made their way throughout all of cosmic time to understand what that was like at the very beginning of time. And perhaps...

maybe about the universe as it existed before time itself began. So to me, it's incredibly fascinating. It encompasses all of science in some sense. It even can include life on other planets, consciousness, the formation of the brain. And to me, I'm always interested in the biggest questions. And the biggest topics that evoke curiosity in me is how did it all get here?

maybe about the universe as it existed before time itself began. So to me, it's incredibly fascinating. It encompasses all of science in some sense. It even can include life on other planets, consciousness, the formation of the brain. And to me, I'm always interested in the biggest questions. And the biggest topics that evoke curiosity in me is how did it all get here?

maybe about the universe as it existed before time itself began. So to me, it's incredibly fascinating. It encompasses all of science in some sense. It even can include life on other planets, consciousness, the formation of the brain. And to me, I'm always interested in the biggest questions. And the biggest topics that evoke curiosity in me is how did it all get here?

And so that's what cosmology allows us to do, apply the strict exacting laws of physics to a specific domain, which is the origin of everything in the universe. That's what makes it so fascinating.

And so that's what cosmology allows us to do, apply the strict exacting laws of physics to a specific domain, which is the origin of everything in the universe. That's what makes it so fascinating.

And so that's what cosmology allows us to do, apply the strict exacting laws of physics to a specific domain, which is the origin of everything in the universe. That's what makes it so fascinating.

Well, first of all, we have to take ourselves back. deep prehistory. We know that ancients were looking at the constellations because they were seemingly either in control of or correlated with or perhaps causative of the seasons. And that was of divine importance, supreme importance for them, right? Their whole existence in early agrarian societies, hunting societies, gathering societies.

Well, first of all, we have to take ourselves back. deep prehistory. We know that ancients were looking at the constellations because they were seemingly either in control of or correlated with or perhaps causative of the seasons. And that was of divine importance, supreme importance for them, right? Their whole existence in early agrarian societies, hunting societies, gathering societies.

Well, first of all, we have to take ourselves back. deep prehistory. We know that ancients were looking at the constellations because they were seemingly either in control of or correlated with or perhaps causative of the seasons. And that was of divine importance, supreme importance for them, right? Their whole existence in early agrarian societies, hunting societies, gathering societies.

So they had to know about time. So time, the essence of time and that On large scale for seasons, for holidays, for festivals, for propitiation of deities and so forth, they had to keep track of it. And that's why in the caves in Lascaux that date back to the 40,000 BCE, they depict constellations. Orion, the hunter, Taurus, the bull, all these different constellations, they depict them there.