New Scientist Essential Guide - No. 24 - Our Incredible Universe

The quest for an ultimate understanding of the cosmos
From chains of galaxies billions of light years long to black holes billions of times more massive than the sun, our universe is a place of grandeur and spectacle. Despite the almost immeasurable difference from the human scale, scientists armed with telescopes and spacecraft have revealed the age of the cosmos, the scope of its contents and the nature of the stage on which it all plays out. But why is there something rather than nothing? Are space and time an illusion? And might the universe be conscious?