In 2015 the Boulder Cosmology Group met at 6PM for DVD lectures on the second and fourth Wednesdays of the month and reading discussions on third Mondays at the Main Branch of the Boulder Public Library.

See http://www.sackett.net/cosmologyAll.htm for a list of all materials covered in the Cosmology Group since it began meeting in 2003.

01/14/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor Alex Filippenko, Understanding the Universe: An Introduction to Astronomy.
      Lecture 87, Dark Energy - Quantum Fluctuations? and Lecture 88, Dark Energy - Quintessence?.

01/26/2015 Book Discussion: The Trouble With Physics: The Rise of String Theory, The Fall of a Science, and What Comes Next, by Lee Smolin.

01/28/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor Alex Filippenko, Understanding the Universe: An Introduction to Astronomy.
      Lecture 89, Grand Unification & Theories of Everything and Lecture 90, Searching for Hidden Dimensions.

02/11/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor Alex Filippenko, Understanding the Universe: An Introduction to Astronomy.
      Lecture 91, The Shape, Size, and Fate of the Universe and Lecture 92, In the Beginning [a fraction of a second after the Big Bang].

02/23/2015 Book Discussion: The Age of Entanglement: When Quantum Physics Was Reborn, by Louisa Gilder. Chapters 1 to 16.

02/25/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor Alex Filippenko, Understanding the Universe: An Introduction to Astronomy.
      Lecture 93, The Inflationary Universe and Lecture 94, The Ultimate Free Lunch? [more on inflation].

03/11/2015   The last two DVD lectures from Professor Alex Filippenko, Understanding the Universe: An Introduction to Astronomy.
      Lecture 95, A Universe of Universes and Lecture 96, Reflections on Life and the Cosmos.

03/16/2015 Book Discussion: The Age of Entanglement: When Quantum Physics Was Reborn, by Louisa Gilder. Chapters 17 to 37.
Also, for Chapter 31, please read this 9 page report from Dave on "Quantum Entanglement - The Aspect Experiment".

03/25/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor David Meyer, A Visual Guide to the Universe.
      Lecture 1, Probing the Cosmos from Space and Lecture 2, The Magnetic Beauty of the Active Sun.

04/08/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor David Meyer, A Visual Guide to the Universe.
      Lecture 3, Mars: Water and the Search for Life and Lecture 4, Vesta and the Asteroid Belt.

04/20/2015 Book Discussion: The Infinity Puzzle: Quantum Field Theory and the Hunt for an Orderly Universe, by Frank Close. Part 1.

04/22/2015   This Wednesday the group did not meet at the library. Instead, members were encouraged to attend Dr. Bruce Jakosky's report on “Early results from the MAVEN mission to Mars” at 7:30PM in the LASP Space Sciences Building (Room W120).

05/13/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor David Meyer, A Visual Guide to the Universe.
      Lecture 5, Saturn: The Rings of Enchantment and Lecture 6, The Ice Moons Europa and Enceladus.

05/18/2015 Book Discussion: The Infinity Puzzle: Quantum Field Theory and the Hunt for an Orderly Universe, by Frank Close. Part 2.

05/27/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor David Meyer, A Visual Guide to the Universe.
      Lecture 7, The Search for Other Earths and Lecture 8, The Swan Nebula.

06/10/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor David Meyer, A Visual Guide to the Universe.
      Lecture 9, The Seven Sisters and Their Stardust Veil and Lecture 10, Future Supernova, Eta Carinae.

06/15/2015 ArXiv Paper Discussion: Art Hobson, “There are no particles, there are only fields” at http://arXiv.org/pdf/1204.4616v2.pdf.
Suggested supplemental reading: the last half (chapter 6 to end) of Rodney Brooks, Fields of Color.

06/24/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor David Meyer, A Visual Guide to the Universe.
      Lecture 11, Runaway Star, Zeta Ophiuchi and Lecture 12, The Center of the Milky Way.

07/08/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor David Meyer, A Visual Guide to the Universe.
      Lecture 13, The Andromeda Galaxy and Lecture 14, Hubble's Galaxy Zoo.

07/20/2015 Discussion of our own Dave Peterson's paper on “Learning Quantum Mechanics and Relativity” which can be found at http://sackett.net/LearningQuantumMechanics.pdf (26 pages).

07/22/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor David Meyer, A Visual Guide to the Universe.
      Lecture 15, The Brightest Quasar and Lecture 16, The Dark Side of the Bullet Cluster.

08/12/2015   The last two DVD lectures from Professor David Meyer, A Visual Guide to the Universe.
      Lecture 17, The Cosmic Reach of Gamma-Ray Bursts and Lecture 18, The Afterglow of the Big Bang.

08/17/2015 Book Discussion: In search of the ultimate building blocks, by Gerard ’t Hooft and his paper
“The Evolution of Quantum Field Theory from QED to Grand Unification” at http://arxiv.org/pdf/1503.05007v1.pdf.

08/26/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor Sean Carroll, The Higgs Boson and Beyond.
      Lecture 1, The Importance of the Higgs Boson and Lecture 2, Quantum Field Theory.

09/09/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor Sean Carroll, The Higgs Boson and Beyond.
      Lecture 3, Atoms to Particles and Lecture 4, The Power of Symmetry.

09/21/2015 Book Discussion (continued): In search of the ultimate building blocks, by Gerard ’t Hooft and his paper
“The Evolution of Quantum Field Theory from QED to Grand Unification” at http://arxiv.org/pdf/1503.05007v1.pdf.

09/23/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor Sean Carroll, The Higgs Boson and Beyond.
      Lecture 5, The Higgs Field and Lecture 6, Mass and Energy.

10/14/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor Sean Carroll, The Higgs Boson and Beyond.
      Lecture 7, Colliding Particles and Lecture 8, Particle Accelerators and Detectors.

10/19/2015 Book Discussion: Superconductivity: A Very Short Introduction, by Stephen Blundell.
     “More is Different”, an interesting article mentioned in Blundell's conclusion by P.W. Anderson about
broken symmetry and the nature of the hierarchical structure of science (4 pages).

10/28/2015   Selected DVD lectures from Professor Sean Carroll, The Higgs Boson and Beyond.
      Lecture 9, The Large Hadron Collider and Lecture 10, Capturing the Higgs Boson.

11/09/2015   The last two DVD lectures from Professor Sean Carroll, The Higgs Boson and Beyond.
      Lecture 11, Beyond the Standard Model of Particle Physics and Lecture 12, Frontiers: Higgs in Space.

11/16/2015 Book Discussion: An Introduction to Modern Cosmology, by Andrew Liddle. Chapters 1 - 4 & Advanced Topic 1.
     A Cosmology Timeline that Paul Kunasz developed for our Liddle discussion (10 pages). Jeff's Notes for Liddle (2nd edition).

11/25/2015   Because this is the day before Thanksgiving and so many people will be busy or travelling we decided to cancel this meeting.

12/09/2015   Perimeter Institute's Neil Turok on “The Astonishing Simplicity of Everything”.
If you wish, you can watch this lecture in advance at http://perimeterinstitute.ca/videos/neil-turok-astonishing-simplicity-everything.

12/14/2015 Book Discussion: An Introduction to Modern Cosmology, by Andrew Liddle. Chapters 5 - 7 & Advanced Topic 2.
     A Cosmology Timeline that Paul Kunasz developed for our Liddle discussion (10 pages). Jeff's Notes for Liddle (2nd edition).
Note: This ^^^^ is the Cosmology Group's last meeting of 2015

For more information, e-mail group leader Jeff Grove: jeff1.grove@gmail.com.

This is http://www.sackett.net/cosmologySchedule2015.htm, last updated December 14, 2015.