The beginning of the universe

Synopsis

The Universe is now about 14 billion years old. How do we know that? And what was there before that, anyway? I am a research scientist working on cosmology, which means I get to ponder these questions for a living. Join me as I will tell you about stuff we see in the sky, and how we think it all fits together. We can now see the hot glow of the Universe's younger days, and I will show you the snapshot taken when it was only about 400,000 years old. We have a pretty good idea what Universe was doing when it was three minutes old, and I will tell you why. Most of all, I will try to tell you how science is done, and convince you there is still romance in exploring the unknown.