In the 1950s, British astrophysicist Sir Fred Hoyle made a name for himself by taping a series of televised lectures called "The Nature of the Universe". Hoyle was of the belief that the universe came from a continual pattern of development that has no beginning or end. This meant that he expressed a great deal of public criticism of the competing theory that the universe had come from a single explosion of dense matter.

This came to a head in the final episode of the series, in which Sir Fred invented a real zinger of a phrase in the hopes of shaming the alternate belief once and for all - "the Big Bang". Unfortunately for Hoyle, this name stuck...but in a good way, and served only to increase the theory's overall popularity!
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