Customer Reviews
how refreshing! - By: M. Taylor, 20 Nov 2007 
Physics is not my subject but I have read this book with great interest & have learnt a great deal. Its very accessible & as a lay person I found the writing style to be open & inviting, it was easy to delvein & out of subjects & chapters - particularly helpful if one isn't very familiar with the subject matter.
The author treats the reader with respect & grants them the intelligence to soak up his points & at the same time understand counter arguements. There is a great sense of humour that comes through as well as a desire to really engage the reader with the subject.
Thankyou - I'll keep delving...
A wonderful physics compendium. - By: SF, 12 Nov 2007 Not only is this a great introduction to the history of 20th Century Physics, it also introduces the reader to the author's sometimes controversial, but fresh perspective on the world of theoretical physics. You don't have to agree with everything, but the book will certainly make you think again about the bizarre world of quantum phenomena. If you didn't get 'A Brief History of Time', then try this; it probably goes down much easier.
Something different - By: geeky, 20 Sep 2007 Chapters 1-4 cover everything that most people will want to know about light, gravity time & relativity, from first principles, & with lots of illustrations. E=mc squared is dealt within chapter two!
Chapter 5 is about where Isaac Newton's physics went wrong.
Chapters 6-8 deal with Doppler shifts, & the way that things seem to distort when they move, & Chapter 9 lists reasons why we might expect moving bodes to drag light along with them.
Chapter 10 is about quantum mechanics & what happens when we can't see things, Chapter 11 is about black holes & dark stars.
Chapter 12 asks what's wrong with general relativity, & Chapter 13 does some math (its title is "Horrible Nasty Mathematics"!).
(deep breath)
Chapter 14 describes the background to special relativity, Chapter 15 takes a critical look at Einstein's theory, & Chapter 16 examines the experimental evidence for it.
Chapters 17, 18 & 19 are more fun, & tackle cosmology, wormhole theory & whether we can build a warp drive.
The rest of the book is about the psychology of science & how it influences what theories say. Chapter 20 is about language traps & mental blocks, Chapter 21 is about social factors & peer pressure, & Chapter 22 is a short conclusions section. Then there's some calculations & a decent reference section for students.
Overall, its a big book with lots of pictures. Most people will probably like Chapters 1-4 & 17-19, but whether you like the other chapters or not will probably depend on how interested you arein their subject matter. Chapters 6-8 do read a bit like a boring school textbook, but the rest of the book is pretty chatty, & it has illustrations almost everywhere. It's not your normal science book.
