Stunning Science and a Couple of Stunning Mistakes

The Universe in Your Hand by Christophe Galfard

New York : Flatiron Books, 2017, c2016.

First US edition

386 pages ; 22 cm

Christophe Galfard tries and mostly succeeds in leading the lay reader through the current state of knowledge about cosmology and astrophysics - taking the reader through Newtonian, Einsteinian and quantum physics along the way. It's an ambitious undertaking, and I think Galfard succeeds better than most at creatively introducing the reader to mind-bending worlds of quantum fields and some of the truly bizarre quandaries and realms of modern cosmology - dark matter, dark energy, and string theory.  

His was one of the first books I've read about quantum fields where I started to just appreciate and even accept the way in which our "common sense" understandings of the world (which works fine on most of the scales we evolved in) are just not capable of reckoning with the way particles are manifestations of the quantum fields. It's heady stuff, and I'll probably reread those sections later to try and take in more of what they offer. Given the positives about this book, I have to qualify it with the following observation.

There is such a glaring mistake early in the book that I'm a bit befuddled that editors and early readers didn't check it. Galfard describes the future demise of our sun as being one where it "explodes, firing all the matter it was made of into outer space" (6). A while later he describes this ending as "spreading into space all the atoms the Sun has forged throughout its life while creating some more - the heaviest ones of all, such as gold" (19).  This was so unlike any scenarios of the sun's demise I had ever read that I thought maybe I had misread previous books and explanations - or that the latest science was radically different. I searched books and online astronomy sites, and so far, I've found nothing to indicate that the sun will blow away all its mass or that a star of the sun's size can forge anything heavier than carbon in its last stages. From what I've read it will end up as a white dwarf that will then last for billions and billons of years as it slowly cools. 

So I'll suggest the book for its navigation through quantum realities and string theory, but hedge my praise based on the beginning of the book.

       

Super Tiny, Super Big

Smash! : Exploring the Mysteries of the Universe with the Large Hadron Collider by Sara Latta
Minneapolis : Graphic Universe, [2017]
72 p. : chiefly ill. ; 24 cm.

This little comic book is more of an hors d'oeuvre than an entree, but there's nothing wrong with that.  Weighing in at a mere 72 pages, and managing to convey the amazing science of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) without getting bogged down in its wild complexities, Latta has managed to create a work that should whet the reader's appetite to know more.   It did mine!

Though the story-line is a bit corny (a little youngish for high school) the science is admirable.  In one part of the book, in the space of just a couple pages she manages to cover most of the basics of the standard model: the six "flavors" of quarks,  six kinds of leptons, the four fundamental forces and the bosons associated with them - and, of course, the most famous triumph of the LHC, the discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012.

It's nice to have a brief, very accessible book to recommend to a student who is not deep into advanced science, and yet wants to know about particle physics.  If you know such a student, Smash! might be just what they need.

Big Ideas, Little Book

Seven Brief Lessons on Physics by Carlo Rovelli
New York, N.Y. : Riverhead Books, 2016.
86 p. : ill. ; 20 cm.

Seven Brief Lessons is one of those lovely little science books that is at once accessible to the lay reader, but also introduces concepts and ideas that leave you more curious (and perplexed even) than when you started.  How confused or satisfied you are after finishing the book will somewhat depend on your knowledge of, and familiarity with scientific concepts.  But even a science novice can come away with a lot to ponder after reading this book.

Rovelli wants to touch on some of the most astounding and important concepts in physics that have developed in the last 115 years.  He starts out with Einstein by mentioning his "Special Theory of Relativity" which dealt with the fluid nature of time, and then proceeds to expound on what he considers one of science's preeminent masterpieces, Einstein's "General Theory of Relativity."  It is this theory that establishes space as a field that is shaped by gravity.

Rovelli continues on in his lessons to discuss quanta, the nature of the cosmos, the search for a unifying theory that will connect the macro understanding of gravity and space to the nearly incomprehensible phenomena of quantum physics at the subatomic level.  His book spirals off into ruminations on heat, time, and the "granular" nature of space itself.

He brings his book to a close with a meditation on the human condition and its place fully within the matrix of nature.

Less a book of answers - or even a summary of where physics stands - this book is more of a jumping off point for pondering the wondrous and nearly unbelievable nature of what humans know and still don't know about the universe we find ourselves in.

Big Hopes for the Very Tiny

The Quantum Age by Brian Clegg
London : Icon, 2015.
vi, 282 p. : ill. ; 20 cm.

I'm not sure why Clegg's Quantum Age just didn't hit the sweet spot for me.  I like science and I like trying to wrap my mind around quantum concepts. I guess that there were several concepts that I never felt were covered well enough, and therefore when they'd get referred to later - I'd find myself still somewhat confused.  Some of these important concepts were tunneling, superposition, decoherence, entanglement, and Cooper's pairs (electrons).

I still muddled through the book and found parts of it interesting enough. The book does help the reader see not only how quantum physics underlies many day to day processes - for example anything involving light - but how modern science has applied it's knowledge of quantum physics to create computing as we know it, and such medical technologies as MRIs. He also points toward the many potential breakthroughs that seem to be on the horizon - practical superconductivity, quantum computing, and advanced encryption to name just some.

I'm glad I read the book, but I can't say it is one that I'll be highly recommending.  I wouldn't discourage a student from checking it out, but I'll definitely be on the lookout for something that I find even better.    

Quantum Science Goes to the Dogs

How to Teach Physics to Your Dog
Chad Orzel
New York : Scribner, 2009.
241 p.

Have a student interested in quantum theory? This is not a bad book for that. Orzel uses humor and the shtick of his dog supposedly asking question after question about the fundamentals of quantum theory.

In spite of the book being meant for the lay reader, I still had a lot of difficulty with understanding the author's explanations of wave functions and his attempt to explain decoherence and the idea of infinite universes. But, there is plenty to enjoy in the book and I LOVED his last chapter where he debunks and derides the shameless hucksterism of people like Depak Chopera who use shallow quantum theory mumble-jumble to sell their self-help and self-improvement books.

Other books I've liked that touch on quantum theory are the book You Are Here by Christopher Potter and The Elegant Universe by Brian Green (which is more about super string theories, and yet discusses a lot of quantum theory, too.)