| Dancing Wu Li Masters: An Overview of the New Physics - GARY ZUKAV |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: Gary Zukov takes the reader in hand and leads them throughout the minefield of complex physics in a simple and enjoyable manner.- Amazon link |
| The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory - BRIAN GREENE |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: To write a book to explain in simple, non-mathematical terms what superstring theory is in not a simple task. In The Elegant Universe Brian Greene, a physicist who works in the area, does a very good job. Superstrings are a theory of particle physics that lays claim to being the ultimate "Theory of Everything", merging Einstein's relativity and quantum mechanics into an understanding of the physics of the very small and very large in the Universe. Hence to understand superstrings, relativity and quantum mechanics have to be explained as well. In this Brian Greene does a very good job, giving one of the best explainations of relativity I have read in the process. Superstring theory is still very much in its infancy and The Elegant Universe does not claim that all the problems have been solved; in fact a point is made of pointing out all the present deficiencies of the theory. Probably not a book for the very beginner, but anyone who has read popular accounts of particle physics and relativity should gain a lot from reading this book. In places not an easy read, not for the style (which was generally very easy) but simply for the difficulty of some of the concepts involved. Superstring theory may or may not be the theory of everything but this book will certainly tell you what we think we know so far. Definitely recommended, but don't expect to read it in a weekend. --Simon Goodwin - Amazon link |
| The New World of Mr.Tompkins - GEORGE GAMOV, RUSSELL STANNARD & MICHAEL EDWARDS |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: Mr Tompkins is back! The mild-mannered bank clerk with the short attention span and vivid imagination has inspired, charmed and informed young and old alike since the publication of the hugely successful Mr Tompkins in Paperback (by George Gamow) in 1965. He is now back in a new set of adventures exploring the extreme edges of the universe - the smallest, the largest, the fastest, the farthest. Through his experiences and his dreams, you are there at Mr Tompkins' shoulder watching and taking part in the merry dance of cosmic mysteries: Einstein's relativity, bizarre effects near light-speed, the birth and death of the universe, black holes, quarks, space warps and antimatter, the fuzzy world of the quantum, and that ultimate cosmic mystery of all ...love. This new text is revised, updated and expanded by best-selling popular-science author Russell Stannard (who wrote the much-acclaimed Uncle Albert series of books for children).- Amazon link |
| The Strange Case of Mrs. Hudson's Cat: And Other Science Mysteries Solved by Sherlock Holmes - COLIN BRUCE |
| Review by Jenny Tye
- L6CST -2004 Amazon.co.uk Review: Colin Bruce explains principles of physics through twelve adventures of London's most famous fictional inhabitant. Sherlock Holmes unravels the paradoxes and principles of classical and quantum physics in order to solve a crime, prevent an assassination, or rescue a damsel in distress - Amazon link - |
| Uncle Albert and the Quantum Quest - RUSSELL STANNARD |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: Exploring quantum physics, this is the third Uncle Albert story for children. Wanting to know what goes on inside an atom, Uncle Albert transports Gedanken via the Thought Bubble into a quantum wonderland, where she encounters a White Rabbit, a Red Queen, and a Cheshire Cat.- Amazon link |
| Stardust - JOHN & MARY GRIBBIN |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: Life begins with the process of star formation. Except for hydrogen, every single atom of every single element in our bodies has been manufactured inside stars and then scattered across the universe in great stellar explosions known as supernovas, only then to be recycled as part of us. The hydrogen is primordial material, produced in the Big Bang, but everything else has been built up in the burning hearts of stars. We are made of stardust. Here the author relates the series of breakthroughs in astronomy that have led to this almost unbelievable insight into human origins. He begins his rich and characteristically accessible account in the 1920s, when astronomers discovered that the oldest stars are chiefly composed by hydrogen and helium, produced at the birth of the universe. He then describes the seminal work of the 1950s and 1960s which unlocked the secret of how elements are crated by nuclear fusion inside stars. In detail, this book goes on to follow the only recently understood life cycle of a star to its climatic end: supernova, the dramatic death of a star. during these explosions, a single star briefly shines as brightly as a hundred billion suns. The resulting ash is spread far and wide throughout the cosmos, forming new generations of stars, planets, and people. Focusing on the relationship between the Universe and the Earth, the author eloquently explains how the physical structure of the Universe has produced conditions ideal for life. In a Universe where the necessary processes operate with such prolific abandon, life-forms like ourselves cannot be unique.- Amazon link |
| In Search of Schrodinger's Cat - JOHN GRIBBIN |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: Quantum theory is so shocking that Einstein could not bring himself to accept it. It is so important that it provides the fundamental underpinning of all modern sciences. Without it, we'd have no nuclear power or nuclear weapons, no TV, no computers, no science of molecular biology, no understanding of DNA, no genetic engineering. In Search of Schrödinger's Cat tells the complete story of quantum mechanics, a truth stranger than any fiction. John Gribbin takes us step by step into an ever more bizarre and fascinating place, requiring only that we approach it with an open mind. He introduces the scientists who developed quantum theory. He investigates the atom, radiation, time travel, the birth of the universe, superconductors and life itself. And in a world full of its own delights, mysteries and surprises, he searches for Schrödinger's Cat - a search for quantum reality - as he brings every reader to a clear understanding of the most important area of scientific study today - quantum physics. In Search of Schrödinger's Cat is a fascinating and delightful introduction to the strange world of the quantum - an essential element in understanding today's world.- Amazon link |
| The Case of the Missing Neutrinos - JOHN GRIBBIN |
| Review by Harry
Farnham - 2007 Amazon.co.uk Review: This book is an excellent collection of papers that cover a whole range of curious happenings in the world of physics. The author is excellent at showing how scientists have been intrigued by phenomena and the research that they have embarked upon! It is also the perfect size to carry around and is in manageable sections (ideal for reading on trains!!). Amazon link |
| Q Is for Quantum: Pasics fromrticle Phy A To Z - JOHN GRIBBIN |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: The quantum world is the world of the very small - the micro-world ('quantum' means the smallest component of a system or the smallest change a system can make). Q IS FOR QUANTUM is about the inner structure of everything, a quest which, like the quest for an understanding of the Universe at large, goes back to the ancient Greeks and touches all of scientific and philosophical thought since then. Historical highlights include Newton's work on particles and Maxwell's work on waves. The longer biographies in the book include Rutherford, Feynman, Crick and Watson. An extended Introduction, which sets out the present state of knowledge, is followed by the main A-Z section, and then by 'Timelines' to indicate what was discovered when.- Amazon link |
| The Men Who Measured The Universe – MARY & JOHN GRIBBIN - Icon Books - ISBN 1840465360 |
| Review by Andrew Waters - U6 - 2005 |
| Amazon Synopsis: The revolution of our understanding of the cosmos and our place in it happened within a single human lifetime, through a combination of new technology and the dedication of a handful of pioneers. This is their story - of the hard work, perseverance and spirit that unlocked the secrets of the night sky. - Amazon link |
| Climbing Mount Improbable - RICHARD DAWKINS & LALLA WARD |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: "Mount Improbable" is Dawkins's metaphor for natural selection, and the central message of this text is that DNA transcends the significance of the organism, and that organisms are merely vehicles for genes. - Amazon link |
| The Selfish Gene - RICHARD DAWKINS |
| Review by Ben Thomas
- L6RAB -2004 . Review by
Elle Busby - L6CST -2004 Amazon.co.uk Review: Inheriting the mantle of revolutionary biologist from Darwin, Watson, and Crick, Richard Dawkins forced an enormous change in the way we see ourselves and the world with the publication of The Selfish Gene. Suppose, instead of thinking about organisms using genes to reproduce themselves, as we had since Mendel's work was rediscovered, we turn it around and imagine that "our" genes build and maintain us in order to make more genes. That simple reversal seems to answer many puzzlers which had stumped scientists for years, and we haven't thought of evolution in the same way since. Why are there miles and miles of "unused" DNA within each of our bodies? Why should a bee give up its own chance to reproduce to help raise her sisters and brothers? With a prophet's clarity, Dawkins told us the answers from the perspective of molecules competing for limited space and resources to produce more of their own kind. Drawing fascinating examples from every field of biology, he paved the way for a serious re-evaluation of evolution. He also introduced the concept of self-reproducing ideas, or memes, which (seemingly) use humans exclusively for their propagation. If we are puppets, he says, at least we can try to understand our strings.- Amazon link |
| The Blind Watchmaker - RICHARD DAWKINS |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: Richard Dawkins is not a shy man. Edward Larson's research shows that most scientists today are not formally religious, but Dawkins is an in-your-face atheist: I want to persuade the reader, not just that the Darwinian world-view happens to be true, but that it is the only known theory that could, in principle, solve the mystery of our existence. The title of this 1986 work, Dawkins's second book, refers to the Rev. William Paley's 1802 work, Natural Theology, which argued that just as finding a watch would lead you to conclude that a watchmaker must exist, the complexity of living organisms proves that a Creator exists. Not so, says Dawkins: "All appearances to the contrary, the only watchmaker in nature is the blind forces of physics, albeit deployed in a very special way...it is the blind watchmaker". Dawkins is a hard-core scientist: he doesn't just tell you what is so, he shows you how to find out for yourself. For this book, he wrote Biomorph, one of the first artificial life programs.- Amazon link |
| Unweaving the Rainbow – RICHARD DAWKINS - Penguin - ISBN 0-14-026408-9 |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: Why do poets and artists so often disparage science in their work? For that matter, why does so much scientific literature compare poorly with, say, the phone book? After struggling with questions like these for years, biologist Richard Dawkins has taken a wide-ranging view of the subjects of meaning and beauty in Unweaving the Rainbow, a deeply humanistic examination of science, mysticism and human nature. Notably strong-willed in a profession of bet-hedgers and wait-and-seers, Dawkins carries the reader along on a romp through the natural and cultural worlds, determined that "science, at its best, should leave room for poetry." Inspired by the frequently asked question, "Why do you bother getting up in the morning?" following publication of his book The Selfish Gene, Dawkins sets out determined to show that understanding nature's mechanics need not sap one's zest for life. Alternately enlightening and maddening, Unweaving the Rainbow will appeal to all thoughtful readers, whether wild-eyed technophiles or grumpy, cabin-dwelling Luddites. Excoriation of newspaper astrology columns follow quotes from Blake and Shakespeare, which are sandwiched between sparkling, easy-to-follow discussions of probability, behaviour and evolution. In Dawkins' world (and, he hopes, in ours), science is poetry; he ends his journey by referring to his title's author and subject, maintaining that "A Keats and a Newton, listening to each other, might hear the galaxies sing." --Rob Lightner, Amazon.com Amazon Synopsis: Keats accused Newton of destroying the poetry of the rainbow by explaining the origin of its colours. Dawkins argures that Keats could not have been more mistaken, and shows how an understanding of science enhances our wonder at the world around us. This is a "hymn of praise" to the scientific attitude, often maligned for alienating our relationship with nature. He shows how science, properly understood, does not disenchant nature, but rather enhances the poetry of experience by revealing the workings of the natural world in their full wonder. The book's complementary strand is be a polemic against anti-science movements of all types. - Amazon link |
| A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes - STEPHEN HAWKING |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: Was there a beginning of time?, Could time run backwards? and Is the universe infinite are just some of the questions considered in this book for the non-scientific layman. The author begins by reviewing the great theories of the cosmos from Newton to Einstein and then delves into the secrets which lie at the heart of space and time.- Amazon link |
| The Universe in a Nutshell - STEPHEN HAWKING |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: The Universe in a Nutshell attempts to address the relative difficulty of Hawking's first foray into popular science, A Brief History of Time. While this sold in its millions, few readers got past the first few chapters. Helpfully, this new work is full of beautifully prepared colour illustrations and decorations, and has a "tree-like" structure, so that readers can skip from chapter to chapter without losing the thread. In 200 highly illustrated pages, Hawking is pushing the frontiers of popular physics beyond relativity and quantum theory, past superstring theory and imaginary time, into a dizzying new world of M-theory and branes. It's a colossal venture--one Hawking is uniquely qualified to undertake--but it is crammed into far too small a space. When you consider the other rather good tomes being written on the nature of consciousness these days, the decision to limit The Universe in a Nutshell to the dictates of publishing rather than to the natural parameters of the material is an unfortunate one. Worse, Hawking tries to paper over the complexity of his field. He rushes over the very concepts he should be helping us understand, only to belabour simple ideas, often by means of flip Star Trek metaphors. Also unfortunately, the illustrations--by turns trivial and opaque--mirror the faults of the text. The author's name alone will guarantee sales, but the book we long for--the long, ruminative, poetic celebration of Hawking's world--seems as far away as ever. --Simon Ings - Amazon link |
| Complete Idiot’s Guide to Einstein’s Universe - MOBIG |
| Available in the School Library - Review by James Foreman - L6ACM-2004 |
| Wrinkles in Time: Imprint of Creation - GEORGE SMOOT & KEAY DAVIDSON |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: In April 1992 astrophysicist George Smoot announced how he and his team of scientists had found "ripples in the fabric of space-time" that were made in the first trillionth of a second after the cataclysmic moment of creation. Their discovery of the ripples was central to the Big Bang Theory, which explains why the universe did not remain uniformly smooth, but became the "lumpy" universe of today, filled with stars, planets and galaxies. By the summer of 1991 Smoot's Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE) satellite had discovered the tiny ripples that had been put there by the primeval explosion process. Shaped by the force of gravity, the smaller of these ripples have grown into galaxies and the great voids in space. This is Smoot's account of his discovery of the driving mechanism of the universe, a discovery which will stimulate debate for years to come. - Amazon link |
| New Scientist – The Last Word - Oxford Press - ISBN 0-19-285199-9 |
| Amazon link |
| Introducing Quantum Theory – JP McEVOY - ISBN 1-84046-057-1 |
| Amazon Customer Review: I thought this book was excellent, and a fun read. I enjoy the format of the "Introducing..." series in general, i.e. the "serious" Graphic Novel. You will need a fairly extensive chemistry/physics background to get the most out of this book, and should be familiar with concepts of classical physics, wave vs. particle behaviours, etc. But even if you're a bit rusty, as I was, I thought it was very interesting putting names and (silly) faces to the founding fathers of Quantum mechanics and going through the history of each of their contributions.- Amazon link |
| Introducing Chaos – ZIAUDDIN SARDAR - Icon books |
| Amazon Synopsis: Providing an introduction to the controversial field of chaos theory, this text shows how chaos makes its presence felt in many varieties of event, from the fluctuation of animal populations to the ups and downs of the stock market. It also exmaines the roots of chaos in modern mathematics and physics, and explores the relationships between chaos and complexity, the unifying theory which suggests that all complex systems evolve from a few simple rules. - Amazon link |
| Scientific Blunders – R.YOUNGSTEN - ISBN 1-85487-966-2 |
| Amazon Synopsis: An account of the errors into which seemingly infallible humans have fallen, whether through obstinacy, arrogance or carelessness. The book gives a useful perspective on the risks and benefits of scientific advance. Examples investigated include the Piltdown Man hoax and the Tay Bridge collapse. - Amazon link |
| Faster than the speed of light – JOAO MAGUEIJO - Random House - ISBN 0-09-942808-3 |
| Review
by Jenny Tye - U6CST - 2005 Amazon Book Description: The idea that the speed of light is a constant - at 186,000 miles per second - is one of the few scientific facts that almost everyone knows. That constant - c- also appears in the most famous of all scientific equations: e=mc2- Yet over the last few years, a small group of highly reputable young physicists have suggested that the central dogma of modern physics may not be an absolute truth - light may have moved faster in the earlier life of the universe, it may still be moving at different speeds elsewhere today. In telling the story of this heresy, and its gradual journey towards acceptance, Joao Magueijo writes as one of the three central figures in the story, introducing the reader to modern cosmology, to the implications of VSL (variable speed of light) and to the world of physicists. The initial rejection of Magueijo's ideas is beginning to give way to a reluctant acceptance that the young men may have a point - only the next few years will tell the final fate of this 'dangerous' idea. Synopsis: This volume tells the story of the most radical idea to have been proposed in physics since Einstein's relativity theory - the suggestion that the speed of light may not be constant - Amazon link |
| Talking Science – ADAM HARTE-DAVIES - Wiley - ISBN 0-470-09362-1 |
| Focus magazine, No.148, March 2005: "...a good book for anyone who wants to see how real science is done..." |Amazon Book Description: Adam Hart Davis has interviewed some of the most influential scientists and thinkers of our time. In this fascinating insight into modern science he presents the stories behind the science, the difficulties behind the discoveries and the future of the findings, as explained by the people themselves. Adam Hart Davis talks with:- Jocelyn Bell Burnell (Bath, UK) Sir Michael Berry (Bristol, UK) Colleen Cavanaugh (Harvard, US) Richard Dawkins (Oxford, UK) . Loren Graham (MIT, US) Richard Gregory (Bristol, UK) Eric Lander (MIT, US) Lord May of Oxford (UK) John Maynard Smith (Sussex, UK) Rosalind Picard (MIT, US) Peter Raven (St Louis, US) Sir Martin Rees (Cambridge, UK) Eugenie Scott (Oakland, US) Lewis Wolpert (UCL, UK) - Amazon link |
| A Short History of Nearly Everything – BILL BRYSON - Black Swan Books - ISBN 0-552-99704-8 |
| Amazon.co.uk Review: What on earth is Bill Bryson doing writing a book of popular science--A Short History of Almost Everything? Largely, it appears, because this inquisitive, much-travelled writer realised, while flying over the Pacific, that he was entirely ignorant of the processes that created, populated and continue to maintain the vast body of water beneath him. In fact, it dawned on him that "I didn't know the first thing about the only planet I was ever going to live on". The questions multiplied: What is a quark? How can anybody know how much the Earth weighs? How can astrophysicists (or whoever) claim to describe what happened in the first gazillionth of a nanosecond after the Big Bang? Why can't earthquakes be predicted? What makes evolution more plausible than any other theory? In the end, all these boiled down to a single question--how do scientists do science? To this subject Bryson devoted three years of his life, reading books and journals and pestering the people who know (or at least argue about it); and we non-scientists should be pretty grateful to him for passing his findings on to us. Broadly, his investigations deal with seven topics, all of enormous interest and significance: the origins of the universe; the gradual historical discovery of the size and age of the earth (and the beginnings of the awesome notion of deep time); relativity and quantum theory; the present and future threats to life and the planet; the origins and history of life (dinosaurs, mass extinctions and all); and the evolution of man. Within each of these, he looks at the history of the subject, its development into a modern discipline and the frameworks of theory that now support it. This is a pretty broad brief (life, the universe and everything, in fact), and it's a mark of Bryson's skill that he is able to carve a clear path through the thickets of theory and controversy that infest all these disciplines, all the while maintaining a cracking pace and a fairly judicious tone without obvious longueurs or signs of haste. Even readers fairly familiar with some or all of these areas of discourse are likely to learn from A Short History. If not, they will at least be amused--the tone throughout is agreeable, mingling genuine awe with a mild facetiousness that often rises to wit. One compelling theme that appears again and again is the utter unpredictability of the universe, despite all that we think we know about it. Nervous page-turners may care to omit the sensational chapters on the possible ways in which it all might end in disaster--Bryson enumerates with cheerful relish the kind of event that makes you want to climb under the bedclothes: undetectable asteroid colliding with the earth; superheated magma chamber erupting in your back garden; ebola carrier getting off a plane in London or New York; the HIV virus mutating to prevent its destruction in the mosquito's digestive system. Indeed, the chief theme of this sprightly book is the miraculous unlikeliness, in a universe ruled by randomness, of stability and equilibrium--of which one result is ourselves and the complex, fragile planet we inhabit. --Robin Davidson - Amazon link |