Explains the basis of our empirical evidence in physics - how the instruments work and what is being measured. Gives an interesting philosophical treatment of epistemology - what some questions have multiple answers, depending on the purpose of the question (e.g., microscopic versus macroscopic perspective, science versus moral agency). ( )

I’ve read several books about particle physics, relativity, quantum mechanics, cosmology, etc., all intended for laypeople of course, and I have fully understood none of them. In fact, all of them have huge sections that leave me befuddled. But actually, this book had a much better ratio than most, I probably sort of felt like I “got” three-quarters of it. Maybe Wilczek has better explanations? Maybe he just skips over the hardest parts? Whatever it is, if you like this kind of stuff but would like to imagine that you are comprehending say 3/4 of the book instead of 1/4, then I recommend this one. I truly enjoyed it.

Wilczek is a good writer, but not a fabulous one. But you can tell he wants to include the reader in his world, and his style kind of charmed me, and as a Nobel prize winning physicist, the guy certainly knows what he’s talking about! ( )

A nice survey of physics but the reborn / conservative / fundamental vocabulary seemed on. Not really central, but I found his speculation on the future of computers and intelligence fascinating. ( )

Easy to read, written in the emphatic voice of a Nobel Prizewinning physicist who clearly knows the subject. I especially liked the summaries:

Four (Deceptively) Easy Principles
1. The basic laws describe change. Distinguish between “state” and “laws”. Laws describe change.
2. The basic laws are universal.
3. Locality: they’re true at every level. Behavior in the immediate future depends only on current conditions in the immediate vicinity.
4. Precision: There are no exceptions, ever, to the laws.

Primary properties of matter from which all other properties can be derived:
mass, charge, spin
( )

In the context of the Higgs particle mass, observed to be 125 GeV/c, naturalness means why shouldn't it be much higher? This is to do with the masses of particles being obtained from the so called "natural units" of physics, G, c, h/2pi which give results massively bigger than observed. Because the Higgs mass is lower, in this sense it's not "natural". And it then looks like the Higgs mass is, so-called, "fine-tuned". But there are other "fine-tunings" in all this as well - such as the cosmological constant. Re this the universe has to expand at pretty well the rate it did (and no different) very early on in it's history. As far as I know, you can't change the Higgs mass (if you could somehow fiddle with this at the beginning of the universe) to be very big for other universes or you end up with vast numbers of pointless, unreal or whatever universes. Because only a few universes come from having the parameters actually seen, or around about, in the Standard Model ... the SM is unnatural. I guess then it's all an appeal to this fine-tuning business to explain this. Wilczek seems to be saying these axions also depend on this. So, I guess, if fine tuning is "in" (and it seems to be) as a requirement for our universe, then the multiverse is also in. And we're in a fine tuned universe in this collection. Thing is, now the problem is kicked down the road and this is where the string theorists come in. One of the reason for a 'newer' theory coming every fortnight is that in many countries salaries, promotions, funding and career opportunities are too dependent on number of publications rather than on quality of work. If this is the trend you can put forth as many unfounded fancy theories as you wish. One thing that can help is that physicists often spout that mass tells space how to curve, but they should focus more on the important lesson of GR that energy density is proportional to curvature. That it does is not as important as in what proportion. Then they can at least begun to see how an emergence from a maximum energy density toward a lowering values must create a curved trajectory with the tightest coils corresponding to higher energy density. Axions?? Bah! We All know they’re invisible…so, why bother?



Roger Penrose: "We need a whole new physics." ( )