Customer Reviews

Fearful Symmetry

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have spent most of my career studying simple groups --
finite and algebraic simple groups -- and the geometric
spaces on which they act and I have found it impossible not to be
carried away by the sheer beauty of these structures
and by the sense that they must have some reality in nature
beyond a mathematician's thoughts. This book allowed me
to have a little sense of how true this might be (far
beyond what I knew just from newspapers). As a group theorist
who has thought a lot about the same 'philosophical' issues,
I couldn't put this book down. It is full of charming stories
and good humor. In my opinion, this book is a model of good scientific writing.

This a wonderfully well-written book that explains in clear and often witty prose -- with little if any math -- what particle physicists do. If you've ever wondered what goes on inside the atom, then this book's for you. I loved reading it.

After buying Dr. Zee's book, I became worried that I would not be able to understand it and would thereby lose respect for my brain, one of my last bankable attributes. The book lay on the side table for a year. Finally, on a whim, I sat down to read it early in the evening-- about dinner-time. The next thing I knew, the windows were getting light and I couldn't feel my feet.
I barely made it through algebra, have no science background, and a scientist would probably tell me that I have no real business reading a book like Dr. Zee's. But his explanations create a case for a greater aesthetics that is so compelling-- a beauty not tangential or decorative, but essential to the architecture of physical reality-- that I wholeheartedly recommend his book to every thinking person I know. And that includes designers. And blondes.

Anthony Zee is one of my favorite contemporary physics writers. His work 'Fearful Symmetry' shows how beautiful the framework of modern physics can be while allowing the reader to gain a greater understanding of the physical phenomenon surrounding them. This text is wonderful for a nonindoctrinated scientist to get his feet wet on some of the unanswered questions in physics. Personally this book found me after graduating my Bachelors and helped form the questions that led to my doctoral career.

This review must begin with a description of the context in which I encountered "Fearful Symmetry" by Anthony Zee. I'm looking for a text to help guide a course on symmetry, the basics of group theory, and the relationship of both to modern physics - all for a class of scientifically curious but mathematically challenged seniors (average age 75). I first ran across Leon Lederman and Christopher Hill's book, "Symmetry and the Beautiful Universe," which I read. However, a friend, having seen the mixed reviews of Lederman posted on Amazon, suggested the Zee book as potentially superior, which I now have read. Regrettably, I must report that compared to Lederman, Zee's book is a failure. It has three major flaws: 1) Zee continually invokes the concept of a creator seeking beauty, an aesthetically driven guiding intelligence, the designer - all concepts that have more to do with religion than with science. Besides being annoying, the implicit assertion is that theoretical physicists are now intellectually in touch with the designer, and that the pathway to that contact is through the aesthetic appeal of symmetry. While it is true that symmetry has been hugely significant in guiding the unraveling of physical theories, both past and present, it is absurd to suggest, as Zee does, some architect of the universe sitting down trying to decide which symmetry group should govern the universe. That may be what Zee thinks, or it may be a large metaphor, but it doesn't matter - it perturbs the flow of ideas. 2) And it is precisely in the flow of ideas that this book really fails. It is clear that Zee doesn't know his reader - how much basic science the reader brings to the book, and how much he or she hopes to leave with. He deals with non-conservation of parity early in the book, way before establishing a context for understanding what a small fraction of the panoply of elementary particles is involved. His treatment of the Lorentz transformation is just words - virtually no insight. His treatment of gauge theory is equally barren. In contrast, the Lederman book, which is willing to put its toe one unit deeper into the mathematics of each subject, deals with all three of these in a vastly superior order and with a much more satisfying level of detail (but still targeting the general reader). 3) Zee presents himself as a "theoretical" physicist. At one point he even says he doesn't care how any particular nucleus behaves. The arrogance of this statement is appalling. Where does Zee think the insights he trumpets came from? He argues, with success, that Einsteinean searches for fundamental symmetries have been important in whatever significant steps our theorists have made, but most physicists I know (and I have a PhD in solid-state physics) recognize the dynamic balance between experiment and theory that is needed for any real progress - a symbiosis of very different disciplines that are inextricably linked together. Einstein could not have come up with his theory of the photoelectric effect without the data. Nor would special relativity come out of a vacuum - the independence of the speed of light to changes in inertial frame was a hot experimental issue, not just a theoretical one. Zee pretends to float above all this mundane dealing with experiment, and it makes him look bad, philosophy-of-science bad, at least in this reviewer's eyes.

This book provides an excellent intro and overview of modern physics, from Noether's theorem to Yang-Mills theory. Most gauge theory books and quantum field theory books are highly mathematical but short on exposition. This is an ideal book to read while tackling the harder stuff like Zee's "Quantum Field Theory in a Nutshell". Zee has one of the best writing styles of any hardcore physicists. Also Recommended is Kerson Huang's "Fundamental Forces of Nature".

This book tries to use symmetry concept to describe many important physical laws from relativity to grand unification theory. For readers with ample physics background, it provides a refreshing review. On the other hand, although the arthor attemps to simplifies some abstract concepts, I feel it will be a very difficult read for those who lacks physics or group theory background to appreciate the underlying beauty of symmetry.

Fearful Symmetry is the most soothing physics book I have ever read. Perhaps soothing is a strange word, but by analogy, reading Feynman is like riding a race horse, while reading others is like being in a rather bad nightclub or being lectured to by a kind but stern uncle. All are worthwhile in their own ways, but none are soothing. Reading Fearful Symmetry is like listening to Schubert by a warm fire on a cold winter's night. Anyone who loves science will enjoy this wonderful look inside the soul of physics.

The author succeeds to convey his passion for the beauty in physics in this excellent book (one of the best I have read on this topic and also an excellent introduction to it). I would not have made it through other books without this one, since Mr. Zee gets as deep as possible without really using formulas and he explains a lot of the concepts in an easy and understandable way, despite the complexity of the topics.

While reading this book you will get a glimpse of gauge symmetries and groups, of particle physics and of the standard model and of how the forces tend to unify at high energy states. It was very interesting how physicists make their way to establishing a proper group and the prediction of the number of particles that must be "out there" if the chosen group is to be correct. I very much enjoyed the chapter about proton decay and the age of the universe, as well as the chapter on matter and anti-matter. This latter even turned my mood a bit "philosophic". This book contained definitely the best explanation of the general and special laws of relativity I have read so far and in only one chapter. (Maybe other explanations are technically better but I do not understand them, whereas after reading this book I was left with the impression that I kind of understood what they were about). I will definitely read the book that Mr. Zee devoted entirely to Einstein and his theories.

Another reviewer mentions that you need an understanding in physics or group theory to appreciate the beauty in the propositions. I am sure you need it to understand the beauty intrinsically (I mean from the formulas or propositions by themselves), but the author does a great job in transmitting the idea of beauty in simplicity and symmetry. Deep Down Things: The Breathtaking Beauty of Particle Physics explains the concepts even more clearly and precisely (excellent book by the way), but Mr. Zee is more passionate about the subject. Symmetry and the Beautiful Universe is also excellent, but in this book, you need to try to follow the formulas Dr. Lederman introduces in order to appreciate the beauty, so it's a bit more difficult. Dr. Zee is full of enthusiasm which he transmits with or without the reader's comprehension of the formulas.

The book had a few grammatical mistakes (parts of sentences were misplaced or a strange sentence structure was used), so it was a bit difficult to read, on top of the subject already being difficult enough (I attribute this to the Spanish translation that I read, but I do not know for sure).

This book is not about symmetry of shapes. It is about a much more fundamental symmetry: the invariances observed in the most fundamental laws of physics. These invariances render modern physics theories simple and fundamentally austere, yet deep in abstract sense and with rich consequences. In this book Zee demonstrates there is no room for decorations in the architecture of physical reality, and opens the reader's eyes to the intrinsic beauty of physics laws at the most fundamental level. Zee manages to do so without a single line of math (Zee occasionally uses a 'ket' notation to denote the states of a physical system, but thoroughly explains this shorthand notation).

Zee's enthusiasm and natural writing style ensures he not only conveys this message, but also gives the reader a clear insight in what modern physics is about. Zee explains how the work of Einstein, Noether and Heisenberg resulted in a history of ideas that inevitably led to a theory of supreme beauty: the non-Abelian gauge theory by Yang and Mills. I know of no other pop science book that explains the essence of this concept so well.

The book reads like a novel. It contains interesting anecdotes, some funny sidelines, many simple - yet instructive - pictures, and is very easy to follow without any specialist knowledge in either math or physics.

Five stars, easily.