Customer Reviews

Feynman's Rainbow: A Search for Beauty in Physics and in Life

5 star:		(25)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Author and physicist Leonard Mlodinow shares his experiences as a young post-doc at the California Institute of Technology, where he had an office just up the hall from Richard Feynman, in this candid and funny memoir.
Feynman - who, when Mlodinow showed up at Caltech, was already living with the cancer that eventually took his life - was an inspiration to the young physicist, who first discovered an interest in physics when while working at a kibbutz in Israel. An old copy of Feynman's book The Character of Physical Law was part of the kibbutz's small library, and it helped Mlodinow decide on his next step - a Ph.D. in the sometimes strange field of particle physics. When the newly minted Doctor's thesis caught the attention of some of Caltech's faculty, Mlodinow found himself offered an unusually plum position on Caltech's faculty.
While at Caltech, Leonard struck up an acquaintance with Feynman, even coaxing the opinionated, occasionally cranky genius to commit his thoughts to cassette tape in a series of interviews. What might have turned into an abstruse version of Tuesdays With Morrie set in the halls of elite academia becomes - thanks to Mlodinow's courage in including himself as a player in the story, and through the graces of Feynman himself, who had little patience for mentoring or moralizing - a cleanly direct exploration of career anguish and punctured hero worship that ripens into a true affection.
It's also about more than Professor Feynman: the book takes his attitudes and his reflections to heart (none more so than the pure and concentrated pleasure Mlodinow observes Feynman taking in the small details of everyday life), but Mlodinow makes room in his account for a small cast of characters that broaden and enrich the story by providing context, contrast, and unexpected sympathies. When the young post-doc, fretting over the physicist's version of writer's block, takes his stoner buddy Ray to a physics lecture, only to run into both Feynman and Murray Gell-Man, Feynman's (mostly) friendly rival and counterpart on campus, Mlodinow forgets to worry about his stalled professional arc from brilliant post-doc to Next Big Thing, and sweats instead over what Ray might come out and say to the touchy, curmudgeonly Grand Old Man of physics. Naturally - and behind young Leonard's back - the two strike up an instant rapport.
Mlodinow's sometimes prickly encounters with Feyman's secretary and self-appointed watchdog are a hoot, as are the passages in which Leonard (and we, his readers) meet the various chaps all up and down the hallway - Constantine, a flashy sort with a fabulously glorious actress girlfriend and a penchant for panache and adventure, John Schwartz (yes, that John Schwartz, the fellow who came up with string theory), and one unnamed chap who, mired in limbo with no Big Idea to pursue, seems to spend his hours tending to a small plant nursery in his office. Young Leonard fears that he will end up a mirror image of this last, whom he dubs "Dr. Gardner," but a brush with his own mortality - and Feynman's sometimes brusque influence - exert themselves, and Mlodinow quits worrying quite so much and learns to follow his bliss.
Along with his small, memorable roster of dramatis personae, Mlodinow folds into his story a fair amount of modern physics theory, making the mysteries of the mathematical universe and the tantalizing goal of a Grand Unified Theory of nature resonate with his own youthful quest for truth, beauty, and happiness. There is also an instructive rumination present on the different philosophies in science - the "Greek" versus "Babylonian" points of view. (The know-better Murray Gell-Man follows the rational, experiment-oriented Greek model, while the more playful Feynman embodies the Babylonian appreciation of intuition and phenomenon.)
"The forces of nature are disparate, but in fine balance," Mlodinow writes at one point, and in his effortlessly charming style, he seems to adopt this as his slogan: for all its assorted and not obviously connected themes, Feynman's Rainbow moves gracefully and with a tender mixture of respect and affection for a man who shone with a child's sense of wonder, and who was also one of the twentieth century's great scientific minds.

Well, this book makes an evening of good reading. Feynman fans would instantly identify with his vintage mannerisms such as scorn for psychology and philosophy, showmanship and his wonder of nature. It contains Feynman's views of how a scientists life should be, how he must go about choosing problems and the emphasis that he must lay on his belief of his capabilities and the problems tractability.

But, more than all the above, this book is about the authors struggles with high expectations. He portrays the emotional lows that graduate students and fresh graduates undergo when they step out to the real world. It tells you that no matter how smart you are, which school you went to, or the quality of work you produce, there would always be moments of self doubt. Feynman himself faced such fallow times more than once, even after he won the Nobel.

Surprisingly, the author does not mention that Feynman went through exactly the same dilemma when he got out of Los Alamos. He was being offered positions with high salary from Berkeley, Institute of Advanced Study, Cornell etc. Feynman felt that he did not deserve these posts as he would not produce any good work any more in his life. How he got over this feeling is a wonderful story in itself.

Overall, I guess the book is worth buying if you are interested in the life of a scientist in general, especially a young one.

There were plenty of famous physicists in the twentieth century, but none as endearing and downright funny as Richard Feynman. If you have ever read his wonderful memoir _Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!_, you know plenty about the humorous side of the serious physicist, the man who originated quantum electrodynamics as well as plenty of other accomplishments within his field, to say nothing of playing the bongos. Now there is an unusual memoir, a tribute from a young physicist who came within Feynman's orbit at Caltech in the early 1980s. _Feynman's Rainbow: A Search for Beauty in Physics and in Life_ (Warner Books) by Leonard Mlodinow gives us another snapshot of Feynman, which would always be welcome, but this one is special. Mlodinow was starting up to be an academic physicist, and got to get advice from Feynman on the task, as well as on what is important in life. Mlodinow presciently taped many of the sessions, and got around to transcribing them only recently. Feynman has lots to teach us still, even if we aren't physicists.

Part of the attraction of this little volume is that while it is about Feynman, it is also about Mlodinow's discomfort as a whiz kid brought in to work at Caltech. He was glad to get the appointment, but also intimidated. "These people at Caltech might actually expect something of me." He didn't know how to start, and floundered for months, until he decided to talk with Feynman, just down the hall, about what he thought about string theory. "Look," Feynman said dismissively, "If you really believed in string theory, you wouldn't come here asking me. You'd come here _telling_ me." The lesson was, find something you believe in and go to work. In Feynman's view, it wouldn't do to work on just anything. If you weren't working on something beautiful, and something you believed in, then the work wouldn't be fun. And fun was essential: "For me, physics is more fun than anything else or I couldn't be doing it." Feynman isn't the only curious character in this memoir. Next door to Mlodinow's office is another Nobel winner, Murray Gell-Mann who had brought the unifying theory of quarks to subatomic particles. John Schwarz, working alone for many years, finally brings out string theory. Stephen Wolfram appears, before "Mathematica" and his own rewrite of science, to eat a pound of rare roast beef. There is also a good deal of science in the book, a brief summary of where physics stood at the end of the millennium.

Mlodinow had a hobby of writing during the time, writing screenplays, which some of his fellow physicists must have thought beneath him. Feynman didn't influence him directly to go into writing, but at least partially because of Feynman's teaching about going after the work that is fun, he wound up writing rather than doing physics. He left Caltech to write an acclaimed history of geometry, and even scripts for _Star Trek_. It is obvious he absorbed the lessons he has generously shared with us in this amusing book, for he left Caltech hoping that he could do something Feynman would admire. "And then I thought, no, even better, I hope that someday I will write something that I would admire." Very nice work, Mr. Feynman.

Richard Feynman and Gell-Man Murray are two towering figures in 20th Century Physics. The book begins with the writer's arrival at Caltech as a fresh postdoc with a PhD from Berkeley in the 1980s. In this little autobiographical book, the author writes about his experiences at Caltech focusing on his interactions with Feynman and Murray - their characters and rivalry. Physics take a back seat in this book. Instead, the author attempts to tell a very human (and sometimes sad) story about himself, Feynman and Murray. I find this book interesting for two reasons. First, the author shares his experience about the insecurities that many PhD graduates have about their ability to do meaningful research work after the PhD (especially when one's PhD work was considered important enough to land a Caltech postdoc). Second, it provides a few glimpses of what Feynman and Murray were like at close range - human beings observed on a daily basis (and at their natural habitat). Overall, I cannot help but get the feeling that Feynman comes across as a more 'humane' person than Murray in this book. The writer doesn't apologize for his bias towards Feynman and he does gives examples of Murray's generosity (e.g. his support and belief on Schwartz who toiled for years with the String Theory). He repeatedly emphasizes on the different styles and outlook (life philosophy) of Feynman and Murray. Feynman is more interested in interesting problems and derives tremendous joy from doing physics. Murray, the smart one who revels in demonstrating his diverse knowledge. At the end, the writer favours Feynman's approach to life partly because of his own interests and inclination - towards writing. For it was Feynman who advocated the pursuit of things that truly brings joy. This is a book that would interest readers who enjoy reading about the lives of eminent scientists especially Feynman.

This is a reasonable book. It is a good read, and it is entertaining, especially to those interested in the daily workings of a major physics departments. The advice Mlodinow received from Feynman on life and work is very useful to everyone who reads it.

However the book is also quite misleading. First, the title and back cover suggest strongly that this is a book about Feynman. It isn't. It is about a junior faculty member who on occasion would talk to Feynman. Second, the book itself goes into great detail describing the people at Caltech, but then has a disclaimer that except for the exact quotes from Feynman, most of the characters and stories are not accurate. Several people have been combined to produce characters, others sound fictional.

The third criticism is that Mlodinow hypes himself too much. Throughout the book he talks about his great research into infinit dimensions and quantum optics. He talks about being well known for his graduate thesis, and for correcting mistakes in well known theories. However amongst other physicists who were active at the time, almost no one has actually heard of him. And looking through citations in research papers from the era reveal very few references to his work.

It is worth reading, but as a biography of Mlodinow, not as an accurate historical portrayal of Feynman, Gell-Mann, or Caltech.

I've been a Feynman fan since back in the 60s. I've read most of the popular books about Feynman and by Feynman, as well as some of his technical ones. Although this book's principle character is the author, there are many interesting snippets from the last few years of Feynman's life. This is a very pleasant book. In addition to containing painless discussions on the work of theoretical physicists, it shows that even the greatest scientific giants have their weak points that make them as human as the rest of us. The book is very well written and in an engaging style that makes it difficult to put down. There are a few lessons in there for all of us.

This is a short book, which is good because there's really not a lot of meat to it. It consists of the author's recollections of his uncertainty about his early career and his qualifications to be a physics researcher, interspersed with conversations with Richard Feynman and observations about Murray Gell-Mann. The book would have been better had it focused more on Feynman and Gell-Mann and less on the author's dope-smoking, garbage-collector friend Ray.
It appears the author left the physics field, due to some combination of losing interest in it and being unable to find a research project that would justify his hiring by Caltech. He later wrote a screenplay that was never made into a movie (I believe thousands of people have done that); co-wrote a mediocre episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation; wrote a book I haven't yet read on the history of geometry; and wrote this modest book. All of this probably means he's accomplished more of note than I have, but probably considerably less than he had hoped as a young physics Ph.D.

Richard Feynman and Gell-Man Murray are two towering figures in 20th Century Physics. The book begins with the writer's arrival at Caltech as a fresh postdoc with a PhD from Berkeley in the 1980s. In this little autobiographical book, the author writes about his experiences at Caltech focusing on his interactions with Feynman and Murray - their characters and rivalry. Physics take a back seat in this book. Instead, the author attempts to tell a very human (and sometimes sad) story about himself, Feynman and Murray. I find this book interesting for two reasons. First, the author shares his experience about the insecurities that many PhD graduates have about their ability to do meaningful research work after the PhD (especially when one's PhD work was considered important enough to land a Caltech postdoc). Second, it provides a few glimpses of what Feynman and Murray were like at close range - human beings observed on a daily basis (and at their natural habitat). Overall, I cannot help but get the feeling that Feynman comes across as a more 'humane' person than Murray in this book. The writer doesn't apologize for his bias towards Feynman and he does gives examples of Murray's generosity (e.g. his support and belief on Schwartz who toiled for years with the String Theory). He repeatedly emphasizes on the different styles and outlook (life philosophy) of Feynman and Murray. Feynman is more interested in interesting problems and derives tremendous joy from doing physics. Murray, the smart one who revels in demonstrating his diverse knowledge. At the end, the writer favors Feynman's approach to life partly because of his own interests and inclination - towards writing. For it was Feynman who advocated the pursuit of things that truly brings joy. This is a book that would interest readers who enjoy reading about the lives of eminent scientists especially Feynman.

Because this book flows like a well-paced novel, I was easily able to finish it in one day (something I almost never do).

In addition to being an excellent storyteller, Mlodinow is very honest and candid in a way that I found sincere and endearing. He describes well the difficulties faced by a talented and promising young adult trying to form his worldview and choose his life/career goals and direction. Many people, not just budding physicists, will be able to relate to this, and indeed I think that is the main value of the book.

In the course of the book, he presents some physics discussions and reflections on the philosophy of science/physics, and of course he also provides some information about Feynman (and Gell-Mann), but none of this is in great depth, so it's best regarded as "bonus" material.

Overall, I can highly recommend this book to anyone with a little background in modern physics, and some familiarity with Feynman and Gell-Mann's biographies and work. The book is very enjoyably written, so reading it is time well spent. I enjoyed the book so much that I will be checking out Mlodinow's other books also.

These reviews are longer than this book, which is 171 pages long and written by a physicist who later became a writer for "Star Trek." It's about discovery. Richard Feynman and Murray Gell-Mann each had a different approach to physics, and a different way of looking at the world. In the end, Gell-Mann taught Feynman string theory because, despite his love for theory, Gell-Mann's instincts had led him to recognize that theory's potential when everyone else thought of it as a joke, while Feynman's instincts, unerring in so many cases, had in this one instance, apparently, been wrong.

The rivalry between Gell-Mann and Feynman, and their apparent reconciliation at the end of Feynman's life, embodies the narrator's personal struggle and that conflict's eventual resolution. Unsure of his abilities, seeking a problem on which to work, Mlodinow learns that, in both physics and life, you find your path by heeding, not "customs and rules," but your own internal voice. That voice may lead to a "big picture" such as a unified field theory, or to the physics of a rainbow or a mental voyage on the U.S.S. Enterprise. Yet all discoveries, both large and small, scientific and uniquely personal, come about as the result following your passion. Mldodinow asked Feynman: what problem should I pursue? Feynman taught him that the answer to this question was one that he had always already known.

This book does not take one hour to read: it takes two. Both of them are worth it.