Quantum Mechanics and Path Integrals: Emended Edition (Dover Books on Physics) [Paperback]

Richard P. Feynman (Author), Albert R. Hibbs (Author), Daniel F. Styer (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 21, 2010 | ISBN-10: 0486477223 | ISBN-13: 978-0486477220

The developer of path integrals, Nobel Prize–winning physicist Richard Feynman, presents unique insights into this method and its applications. Feynman starts with an intuitive view of fundamental quantum mechanics, gradually introducing path integrals. Later chapters explore more advanced topics, including the perturbation method, quantum electrodynamics, and statistical mechanics. 1965 edition, emended in 2005.

Product Details

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Dover Publications (July 21, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0486477223
• ISBN-13: 978-0486477220
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #8,375 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #7 in Books > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Physics > Quantum Theory

More About the Author

Richard P. Feynman was born in 1918 and grew up in Far Rockaway, New York. At the age of seventeen he entered MIT and in 1939 went to Princeton, then to Los Alamos, where he joined in the effort to build the atomic bomb. Following World War II he joined the physics faculty at Cornell, then went on to Caltech in 1951, where he taught until his death in 1988. He shared the Nobel Prize for physics in 1965, and served with distinction on the Shuttle Commission in 1986. A commemorative stamp in his name was issued by the U.S. Postal Service in 2005.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

49 of 52 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A must have for anyone interested in Particle Physics or String Theory, July 10, 2010

By 

electron0511 (Blacksburg, VA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Quantum Mechanics and Path Integrals: Emended Edition (Dover Books on Physics) (Paperback)

It is a gospel for all physics students that this masterpiece is finally available as a Dover edition. Written by Feynman himself, this book explains the path integral approach to quantum mechanics in a way that is understandable to every beginning quantum mechanic. Path integrals are integral (sorry, bad English) to the study of quantum field theory and string theory, and you must be a master at it if you would like to work in either of these fields. Purchase this book at once and start working!

65 of 71 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If you liked volumes I and II of the Lectures..., July 28, 2010

By 

Atul Sharma - See all my reviews

This review is from: Quantum Mechanics and Path Integrals: Emended Edition (Dover Books on Physics) (Paperback)

The Feynman Lectures deserve their status as classics, bringing novel insights and clarity even to topics that one would think ancient and musty (e.g. his exposition of radio waves). I'm not sure I would recommend them as undergraduate texts, since there may be too much wizardry where the solutions depend on deep insights or unexpected symmetries, with perhaps too few examples of brute calculation and no exercises to be worked by the student. However, they are unsurpassed when used to supplement the usual treatments or just to appreciate the beauty of the subject. For some reason, I never had the same feeling toward Volume III (Quantum Mechanics). In part, I think this is because he was trying too hard to reconcile the usual Schroedinger description with his own version of Quantum Mechanics, namely the least action/ path integral approach used in this text. Without the same constraint here (although he does very elegantly derive the wave equation from the least action principle), I experienced the same sense of wonder and awe that I felt from his earlier treatment of mechanics and electricity/magnetism. Although it's only my personal opinion, I would recommend this as the true successor to volumes I and II of the Lectures.

44 of 49 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Return of a classic, August 15, 2010

By 

William R. Franklin "Illuminatus" (Timonium, MD USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Quantum Mechanics and Path Integrals: Emended Edition (Dover Books on Physics) (Paperback)

It is wonderful to see this extraordinary work back in print, especially in this attractive low cost Dover edition. As an added bonus, the myriad misprints that plagued the original 1965 printing (and caused me such grief when I first read it in high school) have been corrected.

The path integral approach, so clearly explained in this volume, derived from Feynman's graduate research at Princeton where he applied variational principles to quantum mechanics. This, in turn, was motivated by a seminal 1932 paper of Dirac.

At the time, the formalism appeared to provide only an elegant means of deriving the wave equation without achieving any new results. But elegant mathematics always seems to have a way of finding application in physics. Just look at how formerly "obscure" topics like Lie algebras and differential geometry have become part of the essential language of particle physics. And path integral methods have proved useful in fields ranging from quantum electrodynamics to acoustic propagation.

Like all of Feynman's works, this text combines sound, if unconventional, mathematics with remarkable physical insight. There is still no better introduction to the topics treated here. This book is required reading for anyone wishing to understand quantum mechanics (at least in so far as anyone can understand quantum mechanics) and who intends to pursue more advanced topics.

Heartily recommended!