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74 of 81 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
As best as can be expected, I guess, December 13, 2002
By A Customer
This review is from: Quantum Theory: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions) (Paperback)
This book does its best, but in the end suffers from something that I think is inherent in the material itself. I did learn a little more about quantum theory from this book, but not much more than I already knew to begin with. And this book didn't really make many of the main concepts any clearer. I don't think is the author's fault, I think it's almost impossible to try to explain these things. Most of the problem, (and similar statements go for cosmology, cryptography, etc.) is that it's almost impossible to explain concepts whose fundamental expression is mathematical language without using mathematics. What inevitably results is some kind of vague, touchy-feely idea of what's meant, but little understanding. And I say this as a mathematician. To give just one example, at one point in the book, the author talks about "probability amplitudes", for several pages. The only problem is, he never says what this term is supposed to mean, but he does mention that complex numbers are involved, and other facts. The result after this happens several times is that the reader starts to read entire paragraphs consisting of terminology that's never been defined clearly. The word "operator" is the best example here. It's fine to talk ABOUT operators in indirect, oblique language, but really you don't have a true understanding of what that word means unless you know its precise mathematical definition, or unless you have a clear understanding of the notion of vector space (axiomatically, not "stuff you can add together"). I didn't have this kind of problem with most of the mathematical terminology, because I know it, but the problem comes with the physics -- the physics concepts are essentially mathematical, and trying to explain them without using mathematics is like trying to understand Shakespeare without being able to read English -- you can always give a vague, hazy account, but not much more. The book is well-written (aside from an overly-biased presentation of the philosophical aspects), but I think it tries to have its cake and eat it too. It says it's free of mathematics, but this isn't really the case. The whole text is fully of talk about operators, vectors, vector spaces, equations, probability theory, and so on. It's the _symbolism_, not the math, that's missing (except for the appendix, which thoroughly confused me, mainly because terms were introduced without precise definition, and the notation was the physicist's notation, not mathematician's notation...) This book was confusing to me, but the reason was because it had too LITTLE math, not too much.
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11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
This is NOT "Quantum Theory for Dummies"--but it's good., January 7, 2008
This pocket-sized, 92-page text--113 pages with appendices and index--professes to be a "very short introduction" to an understanding of quantum theory, to the unseen world that's so many millions of times smaller than even atoms.
It's not at all a bad summary of the field of quantum mechanics, written fairly lucidly, concisely, and with interest, but I'd have to say it's lacking as an introduction to the subject, in that it really does assume its readers are intelligent people with something of a science background. Do not buy this expecting it to be QUANTUM THEORY FOR DUMMIES, because it's still fairly dense and heavy, and not written as clearly or as startlingly as much of Stephen Hawking's stuff. To some readers, this assumption of their intelligence may be refreshing, and it is to a degree, but with a subject as complex and bizarre as quantum mechanics, most non-scientists will need as much help as they can get, help not necessarily to be found in here.
I do have to say, though, that this is a book worth reading, and, then, re-reading. After I read it, I went back through and looked up a few of the more major concepts--quantum entanglement, in which two particles that interact will continue to affect each other no matter how far apart they're separated; Schrödinger's Cat and the idea of a state between life and death, between here and there, between being and non-being; Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle and how you can't have a knowledge of both position and momentum of a particle; et cetera--and just that brief re-reading was a huge help to me.
The book will teach you a lot about the subject, and will give you a good start toward further educating your knowledge of this awesome and frustrating topic, this topic which has already done so much toward unlocking the secrets of our existence and our universe--and toward confusing everyone.
Its glossary is lacking, its author has a subtle but evident Christian bias, but overall it's a good little book, and I enjoyed it. I recommend it.
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30 of 39 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Very short, but not all that lucid, December 5, 2002
This review is from: Quantum Theory: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions) (Paperback)
This is a short book, and that is its only advantage, unfortunately. Granted, that the author is eminent in this field and was himself a student of the great Paul Dirac. However, this book does not sit easily in a series designed to make a subject approachable to the novice. It has far too much esoteric maths than is good for a book of this genre. An ever stronger criticism is the fact that instead of keeping to basic physics ideas such as the double slit experiment (which this book does well!) and then developing the ideas of atomic structure, and the uncertainty principle, it dwells on things like operators and such like. If you want a good introduction to Quantum Theory, look no further than the books by George Gamow's "The New World of Mr Tompkins" or "Mr Tomkins in paperback", or, "Uncle Albert and the Quantum Quest".
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