Customer Reviews

The Refrigerator and the Universe: Understanding the Laws of Energy

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

 

 

The book presents the three laws of thermodynamics: the first law (conservation of energy)in chapters 1-4, the second law (dispersal of energy) in chapters 5-9, and the third law (low temperature behavior) in chapter 14. Other chapters apply thermodynamics to light, chemistry, biology, geology, and cosmology. The authors present thermodynamics using both classical and statistical mechanical arguments. References are listed for further study of topics.

Although the book is intended for a general audience, the book will be interesting even to a reader who already has some familiarity with thermodynamics because the book probably treats at least a few applications with which he is unfamiliar. The book also makes a number of refreshing admissions about the limits of thermodynamics; for example, thermodynamics can't be strictly applied to living organisms (p. 297), and in general relativity, energy need not be conserved (p. 370).

The book requires a knowledge of simple algebra and logarithms; however, a tutorial on these subjects is presented in an appendix.

Quite a few good to excellent pop science books have been published since this volume was released in 1995. After 14 years the Goldsteins' book still stands for this reader as one of the most rewarding. For one thing, the authors are serious about getting historical detail right. The authors write fluently, but there is a clear expectation that the details of the intellectual adventure are what will engage and sustain your interest. For those not already well versed in thermodynamics, the book will require closer attention than some other very good books on overlapping topics such as Boltzmann's Atom by David Lindley. The payoff from the Goldsteins' book is, however, exceptional. As with John Derbyshire's Prime Obsession, when you finish this book, you will have much of an insider's understanding of an important but difficult subject (up through the early 1990s), even if you knew little or nothing about it going in. Highly recommended.

In the U I had this rather old professor who said that we should not be discouraged by the difficulty in thermodynamics for many great men of science found it difficult too.

If I had to go back and teach those course I would start by recommending this book.. first sound principles well grasped.. anything can be done after that

This book is truly a gift to thosewho desire to understand in depth the making of that which exists. The thinking and aggressive searchfor understanding behind this workhas brought the laws of entropy toits most basic level. Knowing thatthe breakup of order does not designate disorder but instead order to a higher degree, seems tobe the rudimental step in discovery. The question seems to merely be what phase of order is one looking at and through what psychological belief patterns is one viewing the order? Martin Goldstein and Inge F. Goldstein takes one through the phases of development with simplicity and ease. Knowing that order is the framework by which visualization takes place and that disorder fragments vision until the loss ofvisual effect becomes total, surely gives one a different way by which to understand an environment and its connecting forces. Does change in its most elementary meaning then bring about disorder to an ordered system? Perhaps ordered systemscan expand connecting additional knowledge to itself or expand and break apart, all governed according to the forces feeding it. Martin and Inge have certainlybegun a cycle of reconsiderations and reevaluations of one's basic pattern of thinking.