Customer Reviews

Thirty Years that Shook Physics: The Story of Quantum Theory

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

A reprinted Dover edition of a lovely set of biographies of the physicists of the Golden Period, from the pen of George Gamow. The original 1966 edition has been out of print for a number of years. This 1985 edition is beautifully reproduced, and it includes fascinating pictures, sketches, and poems, done by Gamow himself. He was born in Odessa, in what was then Russia, --before the Soviet Union. The story of his escape to the West is straight out of a thriller. Only it is real! Later in the US, Gamow was referred to by a journalist,--- some time during the Cold War, as "the only scientist in America with a real sense of humor". With his lovely books, we have now all come to experience how Gamow can take the most technical stuff and make it simple. Fun too! The book:--Intellectual treats, whimsy, but deep. It contains penetrating and personal biographies of Niels Bohr, Paul Ehrenfest, Wolfgang Pauli, Werner Heisenberg, Albert Einstein, and recollections from the conferences in the 1930ties in Copenhagen, Brussels, and in the Solvay Institute. Illustrated with lovely drawings by Gamow himself. A book with pictures and conversations! Much of it can be understood by a child, and other parts might require a little concentration. All of it is great fun. The author Gamow started in nuclear physics, during the Golden Age of Physics, worked with Niels Bohr, then later in the US, on the Manhattan Project during WWII, and after the war, he was professor in Boulder Colorado. He has a building on campus named after him! The books he wrote are pearls, and they have been equally popular with my parent's generation as with mine. Luckely some have been reprinted! Other Gamow titles: Biography of Physics, Atomic Energy [dedicated to the hope of lasting peace], Physics of the Strapless Evning Gown,...We are lucky that Dover has reprinted some of them. Gamow's list of scientific accomplishments includes a 1948 landmark paper on the origin of chemical elements, the Big Bang model, and later work with F. Crick on DNA and genetic coding.-- Do more Gamow editions, Dover!

Actually this is the motto of a great Italian writer, Leonardo Sciascia. But, in the domain of science, no one better than Gamow lived to it. The great Russian-born physicist, educated by Bohr, reviews the birth of quantum mechanics and its first applications as an insider, with great panache and as much accuracy as is allowed "by complementarity" (which concept, complementarity, he explains brilliantly). He did everything brilliantly. Once, studying, with the great Brazilian theorist Mario Schenberg, ways of very efficient energy dissipation needed in the stars, they proposed that the energy should flow out in the form of neutrinos. This eventually became the well-known URCA model. Gamow named it after a famous casino at Rio de Janeiro, where money dissipated very efficiently too, at the green tables.Gamow is also the originator of the Big-Bang model of the universe, which is called by many "Gamow's cosmology". A great scientist, a great writer, a great wit!

George Gamow's "Thirty Years That Shook Physics" is an exceptional book, an entertaining look at the physicists (including himself) that participated in the unveiling of quantum theory.

His book is enlivened by unique photos of the great physicists and mathematicians, their families and friends. We see Niels Bohr and his wife on a motorcycle, Wolfgang Pauli and George Gamow (in lederhosen) on a steamer on a Swiss Lake, Werner Heisenberg in swim trunks, Enrico Fermi playing tennis without a shirt, George Gamow and Leon Rosenfeld resting on a snow covered peak (supposedly discussing nuclear physics), and Niels Bohr and Albert Einstein chatting at a technical session in Brussels.

Many contemporary books on physics for the layman, following publisher's dictates, scrupulously avoid all mathematics. Writing in the 1960's, Gamow assumed that algebraic equations, graphs, and diagrams of experimental setups would actually help clarify explanations and not send readers fleeing in panic. Algebra is necessary; more advanced math is not. Gamow is fun to read, but be prepared to think.

It is amusing how many of the Amazon reviewers mention that they first encountered Gamow in their youth. I too read Gamow, reveling in the excitment of scientific work and discovery.

Gamow adds a bit of fun and comedy to science. We all learn (but may have forgotten) about the Pauli Exclusion Principle that only two electrons with opposite spins can occupy the same quantum orbit. Gamow also introduces us to a lessor known observation, the Pauli Effect, which states that the mere presence of Wolfgang Pauli, a theoretical physicist, near a laboratory ensured that the experimental apparatus would break.

Gamow concludes his history of quantum theory with a light-hearted play created by students of Niels Bohr and presented one evening during technical meetings in 1932 in Copenhagen. "The theme of this dramatic masterpiece has Pauli (Mephistopheles) trying to sell to the unbelieving Ehrenfest (Faust) the idea of a weightless neutrino (Gretchen)."

Gamow has remained in print since the 1960's, due largely to his unique style and for his obvious enthusiasm for physics and for people that do physics. I heartily recommend this book for the layman, and for any student of science, high school or college.

Recently, his popular "Mr. Tompkins in Wonderland" and "Mr. Tompkins Explores the Atom" have been released again, with some updates for recent discoveries. A typical review claims: "will vastly fascinate the whimsical, and is also scientific". Don't miss Gamow.

I first read this back in high school. I loved it. Yeah, I'm a science geek. This book is not only a wonderful account of the history and science of quantum theory (from 1900 through 1930), but of Dr. Gamow's personal and professional associations with those who made it all happen. The black and white photographs are an added bonus. My favorite is of Neils Bohr out for a motorcycle ride with his wife.

Please note that my review is based on the Doubleday/Anchor version from 1966. Does the later version contain the photographs? I don't know.

The first three decades of the twentieth century saw history's most concentrated burst of human knowledge of nature. The world described by the greatest of scientists, Isaac Newton, changed quickly to a very strange and startling world described notably by Planck, Einstein, Bohr, Pauli, Schrodinger, Heisenberg, Dirac, Fermi, and a few others. George Gamow was one of these individuals. His lucent knowledge of the important ideas of the quantum theories and of the men who developed these ideas, makes for very interesting reading.
In his "Thirty Years that Shook Physics," Gamow the physicist is also found to be Gamow the artist -- his excellent drawings augment the narrative -- and Gamow the light hearted humorist. Because of the author's close friendships with Bohr and Pauli (and to a lesser extent, Dirac) the reader will meet not only the thoughts of these characters, but the characters themselves. It seems that quantum physicists like to have fun too. The book concludes with an illustrated text of a play composed and performed at the 1932 Copenhagen conference, although it can be followed it is something of an 'inside joke', if you will.
The book was written in 1965 and Gamow, noting difficulties with quantum theory, expected to see a new and equally radical revolution in physical theories before the end of the century. Although quantum theory has been hugely successful in its application, a new theory is still anticipated. [M-theory?] This book is an excellent account of the emergence of quantum theory, presented in the words of one of its principals.

In my opinion, the great merit of this book is to show physics as a human adventure, with wins, frustation, surprises, excitement, healthy concorrence among scientists. Gamow is very good in this aspect, as we can see by his other books. Besides, it relives by far the most interesting and exciting age of physics. This history of the quantum theory is very well written, showing how each theoretical development gives the reasons and motivation for the following, how the matter started with the solution Planck has given to his problem, leading to the later formulations and great discoveries of Weisenberg, Schrodinger, Bohr... Very interesting and pleasant to read.

This is a good book for a reader with a modern physics background. It is not a good book for someone with little or no background in mathematics or physics, as they will be overwhelmed by unfamiliar concepts and mathematics. I recommend the first half of John Gribbin's "In Search of Schrodingers Cat" for those readers. It covers much the same historical ground, but without any mathematics.

Gamow was one of the "shakers" who shook up the world of physics between 1900 and 1930 and as such he was very well placed to write this book. The book chronologically traces the development of Quantum Mechanics. Interspersed with the physics are capsule biographies and personal reminiscences of the major players. Gamow also includes his drawing of the players and some of his personal photographs. The style is light and breezy, but with a firm grounding in the relevant physics. The book starts with the problem of explaining black body radiation and how the assumptions that Max Planck required to solve the problem created Quantum Mechanics. I found the explanation of the "ultraviolet catastrophe" to be clearer than I have found in most other sources. To do this requires some mathematics, but not the complete rigorous sort that you will find in a textbook. However, if you are afraid of second order differential equations and matrix mathematics, then this is not the book for you. The development of the "uncertainty principle" was also quite good. Gamow shows that it flowed naturally from the mathematics that Heisenberg utilized and that it was only is a subsequent paper that Heisenberg employed the idea of it as the product of an experimental limitation.

I would have given the book 5 stars were it not for two factors. Firstly, the book is only 165 pages long, including a play written by several pupils of Niels Bohr, which is a variation of the Faust legend applied to the scientists who developed Quantum Mechanics. Personally, I could have done without this part of the book.

My second concern is more a bit more serious. The development of Quantum Mechanics was not quite as straightforward as described here. For instance, while Planck was the father of QM he did not believe in it and did his best to disprove some of the basic ideas that others created from his initial work. Einstein, the first person utilize Planck's ideas also became an opponent of QM. As mentioned, there is an excellent derivation of Heisenberg's "uncertainty principle", but no discussion of why some people believe that it is a basic rule of the universe, independent of the experimental arguments that have been used to describe it, while others embrace the experimental idea and dismiss the mathematical arguments as being a quirk of the mathematics that were employed. To my mind the book would have been greatly enhanced if some of these problems were discussed. Even if they are not resolved, it is important to know that they exist.

I came to this book looking for some basic explanations and summaries of quantum mechanics theories, having just read "Einstein: His Life and Universe" by Isaacson. Isaacson wonderfully explained both Einstein's theories and the theories of some of his contemporaries in ways that I could understand, and I was looking for more of the same. Reviews here praise Gamow as being wonderful for the lay reader. I must disagree.

The value of this book is that it does beautifully bring together, in a good order and organization, the theories and personalities of the physicists involved in quantum theory. Some of it, written in the first person, is very entertaining, as Gamow relates stories told to him, or shares experiences he had with these men.

But in terms of explaining to a -lay- reader the theories, he fails. The best example of this is when he relates Einstein's challenge to Bohr at the 6th Solvay Congress. It's a classic story of how Einstein, ever eager to challenge quantum theory, shook Bohr up with an apparently unanswerable objection. The next morning Bohr had the answer. But Bohr's answer, by Gamow's hand, is almost impossible to understand. Isaacson describes the same episode and makes both the challenge and the answer clear. If I hadn't already read Isaacson's explanation, I would have had no idea what Gamow was talking about. (This is somewhat ironic in that Gamow -does- explain some things that he might take for granted: complex numbers, matrix arithmetic, basic units like c and mg, et al.)

In short, this volume is a most valuable book for the physics student. Much of it is interesting to the lay reader as well. But if you're looking for clear explications of the theories, look elsewhere. Yes, the theories are complicated, and some physics background is inevitably necessary, but Gamow makes them even less accessible than they need to be.

I turned to this volume to get a clearer idea of some basic notions involved in quantum theory, but found it much less accessible than I had expected it to be. Though this is often thought of as a "popular" book, Gamow does not really write for a lay audience. The introduction concludes: "The author hopes that the new generation of physicists will find some interesting information in the pages that follow." It is for these physicists that Gamow writes.

*The Thirty Years That Shook Physics* began in 1900 because it was then that Planck proposed that light comes in discrete packages, or quanta. However, there was no comparable event to justify the closure implied in the title. Rather, Gamow chose the number thirty because quantum theory bogged down around 1930 in "tremendous difficulties." (He anticipated that this "stalemate" would be "broken up -- maybe next year [i.e. 1966], maybe in the year A.D. 2000.")

Gamow almost completely ignores both the technological consequences and the metaphysical implications of the theories he discusses so compactly, and not a single sentence hints at the ethical problems faced by science in the twentieth century or the tragic dimensions of this chapter of human history. The humorous adaptation of Goethe's *Faust* at the end of the book, which takes up one-quarter of its pages, is symptomatic of a rather boyish lack of sensibility that seems to have pervaded 20th-century physics before World War II.

Despite the book's limitations, the author's personal acquaintance with many of the figures discussed enlivens his pages with amusing anecdotes and makes it an enjoyable read, even for the non-physicist. The raucous parody of *Faust* provides a sort of light dessert to the heavy, but always flavorful, meal that precedes it.

A very readable account of the ideas and discoveries that transformed physics in the first half of the 20th century. Beside being a notable theoretical physicist, Gamov shows himself to be a first rate teacher. He provides clear explanations of some of the major developments in atomic theory for a time period that saw rapid intellectual development.