Universe on a T-Shirt: The Quest for the Theory of Everything [Hardcover]

Dan Falk (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1559707070 | ISBN-13: 978-1559707077 | Publication Date: January 23, 2004 | Edition: 1

No scientific quest is as exciting and elusive as the search to understand the Universe. Falk's book places this search in its historical context, tracing the quest from its roots in ancient Greece to the twenty-first century, through the breakthroughs of Newton, Maxwell, and Einstein, up to the excitement of "string theory" and today's efforts to merge quantum theory with general relativity. With as much emphasis on history as on science, Falk's enlightening and entertaining book is aimed very much for the general reader. The search for a Unified Theory is full of quirky personalities, interesting tales, and moments of brilliance-high science and high drama.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This volume begins with a quote from physicist Leon Lederman: "My ambition is to live to see all of physics reduced to a formula so elegant and simple that it will fit easily on the front of a T-shirt." Such a "Theory of Everything" is the holy grail of contemporary physics, and Falk, a widely published science writer and broadcaster, spends most of his book recounting the various stabs in that direction made by scientists over the past millennia. Beginning with Aristotelian physics, Falk races through the scientific revolution, general relativity and quantum mechanics, winding up with an exploration of the current best hope for unification, string theory. Falk's prose is familiar and clear, and the book hangs together well, with the exception of an unexpected detour into the philosophy of science in the last chapter. In particular, the author has a knack for popularizing modern physicsthough the narrative reaches back to the ancient Greeks, it's strongest once Falk attains the 20th century. The book as a whole offers an accessible, if cursory, overview of the history of physics (it's the kind of book that refers to atoms as "nature's Lego® set" and has an occasional topical one-panel comic embedded in the text) and is a reasonable introduction to physics past and present for readers with little science background. B&w illus.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From School Library Journal

Adult/High School–In this entertaining account, Falk makes the history of Western science seem fresh and new, and the mysteries of modern physics remarkably accessible. With humor, brevity, and clarity, and including the occasional black-and-white illustration or cartoon, the author brings history and personalities to life. As he delineates science's many revelations–from the ancient Greek search for logos through discoveries of gravity, electromagnetism, and the rest, and on to modern physics–he tells the story of an unbroken quest to understand the workings and origins of our universe, and, sometimes, of the price exacted for pursuing knowledge beyond accepted paradigms and dogma. Reminding readers that the most elegant solution to any problem is usually the correct one, with each new development he envisions the way that concept might be expressed on a T-shirt. Arriving at the particle physics, cosmology, and string theory of today, he explains how a "theory of everything," now under construction, promises to reconcile the several seemingly unconnected directions taken by physics in the past century. In the final section, he asks where religion fits in; though here he has fewer answers, he provides many useful points for consideration. Among the recent books attempting to translate, for nonmathematicians, the leading edge of a science whose concepts can only truly be accessed mathematically, this may well be the most successful.–Christine C. Menefee, Fairfax County Public Library, VA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Arcade Publishing; 1 edition (January 23, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1559707070
• ISBN-13: 978-1559707077
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.7 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,472,688 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Entertaining but lacking, March 1, 2004

By 

Tormod Guldvog (Oslo, Norway) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Universe on a T-Shirt: The Quest for the Theory of Everything (Hardcover)

First I'd like to point out that I am one of those readers who have read the popular books of many of the cosmologists and physicists mentioned in this book. And I agree with a previous reviewer that if you have read Martin Rees and John Barrow, this might not be a very interesting book.

But I had a good time reading it. It is short and concise. Lots of chapters (I think the longest is about 5 pages or so) which makes this a very easy book to read.

The main problem is that the task of crunching the search for a "theory of everything" through the ages into a book of about 200 pages is impossible. That is probably why this is a book with no mention of anything but "western" theories.

I also found the last chapter on where God is in everything rather confusing. It seems as if the book's editor wanted to cut it but it was left in as some sort of compromise. It provides an afterthought but takes the narrative off track.

Dan Falk has written a good book for lay people who find Stephen Hawking inaccessible and who don't feel at home with more theoretical books. But the entire concept of "putting theories on a t-shirt" which every section ends with, says a lot about this book: simplification is king. And that is why it only gets three stars from me.

If you would like to read a really good book about scientific history, read Mendeleyev's Dream by Paul Strathern. It is everything this book is not.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good attempt by a journalist., January 14, 2004

By 

Wojciech Langer (Toronto, Ontario) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Universe on a T-Shirt: The Quest for the Theory of Everything (Hardcover)

By my standard only three stars, but it does not mean book is bad. This is a brief history of science that led to creation of modern cosmology and our current knowledge of the Universe. Not for Scientific American readers though.
Book targets general population, people who read about Cosmos and science in daily newspapers.
Written nice and easy, but advanced reader who studied works of scientists like Brian Greene, Lee Smolin, John Barrow, Martin Rees or Steven Weinberg, should not bother.

For discussion about religion and science (do we have God-designer or not?) it is better to check Victor Stenger's "Has Science Found God".
Also, a good alternative is Timothy Ferris: "Coming of Age in the Milky Way" - same topics.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars on science, simplicity, and the quest for truth..., March 11, 2004

By 

Amanda Gefter (Philadelphia, PA USA

Philadelphia, PA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Universe on a T-Shirt: The Quest for the Theory of Everything (Hardcover)

Dan Falk's Universe on a T-Shirt is an informative and entertaining tour of mainstream science-from Democritus to string theory-guided by a single, reining principle: that science is the pursuit of an aesthetic of simplicity, and that the culmination of this pursuit, the theory of everything, will be simple enough to grace a t-shirt.

Written in clear, clever, friendly prose, the book is easy to understand yet thorough; it serves as an excellent introduction for novices in the topics of physics and cosmology, but is full of fun facts, amusing anecdotes, and intriguing insights for the more knowledgeable reader. History is brought to life through brief biographical portraits of each scientist and thinker who has played a key role in the ongoing search for the ultimate theory, and the reader emerges from Falk's journey with an exciting sense of not only what is going on in science, but of what science itself is all about.

Speckled with illuminating quotes from physicists working in the field, Universe on a T-shirt dares to ask not only where physics is headed, but whether or not it is headed down the right path. Should notions like beauty and simplicity necessarily pave the road to truth, Falk asks. And will the ultimate theory mark the end of physics? Falk doesn't cower from the philosophy that lurks at the heart of physics. Instead, he embraces it, and allows the reader to delve into some of the most fundamental questions about the nature of reality. The author sympathetically writes of the layman's sense of cosmic alienation-perhaps this book can help those afflicted feel at home in the universe, and a part of the inspiring quest to truly understand it.