There seems to be a few kindle versions of this book out at the moment. These vary in price from $0.99 to a few dollars. I bought the $0.99 version and before I get to the substance of the book first a few comments about technical details of this kindle version. There seem to be some problems here. First there are some 35+ end-notes in the book signaled by the usual underline, but when I tap on them they don't go anywhere. Luckily these end-notes are in the book (at the end) and it is easy enough (if a bit inconvenient) to set and move bookmarks in the notes section so that I could follow the end-notes as I read along. Much worse, the author refers to a half-dozen or so figures in the book and none of these appear to be present at all in the Kindle version I bought. This is a BIG shortcoming! Hopefully the more expensive versions include these figures, but I simply do not know. Now on to the substance of it...
Eddington spends the first half of the book explaining the implications of the discoveries of physics in the latter half of the 19th century (thermodynamics) and the first 25 years of the 20th (relativity and quantum mechanics). Bear in mind that when Eddington wrote this (1928) all of relativity (special and general) were in place as were most of the building blocks of modern quantum mechanics. Schrodinger, Dirac, and Heisenberg had all made their primary contributions and Eddington weaves them together effortlessly. Only entanglement seems to be missing, but then again something had to be discovered since 1928! Meanwhile Eddington's explanation of all these phenomena (especially the relativistic time-space manifold) is refreshingly clear. In the first place Eddington was among the few people in the world who understood them all, and second, being in their early development they were free of much of the detail that clutters even good modern explications.
But it's the second half of this book that gets really good. Eddington explains that the metricality that now (and even in his time) characterizes all of physics applies to all possible worlds, but what makes this world the actual world is that we, that is consciousness, live in it. Eddington embarks on an exploration of the relationship between what physics has discovered and says about the world, and the nature of both consciousness and free will and how these relate to the discoveries of physics. In this I notice that Eddington raises just about every issue concerning these two subjects that I see raised in modern philosophy concerning these twin phenomena even today. Moreover, while modern philosophers seem to be more strident in their views one way or another (for example rejecting free will and even consciousness as illusion or asserting that the only real properties of the world are the mathematical relations that physics discovers) Eddington finds room in the universe for accepting that consciousness and free will are significant and real and that philosophy needs to accommodate them even if the metrics of physics don't apply! Eddington doesn't resolve any of the modern issues, but he understands the significance of that which lies beyond physics much better than do most modern philosophers and physicists! All in all I think the thinking of this brilliant astronomer, physicist, and philosopher should serve as a touch point reminding moderns of what needs to be explained in the mysteries of the universe.
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Tracey H
You have to be engrossed by physics to enjoy this
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on July 10, 2016
