Farewell to Reality
How Fairytale Physics Betrays the Search for Scientific Truth
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- $4.99
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- $4.99
Publisher Description
Modern physics is heady stuff. It seems that barely a week goes by without some new astounding science story; some revelation about hidden dimensions, multiple universes, the holographic principle or incredible cosmic coincidences. But is it true? What evidence do we have for super-symmetric squarks', or superstrings vibrating in an 11-dimensional space-time? How do we know that we live in a multiverse? How can we tell that the universe is a hologram projected from information encoded on its boundary? Doesn't this sound like a fairy story?
In Farewell to Reality Jim Baggott asks whether all that we currently know about the universe is based upon science or fantasy. In addition he wonders whether these high priests of fairy tale physics - such as John Barrow, Paul Davies, David Deutsch, Brian Greene, Stephen Hawking, Michio Kaku, Gordon Kane and Leonard Susskind - are the emperor's latest tailors.
Praise for Jim Baggott:
A shimmering tour d'horizon. Quantum theory may deny us the possibility of properly comprehending physical reality, but Baggott's account is smart and consoling. Kirkus Reviews.
Jim Baggott's inspired - and inspiring - idea of presenting the history of quantum physics in terms of 40 key moments works both as an introduction for the uninitiated and as a refresher for anyone who thinks they know the story. John Gribbin.
I never read such a good, comprehensive account as Jim Baggott's...highly recommended. A.N. Wilson.
The best popular science book of the year to date by far. popularscience.co.uk
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
From superstrings and black holes to dark matter and multiverses, modern theoretical physics revels in the bizarre. Now it's wandered into the realm of "fairy-tale," says science writer and former "practicing" physicist Baggott (A Beginners Guide to Reality). Quantum theory led scientists to create a Standard Model of physics in the mid-20th century, but that model is really an amalgam of distinct individual quantum theories necessary to describe a diverse array of forces and particles. Meanwhile, astronomical observations have revealed that 90% of our universe is made of something we can't see (dark matter); some mysterious "dark energy" is pushing all of it apart at an accelerating rate, and physicists are gambling on a "supersymmetry" theory in hopes that it could be the holy grail, a Grand Unified Field Theory that might lend coherence to the Standard Model while explaining some of the phenomena the latter fails to account for despite the fact, Baggott says, that for "every standard model problem it resolves, another problem arises that needs a fix." In consistently accessible and intelligent prose, Baggott sympathetically captures the frustrations of physicists while laying out a provocative and very convincing plea for a reality check in a field that he feels is now too "meta" for its own good.
