The Search for Superstrings, Symmetry, and the Theory of Eve Book + PRICE WATCH * Amazon pricing is not included in price watch

The Search for Superstrings, Symmetry, and the Theory of Eve Book

In days of yore, educated men and women would avidly follow new developments in the world of science; these days it seems to be too much trouble--relativity was bad enough, but "N-dimensional space"? Fortunately for those of us who have trouble visualizing parallel parking, much less quarks and gluons, John Gribbin is back with an up-to-date primer on subatomic physics. The Search for Superstrings, Symmetry, and the Theory of Everything refers as much to the reader's search for understanding as to the physicist's search for clever theories and experimental evidence to back them up, and Gribbin's prose is up to both tasks. While meeting luminaries from Einstein to Steven Weinberg, we are treated to clear explanations of what in the world they're talking about, whether it's the "collapse of the wave function" or "high-energy particle acceleration." This material is especially fascinating to those of us without much mathematical inclination, as Gribbin manages to show the state-of-the-art in modern physics without forcing us to go back to school for a few years. (There is an appendix, "Group Theory for Beginners," for interested parties.) Writers like Gribbin are helping us reclaim the time when a little learning was all it took to understand science--and The Search for Superstrings, Symmetry, and the Theory of Everything might just convince you that it's not so hard, after all. --Rob Lightner Read More

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  • Product Description

    Few areas of current scientific investigation are as intriguing, contentious, or bizarre as physicists' search for a Grand Unified Theory that would unite all the forces and particles of nature in one coherent mathematical package. Since Einsten's time, this "theory of everything" has become the Holy Grail of physics, and its pursuit has resulted in some of the most extraordinary conceptions in the history of science. In THE SEARCH FOR SUPERSTRINGS, SYMMETRY, AND THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING, bestselling science popularized John Gribbin explores the field of particle physics, the most exciting area of research in physics today and the key to uncovering the Grand Unified Theory.

    Gribbin offers a clear and concise historical overview of subatomic particles, from the discovery of the electron in 1897 to some of the most exotic and dazzling unification schemes being proposed today. Following a series of major breakthroughs in the 1990s, physicists are not putting together a clearer picture of how subatomic particles work, using the radical theories of "superstrings" - the hypothesis that particles are loops of vibrating "string" - and "supersymmerty." Gribbin guides the reader through these brilliant new models and dazzling research leading up to them, as well as such other concepts as a twenty-six-dimensional universe and virtual particles. Written in clear and accessible prose, THE SEARCH FOR SUPERSTRINGS describes the hundred-year saga of particle physics, culminating in current scientific research that stands on the cusp of radically altering our conception of the universe.

  • 0316329754
  • 9780316329750
  • John Gribbin
  • 1 January 1999
  • Little, Brown and Company
  • Hardcover (Book)
  • 224
  • 1st North American Ed
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