en-US Sat, 28 Oct 2023 06:33:00 -0700 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg 150129 “Unusually well written and informative…Weinberg is one of the world's most creative theoretical phsyicists.��
—Martin Gardner, Washington Post Book World

In Dreams of a Final Theory, Stephen Weinberg, the Nobel Prize-winning physicist and bestselling author of The First Three Minutes describes the grand quest for a unifying theory of nature—one that can explain forces as different as the cohesion inside the atom and the gravitational tug between the sun and the earth. Writing with dazzling elegance and clarity, he retraces the steps that have led modern scientists from relativity and quantum mechanics to the notion of superstrings and the idea that our universe may coexist with others.

But Weinberg asks as many questions as he answers, among them: Why does each explanation of the way nature works point to the other, deeper explanations? Why are the best theories not only logical but beautiful? And what implications will a final theory have for our philosophy and religious faith?

Intellectually daring, rich in anecdote and aphorism, Dreams of a Final Theory launches us into a new cosmos and helps us make sense of what we find there.

“This splendid book is as good reading about physics and physicists as this reviewer can name…clear, honest, and brilliantly instructive.��
—Philip Morrison, Scientific American]]> 340 Steven Weinberg 0679744088 Michael123 0 4.09 1987
author: Steven Weinberg
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.09
book published: 1987
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This book is an overview of particle physics and the standard model, which lists the detailed components of atomic constituents. They are the smallest components that scientists can detect. The information presented is somewhat dated: he goes on about the Higgs (which was discovered) and the Super Collider project, which has long been cancelled. As an aside: it would be interesting to speculate on what would have happened had we built it. Also, at the time of this book (1992), Dark Matter and Dark Energy were very poorly understood (well more so than today).
]]> 476017 371 Julian Barbour 0297819852 Michael123 0 4.15 1999
author: Julian Barbour
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1999
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Perhaps the best book on the quantum perspective. Reading and writing accurately about modern physics without the crutch of mathematics is a difficult but rewarding challenge. The author has a deep understanding and familiarity with the historical literature and an ability to intuit the perspective of the actors as they struggle to fit observations into a coherent narrative - and perhaps since he himself is one of that company, he engages the reader as if one is a participant in the conversation.
]]> 150131
Our universe has been growing for nearly 14 billion years. But almost everything about it, from the elements that forged stars, planets, and lifeforms, to the fundamental forces of physics, can be traced back to what happened in just the first three minutes of its life.

In this book, Nobel Laureate Steven Weinberg describes in wonderful detail what happened in these first three minutes. It is an exhilarating journey that begins with the Planck Epoch - the earliest period of time in the history of the universe - and goes through Einstein's Theory of Relativity, the Hubble Red Shift, and the detection of the Cosmic Microwave Background. These incredible discoveries all form the foundation for what we now understand as the "standard model" of the origin of the universe. The First Three Minutes examines not only what this model looks like, but also tells the exciting story of the bold thinkers who put it together.

Clearly and accessibly written, The First Three Minutes is a modern-day classic, an unsurpassed explanation of where it is we really come from.]]> 224 Steven Weinberg 0465024378 Michael123 0 4.11 1977
author: Steven Weinberg
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1977
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Awesome book by one of the greatest physicist of all time Sir Weinberg.This book is about how universe took shape and other cosmic queries.
]]> 1842
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and a national bestseller: the global account of the rise of civilization that is also a stunning refutation of ideas of human development based on race.

In this "artful, informative, and delightful" (William H. McNeill, New York Review of Books) book, Jared Diamond convincingly argues that geographical and environmental factors shaped the modern world. Societies that had a head start in food production advanced beyond the hunter-gatherer stage, and then developed writing, technology, government, and organized religion—as well as nasty germs and potent weapons of war—and adventured on sea and land to conquer and decimate preliterate cultures. A major advance in our understanding of human societies, Guns, Germs, and Steel chronicles the way that the modern world came to be and stunningly dismantles racially based theories of human history.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the Phi Beta Kappa Award in Science, the Rhone-Poulenc Prize, and the Commonwealth Club of California's Gold Medal]]> 498 Jared Diamond 0739467352 Michael123 0 4.04 1997
author: Jared Diamond
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.04
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The book is just too factual and fascinating to be disputed otherwise. Jared hit the head of the nail and in an extremely subtle way provided scientific answers to decades old historical question of differentiated developmental levels of the human society in recent history. His diversity in giving explanations and examples makes the book a universal appeal to all disciplines and faculties. Its a must for every level headed person with a universal concern for the global family.
]]> 132695
In Three Roads to Quantum Gravity , Lee Smolin provides an accessible overview of the attempts to build a final "theory of everything." He explains in simple terms what scientists are talking about when they say the world is made from exotic entities such as loops, strings, and black holes and tells the fascinating stories behind these the rivalries, epiphanies, and intrigues he witnessed firsthand.

"Provocative, original, and unsettling." -- The New York Review of Books

"An excellent writer, a creative thinker." -- Nature]]> 256 Lee Smolin 0465078362 Michael123 0 4.20 2000
author: Lee Smolin
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2000
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Smolin writes clearly enough for people with a basic science background. But he does not condescend. He deals with the most profound ideas in physics here. He is also a generous teacher and gives due credit to his colleagues. Great reading!
]]> 19395553 Our Mathematical Universe is a journey to explore the mysteries uncovered by cosmology and to discover the nature of reality. Our Big Bang, our distant future, parallel worlds, the sub-atomic and intergalactic - none of them are what they seem. But there is a way to understand this immense strangeness - mathematics. Seeking an answer to the fundamental puzzle of why our universe seems so mathematical, Tegmark proposes a radical idea: that our physical world not only is described by mathematics, but that it is mathematics. This may offer answers to our deepest questions: How large is reality? What is everything made of? Why is our universe the way it is?

Table of Contents
Preface

1 What Is Reality?
Not What It Seems �� What’s the Ultimate Question? �� The Journey Begins

Part One: Zooming Out

2 Our Place in Space
Cosmic Questions �� How Big Is Space? �� The Size of Earth �� Distance to the Moon �� Distance to the Sun and the Planets �� Distance to the Stars �� Distance to the Galaxies �� What Is Space?

3 Our Place in Time
Where Did Our Solar System Come From? �� Where Did the
Galaxies Come From? �� Where Did the Mysterious Microwaves
Come From? �� Where Did the Atoms Come From?

4 Our Universe by Numbers
Wanted: Precision Cosmology �� Precision Microwave-Background Fluctuations �� Precision Galaxy Clustering �� The Ultimate Map of Our Universe �� Where Did Our Big Bang Come From?

5 Our Cosmic Origins
What’s Wrong with Our Big Bang? �� How Inflation Works �� The Gift That Keeps on Giving �� Eternal Inflation

6 Welcome to the Multiverse
The Level I Multiverse �� The Level II Multiverse �� Multiverse Halftime Roundup

Part Two: Zooming In

7 Cosmic Legos
Atomic Legos �� Nuclear Legos �� Particle-Physics Legos �� Mathematical Legos �� Photon Legos �� Above the Law? �� Quanta and Rainbows �� Making Waves �� Quantum Weirdness �� The Collapse of Consensus �� The Weirdness Can’t Be Confined �� Quantum Confusion

8 The Level III Multiverse
The Level III Multiverse �� The Illusion of Randomness �� Quantum Censorship �� The Joys of Getting Scooped �� Why Your Brain Isn’t a Quantum Computer �� Subject, Object and Environment �� Quantum Suicide �� Quantum Immortality? �� Multiverses Unified �� Shifting Views: Many Worlds or Many Words?

Part Three: Stepping Back

9 Internal Reality, External Reality and Consensus Reality
External Reality and Internal Reality �� The Truth, the Whole Truth and Nothing but the Truth �� Consensus Reality �� Physics: Linking External to Consensus Reality

10 Physical Reality and Mathematical Reality
Math, Math Everywhere! �� The Mathematical Universe Hypothesis �� What Is a Mathematical Structure?

11 Is Time an Illusion?
How Can Physical Reality Be Mathematical? �� What Are You? �� Where Are You? (And What Do You Perceive?) �� When Are You?

12 The Level IV Multiverse
Why I Believe in the Level IV Multiverse �� Exploring the Level IV Multiverse: What’s Out There? �� Implications of the Level IV Multiverse �� Are We Living in a Simulation? �� Relation Between the MUH, the Level IV Multiverse and Other Hypotheses •Testing the Level IV Multiverse

13 Life, Our Universe and Everything
How Big Is Our Physical Reality? �� The Future of Physics �� The Future of Our Universe—How Will It End? �� The Future of Life •The Future of You—Are You Insignificant?

Acknowledgments
Suggestions for Further Reading
Index]]> 432 Max Tegmark 1846144760 Michael123 0 4.20 2012
author: Max Tegmark
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.20
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This book makes you interested in mathematics and the world like reading a detective story
]]> 17977
Dawkins's brilliant, inventive approach allows us to view the connections between ourselves and all other life in a bracingly novel way. It also lets him shed bright new light on the most compelling aspects of evolutionary history and theory: sexual selection, speciation, convergent evolution, extinction, genetics, plate tectonics, geographical dispersal, and more. The Ancestor's Tale is at once a far-reaching survey of the latest, best thinking on biology and a fascinating history of life on Earth. Here Dawkins shows us how remarkable we are, how astonishing our history, and how intimate our relationship with the rest of the living world.]]> 688 Richard Dawkins 061861916X Michael123 0 4.13 2004
author: Richard Dawkins
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2004
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Very interesting for a novice to the sciences. However, many terms and names are beyond the novice's understanding. You may spend some time looking up long words. Some humor. If one is religiously orientated, well it's not the book for you. DNA focused. Where did we come from? Maybe, this book answers some of those questions.
]]> 298252 The eternal questions of science and religion were profoundly recast by Einstein's theory of relativity and its implications that time can be warped by motion and gravitation, and that it cannot be meaningfully divided into past, present, and future.
In About Time, Paul Davies discusses the big bang theory, chaos theory, and the recent discovery that the universe appears to be younger than some of the objects in it, concluding that Einstein's theory provides only an incomplete understanding of the nature of time. Davies explores unanswered questions such as:
* Does the universe have a beginning and an end?
* Is the passage of time merely an illusion?
* Is it possible to travel backward -- or forward -- in time?
About Time weaves physics and metaphysics in a provocative contemplation of time and the universe.]]> 316 Paul C.W. Davies 0684818221 Michael123 0 4.25 1995
author: Paul C.W. Davies
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1995
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It is not an easy read (for me) but was an amazing book to read. If you want to think more about time and relativity and are not able to read Ph.D. level papers on the subject, I would suggest this book.
]]> 8255917
Despite the reverence his name inspires Washington remains a waxwork to many readers, worthy but dull, a laconic man of remarkable self-control. But in this groundbreaking work Chernow revises forever the uninspiring stereotype. He portrays Washington as a strapping, celebrated horseman, elegant dancer and tireless hunter, who guarded his emotional life with intriguing ferocity. Not only did Washington gather around himself the foremost figures of the age, including James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson, he orchestrated their actions to help realise his vision for the new federal government, define the separation of powers, and establish the office of the presidency.

Ron Chernow takes us on a page-turning journey through all the formative events of America's founding. This is a magisterial work from one of America's foremost writers and historians.]]> 904 Ron Chernow 1594202664 Michael123 0 4.14 2010
author: Ron Chernow
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.14
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This book truly kept me engaged from the first page to the last. Enjoyable, detailed, and illuminating, it paints a fresh portrait of the person who created the Executive Office. Wonderful.
]]> 2095
Now, in a major publishing event, Hawking returns with a lavishly illustrated sequel that unravels the mysteries of the major breakthroughs that have occurred in the years since the release of his acclaimed first book.]]> 216 Stephen Hawking 055380202X Michael123 0 4.20 2001
author: Stephen Hawking
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2001
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This is best book about space it helps in understanding the universe.
]]> 40277241
Within these pages, he provides his personal views on our biggest challenges as a human race, and where we, as a planet, are heading next. Each section will be introduced by a leading thinker offering his or her own insight into Professor Hawking's contribution to our understanding.]]> 256 Stephen Hawking 1984819194 Michael123 0 4.28 2018
author: Stephen Hawking
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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This book is a masterpiece and a truly magnificent read. The easy-to-understand explanation to these puzzling questions. The narrative structure is top-notch and Stephen Hawking’s wit is exuberant in this book. It gives us an insight to his thinking and it is quite lucid and fascinating. This was his parting gift to humanity. As a 13 yo budding physicist it truly gives me goosebumps. :)
]]> 17349
Casting a wide net through history and culture, Sagan examines and authoritatively debunks such celebrated fallacies of the past as witchcraft, faith healing, demons, and UFOs. And yet, disturbingly, in today's so-called information age, pseudoscience is burgeoning with stories of alien abduction, channeling past lives, and communal hallucinations commanding growing attention and respect. As Sagan demonstrates with lucid eloquence, the siren song of unreason is not just a cultural wrong turn but a dangerous plunge into darkness that threatens our most basic freedoms.]]> 459 Carl Sagan 0345409469 Michael123 0 4.28 1995
author: Carl Sagan
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.28
book published: 1995
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Amazing book that gives a clear impression on how we should regard science and also how to think critically with skepticism not only on scientific but also non-scientific claims and assumptions.
]]> 2099 A Brief History of Time has sold over 9 million copies worldwide. Now, in everyday language, Stephen Hawking's Universe reveals step-by-step how we can all share his understanding of the cosmos, and our own place within it. Stargazing has never been the same since cosmologists discovered that galaxies are moving away from each other at an extraordinary speed. It was this understanding of the movement of galaxies that allowed scientists to develop a theory of how the universe was created—the Big Bang theory. Working with this theory, Stephen Hawking and other physicists felt challenged to come up with a scientific picture that would tackle the fundamental question: what is the nature of the universe? Stephen Hawking's Universe charts this work and provides simple explanations for phenomena that arouse our curiosity. This work is a voyage of discovery with an astonishing set of conclusions that will enable us to understand how matter can be produced from nothing at all and will provide us with an explanation for the basis of our existence and that of everything around us.]]> 304 David Filkin 0465081983 Michael123 0 4.33 1997
author: David Filkin
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.33
book published: 1997
rating: 0
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Ideal for a Birthday or Christmas present for young and budding Astronomers! Easy reading from the great man and great illustrations too! Very good value and was in great condition for a used book. If you want things explained in fairly un-tech like terms, then this is the one to buy.
]]> 12232938
So begins the story of Susie Salmon, who is adjusting to her new home in heaven, a place that is not at all what she expected, even as she is watching life on earth continue without her -- her friends trading rumors about her disappearance, her killer trying to cover his tracks, her grief-stricken family unraveling. Out of unspeakable tragedy and loss, The Lovely Bones succeeds, miraculously, in building a tale filled with hope, humor, suspense, even joy.]]> 372 Alice Sebold 0316166685 Michael123 4 3.87 2002
author: Alice Sebold
name: Michael123
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2002
rating: 4
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]]> 12691
Marley quickly grew into an uncontrollable ninety-seven-pound steamroller of a Labrador retriever. Expelled from obedience school, even the tranquillisers prescribed by the vet couldn't stop him.

Yet through the chaos and the hilarity, he won hearts and remained a steadfast model of devotion to his family, even when they were at their wits' end. Unconditional love, they would learn, comes in many forms.]]> 291 John Grogan 0739461192 Michael123 4 4.14 2005
author: John Grogan
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2005
rating: 4
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]]> 139069 The harrowing tale of British explorer Ernest Shackleton's 1914 attempt to reach the South Pole, one of the greatest adventure stories of the modern age.

In August 1914, polar explorer Ernest Shackleton boarded the Endurance became locked in an island of ice. Thus began the legendary ordeal of Shackleton and his crew of twenty-seven men. When their ship was finally crushed between two ice floes, they attempted a near-impossible journey over 850 miles of the South Atlantic's heaviest seas to the closest outpost of civilization.

In Endurance, the definitive account of Ernest Shackleton's fateful trip, Alfred Lansing brilliantly narrates the harrowing and miraculous voyage that has defined heroism for the modern age.

First edition: here.]]> 282 Alfred Lansing Michael123 4 4.42 1959
author: Alfred Lansing
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.42
book published: 1959
rating: 4
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]]> 33313 A deluxe, annotated edition of Kitchen Confidential to celebrate the life of Anthony Bourdain, featuring new photo inserts

Over two decades ago, the New Yorker published a now infamous article, “Don’t Eat Before Reading This,�� by then little-known chef Anthony Bourdain. Bourdain spared no one’s appetite as he revealed what happens behind the kitchen door. The article was a sensation, and the book it spawned, the now iconic Kitchen Confidential, became an even bigger sensation and megabestseller. Frankly confessional, addictively acerbic, and utterly unsparing, Bourdain pulls no punches in this memoir of his years in the restaurant business.

Fans will love to return to this deliciously funny, delectably shocking banquet of wild-but-true tales of life in the culinary trade, laying out Bourdain’s more than a quarter-century of drugs, sex, and haute cuisine. Including a handwritten introduction and annotations done by Bourdain about a decade after the book was originally published, this edition also features previously unpublished photos to accompany the now-classic text.]]> 312 Anthony Bourdain 0060899220 Michael123 4 4.17 2000
author: Anthony Bourdain
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2000
rating: 4
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]]> 110737 There's an alternate cover edition here

Seabiscuit was one of the most electrifying and popular attractions in sports history and the single biggest newsmaker in the world in 1938, receiving more coverage than FDR, Hitler, or Mussolini. But his success was a surprise to the racing establishment, which had written off the crooked-legged racehorse with the sad tail. Three men changed Seabiscuit’s fortunes:

Charles Howard was a onetime bicycle repairman who introduced the automobile to the western United States and became an overnight millionaire. When he needed a trainer for his new racehorses, he hired Tom Smith, a mysterious mustang breaker from the Colorado plains. Smith urged Howard to buy Seabiscuit for a bargain-basement price, then hired as his jockey Red Pollard, a failed boxer who was blind in one eye, half-crippled, and prone to quoting passages from Ralph Waldo Emerson. Over four years, these unlikely partners survived a phenomenal run of bad fortune, conspiracy, and severe injury to transform Seabiscuit from a neurotic, pathologically indolent also-ran into an American sports icon.

Author Laura Hillenbrand brilliantly re-creates a universal underdog story, one that proves life is a horse race.


From the Hardcover edition.]]> 457 Laura Hillenbrand 0345465083 Michael123 4 4.22 1999
author: Laura Hillenbrand
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1999
rating: 4
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]]> 193388249
Then, one by one, the Osage began to be killed off. The family of an Osage woman, Mollie Burkhart, became a prime target. One of her relatives was shot. Another was poisoned. And this was just the beginning, as more and more Osage were dying under mysterious circumstances, and many of those who dared to investigate the killings were themselves murdered.

As the death toll rose, the newly created FBI took up the case, and the young director, J. Edgar Hoover, turned to a former Texas Ranger named Tom White to try to unravel the mystery. White put together an undercover team, including a Native American agent who infiltrated the region, and together with the Osage began to expose one of the most chilling conspiracies in American history.]]> 338 David Grann 0593470834 Michael123 3 4.12 2017
author: David Grann
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2017
rating: 3
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]]> 1898
Into Thin Air is the definitive account of the deadliest season in the history of Everest by the acclaimed journalist and author of the bestseller Into the Wild. On assignment for Outside Magazine to report on the growing commercialization of the mountain, Krakauer, an accomplished climber, went to the Himalayas as a client of Rob Hall, the most respected high-altitude guide in the world. A rangy, thirty-five-year-old New Zealander, Hall had summited Everest four times between 1990 and 1995 and had led thirty-nine climbers to the top. Ascending the mountain in close proximity to Hall's team was a guided expedition led by Scott Fischer, a forty-year-old American with legendary strength and drive who had climbed the peak without supplemental oxygen in 1994. But neither Hall nor Fischer survived the rogue storm that struck in May 1996.

Krakauer examines what it is about Everest that has compelled so many people -- including himself -- to throw caution to the wind, ignore the concerns of loved ones, and willingly subject themselves to such risk, hardship, and expense. Written with emotional clarity and supported by his unimpeachable reporting, Krakauer's eyewitness account of what happened on the roof of the world is a singular achievement.]]> 368 Jon Krakauer Michael123 3 4.24 1997
author: Jon Krakauer
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.24
book published: 1997
rating: 3
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]]> 27161156 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780062300546.

Hillbilly Elegy recounts J.D. Vance's powerful origin story...

From a former marine and Yale Law School graduate now serving as a U.S. Senator from Ohio and the Republican Vice Presidential candidate for the 2024 election, an incisive account of growing up in a poor Rust Belt town that offers a broader, probing look at the struggles of America's white working class.

Hillbilly Elegy is a passionate and personal analysis of a culture in crisis—that of white working-class Americans. The disintegration of this group, a process that has been slowly occurring now for more than forty years, has been reported with growing frequency and alarm, but has never before been written about as searingly from the inside. J. D. Vance tells the true story of what a social, regional, and class decline feels like when you were born with it hung around your neck.

The Vance family story begins hopefully in postwar America. J. D.'s grandparents were "dirt poor and in love," and moved north from Kentucky's Appalachia region to Ohio in the hopes of escaping the dreadful poverty around them. They raised a middle-class family, and eventually one of their grandchildren would graduate from Yale Law School, a conventional marker of success in achieving generational upward mobility. But as the family saga of Hillbilly Elegy plays out, we learn that J.D.'s grandparents, aunt, uncle, and, most of all, his mother struggled profoundly with the demands of their new middle-class life, never fully escaping the legacy of abuse, alcoholism, poverty, and trauma so characteristic of their part of America. With piercing honesty, Vance shows how he himself still carries around the demons of his chaotic family history.

A deeply moving memoir, with its share of humor and vividly colorful figures, Hillbilly Elegy is the story of how upward mobility really feels. And it is an urgent and troubling meditation on the loss of the American dream for a large segment of this country.]]> 264 J.D. Vance Michael123 4 3.81 2016
author: J.D. Vance
name: Michael123
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2016
rating: 4
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]]> 58065033 390 Bonnie Garmus Michael123 3 4.23 2022
author: Bonnie Garmus
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2022
rating: 3
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]]> 34066798 The mega-bestseller with more than 2 million readers—Now a Paramount+ with Showtime series starring Ewan McGregor as Count Alexander Rostov

From the #1 New York Times-bestselling author of The Lincoln Highway and Rules of Civility, a beautifully transporting novel about a man who is ordered to spend the rest of his life inside a luxury hotel

In 1922, Count Alexander Rostov is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik tribunal, and is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from the Kremlin. Rostov, an indomitable man of erudition and wit, has never worked a day in his life, and must now live in an attic room while some of the most tumultuous decades in Russian history are unfolding outside the hotel’s doors. Unexpectedly, his reduced circumstances provide him entry into a much larger world of emotional discovery.

Brimming with humor, a glittering cast of characters, and one beautifully rendered scene after another, this singular novel casts a spell as it relates the count’s endeavor to gain a deeper understanding of what it means to be a man of purpose.]]> 462 Amor Towles Michael123 3 4.28 2016
author: Amor Towles
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2016
rating: 3
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]]> 18143977
In a mining town in Germany, Werner Pfennig, an orphan, grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find that brings them news and stories from places they have never seen or imagined. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments and is enlisted to use his talent to track down the resistance. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another.

From the highly acclaimed, multiple award-winning Anthony Doerr, the stunningly beautiful instant New York Times bestseller about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II.

An alternate cover for this ISBN can be found here]]> 544 Anthony Doerr 1476746583 Michael123 4 4.31 2014
author: Anthony Doerr
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2014
rating: 4
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]]> 2767 Zinn portrays a side of American history that can largely be seen as the exploitation and manipulation of the majority by rigged systems that hugely favor a small aggregate of elite rulers from across the orthodox political parties.
A People's History has been assigned as reading in many high schools and colleges across the United States. It has also resulted in a change in the focus of historical work, which now includes stories that previously were ignored

Library Journal calls Howard Zinn’s book “a brilliant and moving history of the American people from the point of view of those…whose plight has been largely omitted from most histories.”]]> 729 Howard Zinn 0060838655 Michael123 4 4.07 1980
author: Howard Zinn
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1980
rating: 4
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]]> 16158542
It was an unlikely quest from the start. With a team composed of the sons of loggers, shipyard workers, and farmers, the University of Washington’s eight-oar crew team was never expected to defeat the elite teams of the East Coast and Great Britain, yet they did, going on to shock the world by defeating the German team rowing for Adolf Hitler. The emotional heart of the tale lies with Joe Rantz, a teenager without family or prospects, who rows not only to regain his shattered self-regard but also to find a real place for himself in the world. Drawing on the boys�� own journals and vivid memories of a once-in-a-lifetime shared dream, Brown has created an unforgettable portrait of an era, a celebration of a remarkable achievement, and a chronicle of one extraordinary young man’s personal quest.]]> 404 Daniel James Brown 067002581X Michael123 4 4.37 2013
author: Daniel James Brown
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2013
rating: 4
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]]> 397483
Burnham's challenge was immense. In a short period of time, he was forced to overcome the death of his partner and numerous other obstacles to construct the famous "White City" around which the fair was built. His efforts to complete the project, and the fair's incredible success, are skillfully related along with entertaining appearances by such notables as Buffalo Bill Cody, Susan B. Anthony, and Thomas Edison.

The activities of the sinister Dr. Holmes, who is believed to be responsible for scores of murders around the time of the fair, are equally remarkable. He devised and erected the World's Fair Hotel, complete with crematorium and gas chamber, near the fairgrounds and used the event as well as his own charismatic personality to lure victims.

Combining the stories of an architect and a killer in one book, mostly in alternating chapters, seems like an odd choice but it works. The magical appeal and horrifying dark side of 19th-century Chicago are both revealed through Larson's skillful writing. - John Moe]]> 464 Erik Larson 0609608444 Michael123 3 4.02 2003
author: Erik Larson
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2003
rating: 3
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]]> 2094
This is the origin of and the reason for A Briefer History of Time: its author's wish to make its content more accessible to readers - as well as to bring it up-to-date with the latest scientific observations and findings.

Although this book is literally somewhat "briefer", it actually expands on the great subjects of the original. Purely technical concepts, such as the mathematics of chaotic boundary conditions, are gone. Conversely, subjects of wide interest that were difficult to follow because they were interspersed throughout the book have now been given entire chapters of their own, including relativity, curved space, and quantum theory.

This reorganization has allowed the authors to expand areas of special interest and recent progress, from the latest developments in string theory to exciting developments in the search for a complete unified theory of all the forces of physics. Like prior editions of the book - but even more so - A Briefer History of Time will guide nonscientists everywhere in the ongoing search for the tantalizing secrets at the heart of time and space.

Thirty-seven full-color illustrations enhance the text and make A Briefer History of Time an exhilarating addition in its own right to the literature of science.]]> 176 Stephen Hawking 0553804367 Michael123 4 4.26 2005
author: Stephen Hawking
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2005
rating: 4
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]]> 1067 386 David McCullough 0743226720 Michael123 4 4.10 2005
author: David McCullough
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2005
rating: 4
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]]> 1168341
One hundred years ago, scientists would have said that lasers, televisions, and the atomic bomb were beyond the realm of physical possibility. In Physics of the Impossible, the renowned physicist Michio Kaku explores to what extent the technologies and devices of science fiction that are deemed equally impossible today might well become commonplace in the future.

From teleportation to telekinesis, Kaku uses the world of science fiction to explore the fundamentals—and the limits—of the laws of physics as we know them today. He ranks the impossible technologies by categories—Class I, II, and III, depending on when they might be achieved, within the next century, millennia, or perhaps never. In a compelling and thought-provoking narrative, he explains:
· How the science of optics and electromagnetism may one day enable us to bend light around an object, like a stream flowing around a boulder, making the object invisible to observers “downstream��
· How ramjet rockets, laser sails, antimatter engines, and nanorockets may one day take us to the nearby stars
· How telepathy and psychokinesis, once considered pseudoscience, may one day be possible using advances in MRI, computers, superconductivity, and nanotechnology
· Why a time machine is apparently consistent with the known laws of quantum physics, although it would take an unbelievably advanced civilization to actually build one
Kaku uses his discussion of each technology as a jumping-off point to explain the science behind it. An extraordinary scientific adventure, Physics of the Impossible takes readers on an unforgettable, mesmerizing journey into the world of science that both enlightens and entertains.]]> 329 Michio Kaku 0385520697 Michael123 4 4.09 2008
author: Michio Kaku
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2008
rating: 4
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]]> 33426 359 Michio Kaku 0192861891 Michael123 4 4.15 1994
author: Michio Kaku
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1994
rating: 4
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]]> 4005310 Why evolution is more than just a theory: it is a fact.

In all the current highly publicized debates about creationism and its descendant "intelligent design," there is an element of the controversy that is rarely mentioned—the "evidence," the empirical truth of evolution by natural selection. Even Richard Dawkins and Stephen Jay Gould, while extolling the beauty of evolution and examining case studies, have not focused on the evidence itself. Yet the proof is vast, varied, and magnificent, drawn from many different fields of science. Scientists are observing species splitting into two and are finding more and more fossils capturing change in the past—dinosaurs that have sprouted feathers, fish that have grown limbs.

Why Evolution Is True weaves together the many threads of modern work in genetics, paleontology, geology, molecular biology, and anatomy that demonstrate the "indelible stamp" of the processes first proposed by Darwin. In crisp, lucid prose accessible to a wide audience, Why Evolution Is True dispels common misunderstandings and fears about evolution and clearly confirms that this amazing process of change has been firmly established as a scientific truth.]]> 282 Jerry A. Coyne 0670020532 Michael123 4 4.18 2008
author: Jerry A. Coyne
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2008
rating: 4
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]]> 53200 NY Times bestseller. 13 extraordinary essays shed new light on the mysteries of the universe & on one of the most brilliant thinkers of our time.
In his phenomenal bestseller A Brief History of Time, Stephen Hawking literally transformed the way we think about physics, the universe, reality itself. In these thirteen essays and one remarkable extended interview, the man widely regarded as the most brilliant theoretical physicist since Einstein returns to reveal an amazing array of possibilities for understanding our universe. Building on his earlier work, Hawking discusses imaginary time, how black holes can give birth to baby universes, and scientists�� efforts to find a complete unified theory that would predict everything in the universe. With his characteristic mastery of language, his sense of humor and commitment to plain speaking, Stephen Hawking invites us to know him better—and to share his passion for the voyage of intellect and imagination that has opened new ways to understanding the very nature of the cosmos.]]> 182 Stephen Hawking 0553374117 Michael123 4 4.19 1993
author: Stephen Hawking
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1993
rating: 4
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]]> 5553 138 Richard P. Feynman 0465023924 Michael123 3 4.22 1994
author: Richard P. Feynman
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1994
rating: 3
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]]> 8167094 From the best-selling author of The Elegant Universe and The Fabric of the Cosmos comes his most expansive and accessible book to date—a book that takes on the grandest question: Is ours the only universe?

There was a time when “universe�� meant all there is. Everything. Yet, in recent years discoveries in physics and cosmology have led a number of scientists to conclude that our universe may be one among many. With crystal-clear prose and inspired use of analogy, Brian Greene shows how a range of different “multiverse�� proposals emerges from theories developed to explain the most refined observations of both subatomic particles and the dark depths of space: a multiverse in which you have an infinite number of doppelgängers, each reading this sentence in a distant universe; a multiverse comprising a vast ocean of bubble universes, of which ours is but one; a multiverse that endlessly cycles through time, or one that might be hovering millimeters away yet remains invisible; another in which every possibility allowed by quantum physics is brought to life. Or, perhaps strangest of all, a multiverse made purely of math.

Greene, one of our foremost physicists and science writers, takes us on a captivating exploration of these parallel worlds and reveals how much of reality’s true nature may be deeply hidden within them. And, with his unrivaled ability to make the most challenging of material accessible and entertaining, Greene tackles the core question: How can fundamental science progress if great swaths of reality lie beyond our reach?

Sparked by Greene’s trademark wit and precision, The Hidden Reality is at once a far-reaching survey of cutting-edge physics and a remarkable journey to the very edge of reality—a journey grounded firmly in science and limited only by our imagination.]]> 384 Brian Greene 0307265633 Michael123 4 4.10 2011
author: Brian Greene
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2011
rating: 4
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]]> 2068 588 Daniel C. Dennett 068482471X Michael123 3 4.07 1995
author: Daniel C. Dennett
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1995
rating: 3
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]]> 131304 532 Simon Singh 0007162219 Michael123 3 4.20 2004
author: Simon Singh
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2004
rating: 3
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]]> 248764 In Climbing Mount Improbable, Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, builds a powerful and carefully reasoned argument for evolutionary adaptation as the force behind all life on earth.

What drives species to evolve? How can intricate structures such as the human eye, the spider's web or the wings of birds develop, seemingly by chance? Regarding evolution's most complex achievements as peaks on a metaphorical mountain, Climbing Mount Improbable reveals the ways in which the theory of natural selection can precisely explain the beautiful, bizarre and seemingly 'designed' complexity of living things.

And through it all runs the thread of DNA, the molecule of life, responsible for its own destiny on an unending pilgrimage through time. Accompanied by evocative illustrations, Dawkins's eloquent descriptions of the living world's astonishing adaptations throw back the curtain on the mysteries of 'Mount Improbable'.

An alternative cover edition for this ISBN can be found here.]]> 308 Richard Dawkins 0141026170 Michael123 4 4.11 1996
author: Richard Dawkins
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1996
rating: 4
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]]> 108939
"The Trouble with Physics" is a groundbreaking account of the state of modern physics: of how we got from Einstein and Relativity through quantum mechanics to the strange and bizarre predictions of string theory, full of unseen dimensions and multiple universes.

Lee Smolin not only provides a brilliant layman's overview of current research as we attempt to build a "theory of everything," but also questions many of the assumptions that lie behind string theory. In doing so, he describes some of the daring, outlandish ideas that will propel research in years to come.]]> 392 Lee Smolin 0618551050 Michael123 4 4.05 2006
author: Lee Smolin
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2006
rating: 4
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]]> 17362 Ever since Albert Einstein's general theory of relativity burst upon the world in 1915 some of the most brilliant minds of our century have sought to decipher the mysteries bequeathed by that theory, a legacy so unthinkable in some respects that even Einstein himself rejected them.

Which of these bizarre phenomena, if any, can really exist in our universe? Black holes, down which anything can fall but from which nothing can return; wormholes, short spacewarps connecting regions of the cosmos; singularities, where space and time are so violently warped that time ceases to exist and space becomes a kind of foam; gravitational waves, which carry symphonic accounts of collisions of black holes billions of years ago; and time machines, for traveling backward and forward in time.

Kip Thorne, along with fellow theorists Stephen Hawking and Roger Penrose, a cadre of Russians, and earlier scientists such as Oppenheimer, Wheeler and Chandrasekhar, has been in the thick of the quest to secure answers. In this masterfully written and brilliantly informed work of scientific history and explanation, Dr. Thorne, the Feynman Professor of Theoretical Physics at Caltech, leads his readers through an elegant, always human, tapestry of interlocking themes, coming finally to a uniquely informed answer to the great question: what principles control our universe and why do physicists think they know the things they think they know? Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time has been one of the greatest best-sellers in publishing history. Anyone who struggled with that book will find here a more slowly paced but equally mind-stretching experience, with the added fascination of a rich historical and human component.]]> 624 Kip S. Thorne 0393312763 Michael123 5 4.22 1994
author: Kip S. Thorne
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1994
rating: 5
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]]> 5552
The focus, as the title suggests, is quantum electrodynamics (QED), the part of the quantum theory of fields that describes the interactions of the quanta of the electromagnetic field-light, X rays, gamma rays--with matter and those of charged particles with one another. By extending the formalism developed by Dirac in 1933, which related quantum and classical descriptions of the motion of particles, Feynman revolutionized the quantum mechanical understanding of the nature of particles and waves. And, by incorporating his own readily visualizable formulation of quantum mechanics, Feynman created a diagrammatic version of QED that made calculations much simpler and also provided visual insights into the mechanisms of quantum electrodynamic processes.

In this book, using everyday language, spatial concepts, visualizations, and his renowned "Feynman diagrams" instead of advanced mathematics, Feynman successfully provides a definitive introduction to QED for a lay readership without any distortion of the basic science. Characterized by Feynman's famously original clarity and humor, this popular book on QED has not been equaled since its publication.]]> 176 Richard P. Feynman 0691024170 Michael123 4 4.26 1985
author: Richard P. Feynman
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.26
book published: 1985
rating: 4
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]]> 15852 An accesible version of Einstein's masterpiece of theory, written by the genius himself

According to Einstein himself, this book is intended "to give an exact insight into the theory of Relativity to those readers who, from a general scientific and philosophical point of view, are interested in the theory, but who are not conversant with the mathematical apparatus of theoretical physics." When he wrote the book in 1916, Einstein's name was scarcely known outside the physics institutes. Having just completed his masterpiece, The General Theory of Relativity—which provided a brand-new theory of gravity and promised a new perspective on the cosmos as a whole—he set out at once to share his excitement with as wide a public as possible in this popular and accessible book.

Here published for the first time as a Penguin Classic, this edition of Relativity features a new introduction by bestselling science author Nigel Calder.]]> 130 Albert Einstein 0143039822 Michael123 4 4.21 1916
author: Albert Einstein
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1916
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]]> 33418 361 Michio Kaku 1400033721 Michael123 4 4.21 2004
author: Michio Kaku
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.21
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rating: 4
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]]> 32191710
But today, few of us have time to contemplate the cosmos. So Tyson brings the universe down to Earth succinctly and clearly, with sparkling wit, in tasty chapters consumable anytime and anywhere in your busy day.]]> 223 Neil deGrasse Tyson 0393609391 Michael123 5 4.07 2017
author: Neil deGrasse Tyson
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2017
rating: 5
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]]> 61535 360 Richard Dawkins 0199291152 Michael123 4 4.15 1976
author: Richard Dawkins
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1976
rating: 4
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]]> 21 544 Bill Bryson 076790818X Michael123 3 4.21 2003
author: Bill Bryson
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2003
rating: 3
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]]> 3869
Told in language we all can understand, A Brief History of Time plunges into the exotic realms of black holes and quarks, of antimatter and “arrows of time,�� of the big bang and a bigger God—where the possibilities are wondrous and unexpected. With exciting images and profound imagination, Stephen Hawking brings us closer to the ultimate secrets at the very heart of creation.]]> 226 Stephen Hawking 0553380168 Michael123 4 4.22 1988
author: Stephen Hawking
name: Michael123
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1988
rating: 4
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]]>