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4.22 AVERAGE
4.22 AVERAGE
challenging
informative
reflective
slow-paced
"There is no time, there is only change; in fact, change is everything we measure!" - notes from the spacetime conference
This past summer I attended a conference on loop quantum gravity because it was at my university and it was free and they gave you lunch all three days. I sat silently at the back, the only person who did not apparently know everyone else, and listened to theoretical physicists discuss cosmology and the future of spacetime. Quite a few of my peers asked why--in respect to the intensity of our busy program and my numerous scholarly/social commitments--why in the hell would I take three full days and dedicate them to a conference for a department I'm unaffiliated with and a topic I can't possibly grasp fully or contribute to? And I don't have an answer to that, or if I do it is the same answer as to why I took up Rovelli's Seven Brief Lessons in Physics, and why I read Gödel, Escher, Bach, and why I still wasn't done and took up this as well. I'm curious. I like thinking about the world we live in. And even if day-to-day I don't do much about quantum physics, it's all a part of the world I participate in and I think it enhances my understanding of our humanity in the same way a Russian novel would.
What gets me, with comments made at the conference and very much with Rovelli, is the sheer beauty that these physicists see in their equations and deductions and theories. For all the long and complicated and messy equations--sometimes unintelligible and sometimes incomplete--Rovelli keeps returning to the simplicity and beauty of these theories. It's compelling not just because it's a fascinating way of reconfiguring how you view the world, but because of the adoration, the passion, that these scientists have for what they study.
I have another answer, too, to why I read this, why I attended that conference, and it's that I've always cared, I've always been curious. When I was in grade four, the first year I was allowed (but not yet required) to participate in the speech competition, I wanted to write about black holes. I went to the library and the librarian gave me this wonderful book and I read about Einstein's theory of relativity, and time slowing/stopping in proximity to a black hole, and it sounded like science fiction but it was also science fact. And so reading this book, yes, the equations are a language I don't understand and I doubt I could give you a succinct or coherent explanation of spacefoam, but now and then I read a paragraph and it summons up what nine-year-old Michaela read and repeated and somehow absorbed as part of her essential understanding of the world. I see the pages of that library book, the illustrations and the text, and I see the school stage for speech-making, and the conversations I've had about time in the near-twenty years I've counted since.
This past summer I attended a conference on loop quantum gravity because it was at my university and it was free and they gave you lunch all three days. I sat silently at the back, the only person who did not apparently know everyone else, and listened to theoretical physicists discuss cosmology and the future of spacetime. Quite a few of my peers asked why--in respect to the intensity of our busy program and my numerous scholarly/social commitments--why in the hell would I take three full days and dedicate them to a conference for a department I'm unaffiliated with and a topic I can't possibly grasp fully or contribute to? And I don't have an answer to that, or if I do it is the same answer as to why I took up Rovelli's Seven Brief Lessons in Physics, and why I read Gödel, Escher, Bach, and why I still wasn't done and took up this as well. I'm curious. I like thinking about the world we live in. And even if day-to-day I don't do much about quantum physics, it's all a part of the world I participate in and I think it enhances my understanding of our humanity in the same way a Russian novel would.
What gets me, with comments made at the conference and very much with Rovelli, is the sheer beauty that these physicists see in their equations and deductions and theories. For all the long and complicated and messy equations--sometimes unintelligible and sometimes incomplete--Rovelli keeps returning to the simplicity and beauty of these theories. It's compelling not just because it's a fascinating way of reconfiguring how you view the world, but because of the adoration, the passion, that these scientists have for what they study.
I have another answer, too, to why I read this, why I attended that conference, and it's that I've always cared, I've always been curious. When I was in grade four, the first year I was allowed (but not yet required) to participate in the speech competition, I wanted to write about black holes. I went to the library and the librarian gave me this wonderful book and I read about Einstein's theory of relativity, and time slowing/stopping in proximity to a black hole, and it sounded like science fiction but it was also science fact. And so reading this book, yes, the equations are a language I don't understand and I doubt I could give you a succinct or coherent explanation of spacefoam, but now and then I read a paragraph and it summons up what nine-year-old Michaela read and repeated and somehow absorbed as part of her essential understanding of the world. I see the pages of that library book, the illustrations and the text, and I see the school stage for speech-making, and the conversations I've had about time in the near-twenty years I've counted since.
informative
medium-paced
I don’t know how I’m supposed to do anything else now. Quantum gravity isn’t going to solve itself.
But seriously, where was the science teacher getting me this excited about effing particle physics when I was 15. Maybe I’d be hanging out on a space station. We’ll never know.
But seriously, where was the science teacher getting me this excited about effing particle physics when I was 15. Maybe I’d be hanging out on a space station. We’ll never know.
challenging
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
relaxing
medium-paced
informative
medium-paced
I don't read that much nonfiction and it's rare that a nonfiction book will keep my attention all the way through. This one lost me about half way through. Most of the first half was enjoyable and insightful.
Definitely got lost in the last half, where the science outweighed the history. But some super interesting stuff here, guys. Also quantum is a funny word.
adventurous
challenging
informative
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced