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Roger Penrose and the Road to Reality
Flipping through the eleven-hundred pages, you notice the gratuitous inclusion of mathematical formulae and the chapter titles on the page headers -- "Quantum algebra, geometry, and spin," "Gravity's role in quantum state reduction," "Calculus on manifolds" -- suggest a far more exclusive audience than yourself, a lowly paper-pusher with a four-year degree. "But then, what's this doing in the popular new releases?" you ask yourself, "Shouldn't it be hidden away in the darkened corner of the store's physics section?" But that's where you're wrong, you realize, glancing through the author's preface; this book is for you: Penrose has, it seems, composed a mathematical physics book for the general audience -- and not merely an introductory one, but one that takes you to the frontiers of modern theory.
The trouble with the common popular-science books that propose to illustrate modern physical theories is in their implicit premise of avoiding mathematical notation and concept in favor of plain English. This works to an extent, but ultimately breaks down when the nature of the subject matter itself is mathematical. Indeed, after reading the wonderful Dancing Wu Li Masters, the reader is no more prepared to plunge into a textbook on modern physics or to comprehend even the titles of the latest mathematical physics papers on Arxiv.org. Physicists know about the fundamental particles or the nature of space only through the mathematics that model the phenomena. Which is not to say that such English language renderings are useless, but they skillfully devise to distance themselves from what physicists actually do, as well as to reenforce readers' natural aversion to numbers and formulae.
Penrose's approach is not to dive head-first into the most strenuous material or to assume a proper background for the comprehension of advanced physics; instead, the first several chapters are devoted to building the necessary mathematical subtext for the remaining bulk of the book. The volume's length is not, as is often the case, a result of lengthy diversions or pedantry (needless complexity); Penrose keeps his eye on the ball throughout, consistently informing the reader how the topic at hand is related to the over-arching theme and infusing the more well-known pedagogy with creative insight, so that even a talented math major may learn from the introductory chapters on number systems or geometry. What's more, the careful organization of the disparate topics permits a fluid drift from one to the next. The effect is a single cohesive book and not a collection of notes or essays.
With 390 illustrations and a generous supply of endnotes and bibliography entries, it's clear that Penrose didn't consider the work completed with the text alone. The inclusion of short problems within the footnotes hints to the reader what concepts are important to understand. The usual footnote-commentary is withheld for the endnotes at the end of each chapter.
It's probable that the name "Roger Penrose" might excite some memories you may have of his previous works, published over a decade ago, both of which explore the mind-brain relationship. At least one of these (Shadows of the Mind -- the other is the more popular The Emperor's New Mind) proposes a quantum theoretical explanation for consciousness which was perhaps too liberal to have been taken seriously by neurologists. Penrose's efforts in quantum theory have, however, been more successful than those in neurology: in 1988 he was awarded the Wolf Prize, one of the very highest honors in mathematics (perhaps second only to the Fields Medal), along with Stephen Hawking, and has made invaluable contributions to quantum physics for the past several decades, proving himself to be one of the finest scientific minds of our day. In consequence to his stature, it's certainly a treat for laypeople that Penrose has donated the time and energy to the creation of a monumental expository work for general consumption.
Whereas the average pop-science journalist reaches upwards to accrue a book's material, Penrose's acknowledged expertise on the subject forces him back towards the ground again. If you think about it, I suppose this is as difficult a task, since much of what Penrose describes he's known for forty or fifty years (he was born in 1931). He apologizes in the final chapter for the necessity of handpicking among the dozen or so "theories of everything," sometimes according to his own professional biases. Today's leading theory, "String Theory" along with the theory of "Loop Quantum Gravity," and the little known "Twister Theory," are all covered in the later chapters; the first portion of the book builds the mathematical foundations for the succeeding chapters, which give an indepth treatment of quantum physics and quantum field theory. These topics are followed by the previously described "theories of everything."
A glance at the table of contents may make or break your purchasing decision; chances are, if you find the mysteries of the terms somehow galvanizing, then you'll enjoy the book. On the other hand, if the eclectic terms frighten you, you should perhaps look at the preface (where Penrose gives solace to anxious readers), or it may be best to avoid the book altogether.
As I mentioned earlier, little has been done for the general audience to explore the wide expanse between physics and mathematics. The Road to Reality is, in this respect, a virtually pioneering effort, and given its size, scope and quality, I would venture to guess it will remain the de facto text in its area for many decades to come, and may safely be placed on your bookshelf next to E.T. Bell's Men of Mathematics, Douglas Hofstadter's Gödel, Escher, Bach, or Benjamin Yandell's recent (*highly* recommended) The Honor's Class: Hilbert's Problem's and Their Solvers.
I am fortunate to have had some mathematics education and so am familiar with the basic principles of complex numbers, calculus, and geometry, making the first several chapters, while still insightful, less toilsome than it might've been. I suspect that the average bright high school graduate would have no trouble with Penrose's quick treatment of these concepts. I would recommend the reader have at least some familiarity with the basic terms of mathematics and physics (i.e. when Penrose mentions "set" you know he's referring to a particular mathematical structure) or the book could overwhelm you quickly. Additionally, readers would be at an advantage having read "English-based" modern physics books such as The Dancing Wu Li Masters, Michio Kaku's Hyperspace, Brian Greene's The Elegant Universe or a similar book about 20th century quantum physics. Either way, it's safe to say that despite the virtuosic readability of the text, it's still going to take an intellectual commitment on the part of the reader to reap all of the available knowledge."
You can purchase The Road to Reality: A Complete Guide to the Laws of the Universe from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
There's an article about what I suppose I would describe as his own flavor of decoherence.
GEB was mentioned above, and I just had to post about it.. It's one of the best books I've ever read. If you've never read it and you're a geek, and at all interested in how the mind works, you'll absolutely love it. I've read it three times, and the last time I even almost understood the whole thing.. :)
It's an absolute classic, I can't recommend it highly enough.
All movements for social change begin as missions, evolve into businesses, and end up as rackets.
If you spell it correctly, and then do a web search, you'll see that it isn't as obscure as you might have thought. It's also beautiful stuff.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
Yes, he is the same Sir Roger Penrose. Knights are generally rare enough to not have the same names as each other.
☠
...but this is the exception to that rule. It's sitting on the corner of my desk, and it's been calling to me since I got it.
I'm actually just taking a couple of months off to finish it properly. Like TAOP this is one of those books you need to read with a notebook to hand. Reading it in the bath could prove hazardous...
--- These are not words: wierd, genious, rediculous
The Tao of Physics by FRITJOF CAPRA, which, I think, predates The Dancing Wu Li Masters.
"Academicians are more likely to share each other's toothbrush than each other's nomenclature."
Cohen
This reminded me of another book that I liked for much the same reason: Inward Bound by Abraham Pais (1986). It's basically a history of modern physics, but unlike most such books does not shy away from the mathematics (without which the physics would make little sense). In fact, I just pulled it off of my shelf and see that one of the testimonials on the back is from none other than Roger Penrose...
Penrose's take on the universe is a pretty amazing one, but a very difficult one to grasp. The main point is: we just don't know enough about the world yet. Not enough mathematics, and our experiments are nowhere near adequate to get final answers.
Energy: time to change the picture.
Penrose patented the concept of the Penrose Tile, but the patent had run out before Kimberly-Clark made the toilet paper. Penrose just made a stink about it publicly. He didn't sue.
Further, there is no single Penrose Tile pattern - it is the concept of a pattern, or lack of one, that emerges using only two tiles. You can combine them in such a way that there can be no repeating pattern.
Penrose's patent covered the ability to create an acyclic pattern using only two tiles.
Penrose never sued anybody - Clark Richert claimed discovery of the two tile acyclic pattern at the same time as Roger Penrose.
Either you're trolling or your professor is another Isaac Newton - pissed off because Liebniz got there first.
I have a bs in physics and I picked this book up hoping that it was going to be a complete view of physics (without being dumbed down, which it does succeed at) only to find that it's basically a complete guide to untested theories and speculations.
I was hoping it would be a complete guide to physics from newtonian physics to relativity, but it completely skips traditional mechanics in favor of whiz-bang theories that sound cool but don't necessarily have much scientific rigor.
I saw this book at the store the other day. I couldn't find anything else that looked interesting, but still, the book seemed a little watered down. Not intense enough, no challenge, and not because it was so expertly written that anyone could understand it. The section I glanced at looked primarily theoretical with a peppering of math, not a comprehensive view both theoretically and mathematically.
A friend of mine looked over it after I put it back on the shelf. She's a gifted writer, but couldn't pass high school algebra. She also couldn't get through the first chapter of this book for her life. Seeing her difficulties frustrates me, she and millions of others want to be able to grasp the more complex theories of physics while avoiding calculus. I hope that one day a truly gifted teacher/writter will be able to write a book for this helpless audience.
The book isn't for those fed up with other "quick guides to physics," but more for people who want one that's jam packed with modern physics and will serve their general education well.
"Man, I am so unbelievably stupid."
Elementary. Buses being commercial vehicles are registered yearly. Many states have licence plate stickers to verify that said vehicle has a current registration. The sticker includes the year the registration was issued. A picture that includes the painting and a licence plate with the sticker would prove that the painting existed at least as early as the date indicated by the registration sticker. QED. HAND.
Come on. Be honest.
Scattered throughout the book are sections that speculate on Platonism, and half-dead cats, and astronauts orbiting black holes and anthropic principles.
The rest of the book is math. And some of it is hard. Maybe iI was supposed to learn about "Clifford Algebra" from juvenile stories about a Big Red Dog. And maybe, I somehow missed the high school geometry lessons about fiber bundles. Perhaps I've simply forgotten my nursery school lullabies on algebraic topology, but I've found that if you actually read the book for the content, and not for the "mindblowin' shit", it's a tough read. Not impossible, mind you. It's just less literary than Goedel Escher Bach.
'You' is second-person. And other than Zork or CYOA, there isn't much popular literature written in the second person.
-Hentai [in vita non pacem est]
Well, actually string theory literally does claim those extra dimensions exist, and Schrodinger's cat is not just a metaphor.
I've read The Road to Reality, and would not recommend it to anyone who doesn't have at least an undergraduate degree in math or physics. You have to read hundreds and hundreds of pages of math before you even get to any physics, and the math is not explained thoroughly and clearly enough that a layperson could really understand it. For me, it was like, "Oh yeah, I remember that course in grad school," but if I hadn't already had the course, I wouldn't have been able to follow it.
If you need somewhere to start, and don't know any physics, try one of the free introductory physics books listed here. After that, if you want to try to bring yourself up to the level Penrose is shooting for, try some of these:
Find free books.
On the contrary, Penrose, genius though he is, needs to be ignored on the subject of computability. Fortunately, he is. He doesn't have anything new to contribute and repeatedly misrepresents Godel's theorem.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
I thought geek meant fool....
"I call a baby goat a 'goatse.'" -- my non-Internet-savvy 6-year-old stepdaughter
Penrose never sued anybody
This blog cites a story from The Wall Street Journal from April, 1997 that appears to be genuine.
This story says the dispute was resolved amicably shortly afterwards.
Some things do remain. I may never be able to look up at a clear dark sky again without thinking "Ah, look, the Riemann Sphere", for one.
Incidentally, anyone with 45 minutes of spare time and a something capable of playing Real-media files can hear Penrose's own views on some fundamental cosmological questions on the BBC or more specifically here . Martin Rees and Carolin Crawford (a Cambridge-contemporary of mine) are also participants.
Quantum effects of the sort proposed by Hameroff and Penrose are based the folding configuration of tubulin dimers, protein components within the microtubule. Simulations of microtubule excitations suggest topological error correction of global states which may be resistant to local decoherence, independent of any nuclear spin 'tickling' induced by an externally-applied electromagnetic field.
Note also that MRI induced quantum coherence of a different sort has been experimentally observed in the brain.
Nevertheless, you are correct in positing that the burden of experimental proof remains upon those who would advocate any revision of prevailing theory.