What do you think?
Rate this book
The Theory of Almost Everything: The Standard Model, the Unsung Triumph of Modern Physics
The most successful and important theory in physics today, fully explained to general readers
This book does for the Standard Model what Brian Greene did for string theory
Historical perspective begins in the 19th century and explains where we are today and where we are heading next
Compelling writing full of rich metaphor and analogy, like Feynman's lectures
70 illustrations present concepts to readers visually
Although many people are talking about string theory, it may only amount to a passing fashion: It hasn't yet been confirmed by experiment, the real test. What has? Where do we really stand? Robert Oerter shows what the next step in physics will without question be based on: "The Theory of Almost Everything"--the single theory that has dominated particle physics for the past 30 years. Cobbled together by many brilliant minds throughout the 20th century, and modestly known as the "Standard Model of Elementary Particles," it is the most wide-ranging and precise theory in the history of physics. From the chemical reactions that power all living things to the nuclear reactions that power the sun, except for gravity, it describes all known physical interactions.Robert Oerter teaches physics at George Mason University. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Maryland. He has done research in the areas of supergravity, especially as applied to superstring theories, and in the quantum mechanics of chaotic systems. He lives in Maryland.
(c) Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.
This book does for the Standard Model what Brian Greene did for string theory
Historical perspective begins in the 19th century and explains where we are today and where we are heading next
Compelling writing full of rich metaphor and analogy, like Feynman's lectures
70 illustrations present concepts to readers visually
Although many people are talking about string theory, it may only amount to a passing fashion: It hasn't yet been confirmed by experiment, the real test. What has? Where do we really stand? Robert Oerter shows what the next step in physics will without question be based on: "The Theory of Almost Everything"--the single theory that has dominated particle physics for the past 30 years. Cobbled together by many brilliant minds throughout the 20th century, and modestly known as the "Standard Model of Elementary Particles," it is the most wide-ranging and precise theory in the history of physics. From the chemical reactions that power all living things to the nuclear reactions that power the sun, except for gravity, it describes all known physical interactions.Robert Oerter teaches physics at George Mason University. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Maryland. He has done research in the areas of supergravity, especially as applied to superstring theories, and in the quantum mechanics of chaotic systems. He lives in Maryland.
(c) Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.
336 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2005
About the author
Robert Oerter
1 book8 followersRobert Oerter obtuvo su doctorado en la Universidad de Maryland y actualmente trabaja como profesor e investigador en la Universidad George Mason. Ha realizado investigación en las áreas de supergravedad, teoría de cuerdas y mecánica cuántica de sistemas caóticos. El área de la física que más le interesa son los fundamentos de la mecánica cuántica.
Fondo de Cultura Económica ha editado La teoría de casi todo. El modelo estándar, triunfo no reconocido de la física moderna (2008).
Fondo de Cultura Económica ha editado La teoría de casi todo. El modelo estándar, triunfo no reconocido de la física moderna (2008).
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 60 reviews
August 19, 2015
This book is really a rare treat. How often can you find a lucid and compelling explanation of perhaps the greatest scientific achievement in history packed into less than 300 pages? Oerter has done a fine thing. In fact, I find it rather remarkable, really, when I reflect that he includes the history of the major discoveries and theoretical advances, as well as surprisingly nuanced discussions of QED, QCD, and Feynman diagrams (among much else), ultimately managing to take the reader from Newton all the way to string theory. There is, in short, much to learn in these pages.
I must say, though, that I find this book rather ambitious for a popular audience. This is not a light read. Since so much information is packed into so few pages, I often had to read slowly and pay close attention. If I hadn’t already read a few books on physics, I might have found this hard to understand in many places; for Oerter compresses explanations of quite complex things like symmetry and special relativity into just a few pages. Therefore I would say the ideal audience for this book is somebody with a background in philosophy or perhaps social science, not the casual reader looking for something to skim through at the beach.
I do not wish to detract from this book’s merit, but Oerter did say something which I disagreed with. In the section on quantum mechanics, Oerter explains that the nature of quantum physics is probabilistic; so predicting everything in the universe down to the fluttering of a hair—which was the dream of Newtonian physics—is simply impossible in a quantum framework, since we can only calculate the probabilities that certain events may happen. After explaining this, Oerter goes on to say that, since deterministic physics was shown to be false, this means free will exists. In his words, “It is almost as though the rules of the universe were designed to protect our free will.”
To my mind, this is simply not true. Oerter seems to think that possessing free will is the same as having one’s actions be unpredictable. But if unpredictable behavior is the same as free will, we must consider electrons to have free will, too—as well as everything else, for that matter, since everything is governed by the laws of quantum mechanics. Clearly, free will is not the same as unpredictability. Free will means determining one’s own actions. So if my actions were governed by either probabilistic or deterministic laws, both cases would equally impinge on my free will, for it would mean that something outside of myself was controlling me. I don’t want to harp on this, however, because it was a very minor point Oerter made.
My carping aside, I can’t recommend this book enough to anyone curious about the current state of understanding in physics. It is well-written, comprehensive, and the right mix of depth and breadth. I hope enough people buy and read this book to motivate Oerter to write some more!
I must say, though, that I find this book rather ambitious for a popular audience. This is not a light read. Since so much information is packed into so few pages, I often had to read slowly and pay close attention. If I hadn’t already read a few books on physics, I might have found this hard to understand in many places; for Oerter compresses explanations of quite complex things like symmetry and special relativity into just a few pages. Therefore I would say the ideal audience for this book is somebody with a background in philosophy or perhaps social science, not the casual reader looking for something to skim through at the beach.
I do not wish to detract from this book’s merit, but Oerter did say something which I disagreed with. In the section on quantum mechanics, Oerter explains that the nature of quantum physics is probabilistic; so predicting everything in the universe down to the fluttering of a hair—which was the dream of Newtonian physics—is simply impossible in a quantum framework, since we can only calculate the probabilities that certain events may happen. After explaining this, Oerter goes on to say that, since deterministic physics was shown to be false, this means free will exists. In his words, “It is almost as though the rules of the universe were designed to protect our free will.”
To my mind, this is simply not true. Oerter seems to think that possessing free will is the same as having one’s actions be unpredictable. But if unpredictable behavior is the same as free will, we must consider electrons to have free will, too—as well as everything else, for that matter, since everything is governed by the laws of quantum mechanics. Clearly, free will is not the same as unpredictability. Free will means determining one’s own actions. So if my actions were governed by either probabilistic or deterministic laws, both cases would equally impinge on my free will, for it would mean that something outside of myself was controlling me. I don’t want to harp on this, however, because it was a very minor point Oerter made.
My carping aside, I can’t recommend this book enough to anyone curious about the current state of understanding in physics. It is well-written, comprehensive, and the right mix of depth and breadth. I hope enough people buy and read this book to motivate Oerter to write some more!
December 30, 2014
Casting around for a good way to explain what an excellent book this is, I realize that I can say it very concisely: in an approachable but still quite responsible manner, it tells you everything you need to know about the Standard Model of Particle Physics to be able to understand the equation on the famous CERN T-shirt.
Well, that was my best shot. If you aren't convinced now, you never will be.
May 27, 2017
The Standard Model of Elementary Particles describes everything we know about symmetries, particles and fields. It is backed up by experiment and has made significant predictions that have been validated including most recently the Higgs particle. It is a relativistic quantum field theory meaning that it takes into account special relativity and quantum mechanics. It does not address gravity, dark matter or dark energy.
Presenting the ideas that led to the Standard Model in historical sequence was helpful. We get overviews of classical concepts, Noether’s theorem, special relativity, quantum mechanics, the Dirac equation, Feynman’s quantum electrodynamics (QED), Schwinger’s quantum field theory and Gell-Mann’s Quantum Chromo Dynamics (QCD), all precursors to the Standard Model. Oerter offers analogies, examples, few equations and lots of Feynman diagrams to reach the lay reader, but it is definitely not a light read. As a non-scientist enthusiast of this genre I found the level of complexity just right.
Classical nineteenth century physics claimed to model the real world. The Standard Model incorporating quantum mechanics instead tells us what we can know about the real world. Particles are equally well described as waves. Quantum mechanics places particles in superpositions that are neither here nor there. The particle has a wave function that collapses when the particle is observed. If the particle could be in one of two distant places and the wave function was a real physical effect, it would be going faster than the speed of light, an impossibility. Particles in quantum field theory are essentially oscillations in an information field.
Feynman’s QED, a subset of the Standard Model, depicts space filled with interacting particles that travel all possible paths to their destination. Summing the paths employing the principle of least action gives the probability of finding the particle along any specific path. Alternatively, Schwinger’s field theory developed at the same time, holds that at each point in space is a quantum harmonic oscillator. When an oscillator is at an energy level above the lowest, it represents a particle or particles. Energy moving from one oscillator to another represents a moving particle. Both Feynman’s and Schwinger’s theories give the same results and both are still used.
Quantum mechanics and its descendent quantum field theories are not direct reflections of physical reality. Take the electron. As defined by the Dirac equation it has spin, but experiments show the electron is so small that its spin would be faster than the speed of light. So thinking of an electron as a tiny spinning ball of charge doesn’t work. It has to be treated as a point particle with no dimensions. If you wonder how something with no size, shape or structure can have mass and spin, you won’t find the answer in the Standard Model. That’s just the way it is.
QED shows electrons surrounded by a cloud of virtual photons that are not regarded as physically real (they can exceed the speed of light) but their effects are considered real. The Dirac equation predicted the positron, an anti-electron (electron with positive charge) that QED depicts going back in time. QED posits that virtual positron-electron pairs are constantly created and then disappear. So called “empty” space is teeming with virtual particles. They are not real but indispensable to the Standard Model. As Feynman put it, ”The theory of quantum electrodynamics describes nature as absurd form the point of view of commonsense. And it fully agrees with experiment. So I hope you can accept nature as she is – absurd.”
Gell-Mann gave us QCD, a quantum field theory for the particles in the nucleus. He discovered and coined the term quarks, the building blocks of protons, neutrons and pions. He also discovered a new force that held quarks together, the strong force mediated by particles called gluons analogous to photons in QED. Gell-Mann found a new symmetry he arbitrarily called color that dictated the existence of the gluon field. There are six quarks arbitrarily named up, down, strange, charm, top and bottom in three “colors” (red, blue or green). Color established a new quantum state allowing three quarks with the same spin to form a fermion without violating the Pauli Exclusion Principle.
Symmetries and symmetry breaking are essential components of the standard model. Oerter gave me a much better understanding of symmetry’s importance to particle formation and quantum field theories. He discusses Noether’s theorem which states that each symmetry is associated with a conserved quantity. Time symmetry is associated with energy, spatial symmetry with momentum, rotational symmetry with angular momentum, color symmetry with the strong force. Spontaneous symmetry breaking allowed the Higgs particle to imbue other particles with mass creating ordinary matter, hence the term “God particle”. Without symmetry breaking and the Higgs there would be no matter. Without a symmetry unimaginatively named U(1) there would be no photons and hence no light. Without color symmetry there would be no elements.
QED explaining the electromagnetic force was the first major building block of the Standard Model. QCD explaining the strong force was the second major building block. When the remaining weak force was explained and incorporated the Standard Model looked pretty much as it does today.
The Standard Model has its limits. At energies higher than those achievable in today’s particle accelerators, we have no experimental data. Thus it could well break down as we approach the instant of the Big Bang. It also predicts that all neutrinos are massless which is known to be wrong. It is clunky. Despite the touted “simple” equation expressing everything it covers, it is inelegant requiring 18 adjustable parameters. It leaves out gravity, dark matter and dark energy.
Bottom line, while it is the best we have and has made accurate predictions, it fails to satisfy. Does nature really operate this way? There must be a greater simpler underlying truth. Oerter ends discussing the search for a deeper structure such as String Theory and the search for more fundamental symmetries. Most popular physics books give the Standard Model short shrift and embrace speculative theories. But it’s helpful to have a baseline and Oerter explains it well. This is a book I expect to reference many times again. Very highly recommended.
Presenting the ideas that led to the Standard Model in historical sequence was helpful. We get overviews of classical concepts, Noether’s theorem, special relativity, quantum mechanics, the Dirac equation, Feynman’s quantum electrodynamics (QED), Schwinger’s quantum field theory and Gell-Mann’s Quantum Chromo Dynamics (QCD), all precursors to the Standard Model. Oerter offers analogies, examples, few equations and lots of Feynman diagrams to reach the lay reader, but it is definitely not a light read. As a non-scientist enthusiast of this genre I found the level of complexity just right.
Classical nineteenth century physics claimed to model the real world. The Standard Model incorporating quantum mechanics instead tells us what we can know about the real world. Particles are equally well described as waves. Quantum mechanics places particles in superpositions that are neither here nor there. The particle has a wave function that collapses when the particle is observed. If the particle could be in one of two distant places and the wave function was a real physical effect, it would be going faster than the speed of light, an impossibility. Particles in quantum field theory are essentially oscillations in an information field.
Feynman’s QED, a subset of the Standard Model, depicts space filled with interacting particles that travel all possible paths to their destination. Summing the paths employing the principle of least action gives the probability of finding the particle along any specific path. Alternatively, Schwinger’s field theory developed at the same time, holds that at each point in space is a quantum harmonic oscillator. When an oscillator is at an energy level above the lowest, it represents a particle or particles. Energy moving from one oscillator to another represents a moving particle. Both Feynman’s and Schwinger’s theories give the same results and both are still used.
Quantum mechanics and its descendent quantum field theories are not direct reflections of physical reality. Take the electron. As defined by the Dirac equation it has spin, but experiments show the electron is so small that its spin would be faster than the speed of light. So thinking of an electron as a tiny spinning ball of charge doesn’t work. It has to be treated as a point particle with no dimensions. If you wonder how something with no size, shape or structure can have mass and spin, you won’t find the answer in the Standard Model. That’s just the way it is.
QED shows electrons surrounded by a cloud of virtual photons that are not regarded as physically real (they can exceed the speed of light) but their effects are considered real. The Dirac equation predicted the positron, an anti-electron (electron with positive charge) that QED depicts going back in time. QED posits that virtual positron-electron pairs are constantly created and then disappear. So called “empty” space is teeming with virtual particles. They are not real but indispensable to the Standard Model. As Feynman put it, ”The theory of quantum electrodynamics describes nature as absurd form the point of view of commonsense. And it fully agrees with experiment. So I hope you can accept nature as she is – absurd.”
Gell-Mann gave us QCD, a quantum field theory for the particles in the nucleus. He discovered and coined the term quarks, the building blocks of protons, neutrons and pions. He also discovered a new force that held quarks together, the strong force mediated by particles called gluons analogous to photons in QED. Gell-Mann found a new symmetry he arbitrarily called color that dictated the existence of the gluon field. There are six quarks arbitrarily named up, down, strange, charm, top and bottom in three “colors” (red, blue or green). Color established a new quantum state allowing three quarks with the same spin to form a fermion without violating the Pauli Exclusion Principle.
Symmetries and symmetry breaking are essential components of the standard model. Oerter gave me a much better understanding of symmetry’s importance to particle formation and quantum field theories. He discusses Noether’s theorem which states that each symmetry is associated with a conserved quantity. Time symmetry is associated with energy, spatial symmetry with momentum, rotational symmetry with angular momentum, color symmetry with the strong force. Spontaneous symmetry breaking allowed the Higgs particle to imbue other particles with mass creating ordinary matter, hence the term “God particle”. Without symmetry breaking and the Higgs there would be no matter. Without a symmetry unimaginatively named U(1) there would be no photons and hence no light. Without color symmetry there would be no elements.
QED explaining the electromagnetic force was the first major building block of the Standard Model. QCD explaining the strong force was the second major building block. When the remaining weak force was explained and incorporated the Standard Model looked pretty much as it does today.
The Standard Model has its limits. At energies higher than those achievable in today’s particle accelerators, we have no experimental data. Thus it could well break down as we approach the instant of the Big Bang. It also predicts that all neutrinos are massless which is known to be wrong. It is clunky. Despite the touted “simple” equation expressing everything it covers, it is inelegant requiring 18 adjustable parameters. It leaves out gravity, dark matter and dark energy.
Bottom line, while it is the best we have and has made accurate predictions, it fails to satisfy. Does nature really operate this way? There must be a greater simpler underlying truth. Oerter ends discussing the search for a deeper structure such as String Theory and the search for more fundamental symmetries. Most popular physics books give the Standard Model short shrift and embrace speculative theories. But it’s helpful to have a baseline and Oerter explains it well. This is a book I expect to reference many times again. Very highly recommended.
March 8, 2021
The Theory of Almost Everything, Robert Oerter, 2006, 327pp. ISBN 0132366789.
In an atom, photon exchange binds electrons to the nucleus. Quantum Electrodynamics tells how (QED). In a nucleus, pion (quark-antiquark pair) exchange binds protons to neutrons. Within a proton or neutron, gluon exchange binds quarks together. Quantum Chromodynamics tells how (QCD). p. 179.
Ordinary matter is made of half-integer-spin fermions: quarks and leptons, including electrons and neutrinos. p. 205. Force-carrying particles such as photons, pions, gluons, W, Z, and Higgs, are whole-number-spin bosons. Any number of bosons, but only one fermion, can be in one place in one quantum state. p. 156. Photons can't interact with each other, but gluons and Higgs can. pp. 177, 206.
The Standard model explains everything. Except gravity. Wait: this just in: neutrinos have mass. Back to the drawing board. p. 221. Oh, and: 85% of the matter in the universe is undetectable dark matter. We'll have to detect it to find out what's up with that. p. 224. Also, the muon's magnetic moment isn't quite as predicted. p. 232.
Writing in 2005: the Higgs particle had not yet been found; its mass was expected to be around 130 GeV. pp. 201, 221, 235, 239. [It was found in 2012, and its mass measured as]
Commits the unforgivable sin of giving equations without defining the variables or operators. Especially in the last chapter, his explanations are inadequate.
In an atom, photon exchange binds electrons to the nucleus. Quantum Electrodynamics tells how (QED). In a nucleus, pion (quark-antiquark pair) exchange binds protons to neutrons. Within a proton or neutron, gluon exchange binds quarks together. Quantum Chromodynamics tells how (QCD). p. 179.
Ordinary matter is made of half-integer-spin fermions: quarks and leptons, including electrons and neutrinos. p. 205. Force-carrying particles such as photons, pions, gluons, W, Z, and Higgs, are whole-number-spin bosons. Any number of bosons, but only one fermion, can be in one place in one quantum state. p. 156. Photons can't interact with each other, but gluons and Higgs can. pp. 177, 206.
The Standard model explains everything. Except gravity. Wait: this just in: neutrinos have mass. Back to the drawing board. p. 221. Oh, and: 85% of the matter in the universe is undetectable dark matter. We'll have to detect it to find out what's up with that. p. 224. Also, the muon's magnetic moment isn't quite as predicted. p. 232.
Writing in 2005: the Higgs particle had not yet been found; its mass was expected to be around 130 GeV. pp. 201, 221, 235, 239. [It was found in 2012, and its mass measured as]
Commits the unforgivable sin of giving equations without defining the variables or operators. Especially in the last chapter, his explanations are inadequate.
April 26, 2009
This is a very nice overview of the "Standard Model" of physics, namely the current theory encompassing all the known particles of physics -- electrons, protons, neutrons, positrons, muons, neutrinos, gluons, the hypotheticized Higgs bosons, etc -- plus all the known interactions and forces, save only gravitation. Oerter argues (and I am inclined to agree with him) that the Standard Model is, perhaps, "the pinnacle of human intellectual achievement to date."
Unlike many semi-popular works on science, Oerter fearlessly includes a few equations (such as Schrodinger's equation of quantum mechanics), and he take pains to explain in detail what every variable means. Another courageous and commendable step is to introduce Feynman diagrams and to use them frequently to explain particle interactions.
Oerter discusses some of the stranger aspects of modern physics, including both the paradoxes of quantum theory as well as some of the philosophical implications, such as the evident fact, emphasized numerous times, that the laws of physics oddly seem to conspire to preserve free will.
In general, this is a very well done work, and is recommended to any thinking person, particularly of scientific background, who wants to understand better the wonders of modern physics.
Unlike many semi-popular works on science, Oerter fearlessly includes a few equations (such as Schrodinger's equation of quantum mechanics), and he take pains to explain in detail what every variable means. Another courageous and commendable step is to introduce Feynman diagrams and to use them frequently to explain particle interactions.
Oerter discusses some of the stranger aspects of modern physics, including both the paradoxes of quantum theory as well as some of the philosophical implications, such as the evident fact, emphasized numerous times, that the laws of physics oddly seem to conspire to preserve free will.
In general, this is a very well done work, and is recommended to any thinking person, particularly of scientific background, who wants to understand better the wonders of modern physics.
June 7, 2011
Robert Oerter's ambitious book leads the reader conceptually through the modern physics of the Standard Model, from its historical antecedents in Newton and Maxwell to the current state of knowledge. As expected in any brief account of this nature, depending upon the background the reader brings to this book, he or she might find some areas provide enough information, while other areas leave the reader wanting more detail. For me, the sections up through and including quantum electrodynamics (QED) provided a fun and vivid review of somewhat familiar physics, while the chapters on quantum chromodynamics and string theory made me want more information to understand the topic.
Oerter's writing is conceptual in nature. He includes few mathematical equations, and those are only presented for illustrative purposes, with no intention of the reader actually understanding them (although they were somewhat familiar to me). The description of Feynman diagrams was excellent, and Oerter's presentation helped me realize the importance of the dual mathematical approaches to the Standard Model (a particle-based approach and a field-based approach). Unlike some popular accounts of physics, Oerter focuses on the science, not the eccentricities of the scientists. For me, this was a welcome antidote to stories about scientists as brilliant but strange people, because such writings perpetuate the popular myth that the average person cannot hope to understand modern science because those that do are so different from everyone else.
However, the final chapters of the book, as the author discussed string theory and attempts to create unified theories that incorporate gravity, proved to be less compelling reading for me. The physics involved at this level of theory (string theories) is highly abstracted from the reality experienced by humans in daily life, and there is something intellectually unsatisfying about a theory that can be shown to correspond to known results and calculations, yet has not successfully predicted any new results. Oerter admirably explains the shortcomings of the Standard Model, and shows that even with a theory of almost everything, there is plenty of physics left for exploration.
Oerter's writing is conceptual in nature. He includes few mathematical equations, and those are only presented for illustrative purposes, with no intention of the reader actually understanding them (although they were somewhat familiar to me). The description of Feynman diagrams was excellent, and Oerter's presentation helped me realize the importance of the dual mathematical approaches to the Standard Model (a particle-based approach and a field-based approach). Unlike some popular accounts of physics, Oerter focuses on the science, not the eccentricities of the scientists. For me, this was a welcome antidote to stories about scientists as brilliant but strange people, because such writings perpetuate the popular myth that the average person cannot hope to understand modern science because those that do are so different from everyone else.
However, the final chapters of the book, as the author discussed string theory and attempts to create unified theories that incorporate gravity, proved to be less compelling reading for me. The physics involved at this level of theory (string theories) is highly abstracted from the reality experienced by humans in daily life, and there is something intellectually unsatisfying about a theory that can be shown to correspond to known results and calculations, yet has not successfully predicted any new results. Oerter admirably explains the shortcomings of the Standard Model, and shows that even with a theory of almost everything, there is plenty of physics left for exploration.
January 25, 2011
Good for what it is. I read so many of these general audience science texts, I wish there was a third category, somewhere between "I've never heard of relativity" and "Yes, I do have a PhD in physics."
April 17, 2014
There are dozens of books out there about dark holes, string theory, chaos theory and what have you. But it's hard to find a book about the Standard Model, even though it is probably the most comprehensive theory at the universe available right now. This book takes the reader from the beginning of Einstein's thinking about spacetime through the 20th century up to the experiments that were ongoing at the time the book was written (2006). That means, for instance, that the Higgs boson was not yet experimentally confirmed at the time the book was published.
I can't claim to understand this stuff. Indeed, I can't even imagine it. No matter how many explanations I read about how time shrinks or expands as we approach the speed of light, I just can't conceptualize it. But I am not giving up trying to inch closer and closer to an understanding of some of the thinking about these fascinating theories that range from galaxies to subatomic particles. I thought that this book did as good a job as any to explain things that even Richard Feynman described as impossible to understand. I liked the fact that the author came up with his own thought experiments and similes rather than relying on the same old descriptions that keep popping up. The book's pace was a little uneven, in the sense that some things were explained fairly painstakingly, but then suddenly (just like time at close to the speed of light), new terms and concepts came gushing out all over the page.
The book would have been more attractive if it had had more or more diverse illustrations. Most of the illustrations were graphs, schematics or Feynman diagrams.
One of the things I liked in this book was that the equation of the Standard Model was actually shown. No matter that it has about 18 variables and looks clunky - seeing it there with my own eyes, even though I couldn't understand it in a thousand years, gave me a feeling of having been given a peep into a wonderful, strange domain of science.
I can't claim to understand this stuff. Indeed, I can't even imagine it. No matter how many explanations I read about how time shrinks or expands as we approach the speed of light, I just can't conceptualize it. But I am not giving up trying to inch closer and closer to an understanding of some of the thinking about these fascinating theories that range from galaxies to subatomic particles. I thought that this book did as good a job as any to explain things that even Richard Feynman described as impossible to understand. I liked the fact that the author came up with his own thought experiments and similes rather than relying on the same old descriptions that keep popping up. The book's pace was a little uneven, in the sense that some things were explained fairly painstakingly, but then suddenly (just like time at close to the speed of light), new terms and concepts came gushing out all over the page.
The book would have been more attractive if it had had more or more diverse illustrations. Most of the illustrations were graphs, schematics or Feynman diagrams.
One of the things I liked in this book was that the equation of the Standard Model was actually shown. No matter that it has about 18 variables and looks clunky - seeing it there with my own eyes, even though I couldn't understand it in a thousand years, gave me a feeling of having been given a peep into a wonderful, strange domain of science.
August 18, 2020
My understanding of the structure of matter ended at Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. I was eager to learn more about the standard model and where it stands at present. This book was recommended as a good description of it for a non physics audience. Although slightly outdated, it still covers the general standard model quite well and gives an introduction to all of the subatomic particles that are known to form matter as we know it.
The book starts with the early 20th century- how the principles of relativity and the works of Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Dirac among many others paved the way for quantum mechanics. From then on, it maps the developments of the entire 20th century and how they describe matter at present.
The last parts of the book also talk about the shortcomings of the model and give a brief introduction to other so called 'grand unified theories'. They also give a glimpse of what the future of physics may hold.
I really enjoyed it. The author has made quite an effort to simplify the basic principles. He has kept the equations to a minimum and has included plenty of everyday examples to explain complex ideas. It is still not an easy read; my progress was slow but rewarding. I think anyone with an understanding of high school physics should be able to follow through.
The book starts with the early 20th century- how the principles of relativity and the works of Heisenberg, Schrodinger and Dirac among many others paved the way for quantum mechanics. From then on, it maps the developments of the entire 20th century and how they describe matter at present.
The last parts of the book also talk about the shortcomings of the model and give a brief introduction to other so called 'grand unified theories'. They also give a glimpse of what the future of physics may hold.
I really enjoyed it. The author has made quite an effort to simplify the basic principles. He has kept the equations to a minimum and has included plenty of everyday examples to explain complex ideas. It is still not an easy read; my progress was slow but rewarding. I think anyone with an understanding of high school physics should be able to follow through.
May 5, 2013
Score: 3.5/5
Mixed feelings on this book. I picked it up for obvious reasons---who wouldn't want a casual introduction to the standard model?
Author Robert Oerter tries to write this book in an accessible way, but as you might expect, managing the line between accessibility and rigor in a book on particle physics is tricky, and some parts of the book are better than others.
Early on, when building up some early historical context, Oerter shows you Schrödinger's wave equation ("Just to show you what it looks like, here is the Schrödinger equation for the quantum field, denoted by Ψ"), but doesn't bother to explain the terms, the partial derivatives, or any of the equation's meaning. It leaves you feeling like he has just said "look at this big, scary equation, doesn't it look complicated?"
Another example shortly afterwards: Oerter explains that all probabilities in a given probability space must sum to 1 (of course), then informs you about Max Born's discovery that "the probability [of an electron's location] is equal to the square of the quantum field"---but no explanation is present as to where this came from, how Born went about finding it, or what further implications that relationship has.
Oerter tries a little too hard to inject humor into the book ("You can check Grimaldi's results for yourself. Find a straight-edged object such as a ruler, a pen, or a Republican"), but that doesn't generally detract from the actual content.
Despite these issues, I enjoyed Oerter's writing the further I got into the book. It often didn't have the details I was interested in, but the result was exactly what I wanted: a springboard to go learn more. By the end, I felt I had enough of a rudimentary grasp of the known elementary particles to comfortably dig into more rigorous materials.
The book was published in 2006, before the recent LHC experiments and Higgs boson. Oerter spends a good bit of time explaining what was thought about the Higgs boson, what it could mean if it was found, and what approaches might be tried if the Higgs doesn't exist after all. Even without the last seven years of history, the context is sufficient to provide a much better understanding of recent news.
Recommended for the intended audience: people who know nothing about the Standard Model but are interested!
(As a follow-up, I think I might get one of these.)
Mixed feelings on this book. I picked it up for obvious reasons---who wouldn't want a casual introduction to the standard model?
Author Robert Oerter tries to write this book in an accessible way, but as you might expect, managing the line between accessibility and rigor in a book on particle physics is tricky, and some parts of the book are better than others.
Early on, when building up some early historical context, Oerter shows you Schrödinger's wave equation ("Just to show you what it looks like, here is the Schrödinger equation for the quantum field, denoted by Ψ"), but doesn't bother to explain the terms, the partial derivatives, or any of the equation's meaning. It leaves you feeling like he has just said "look at this big, scary equation, doesn't it look complicated?"
Another example shortly afterwards: Oerter explains that all probabilities in a given probability space must sum to 1 (of course), then informs you about Max Born's discovery that "the probability [of an electron's location] is equal to the square of the quantum field"---but no explanation is present as to where this came from, how Born went about finding it, or what further implications that relationship has.
Oerter tries a little too hard to inject humor into the book ("You can check Grimaldi's results for yourself. Find a straight-edged object such as a ruler, a pen, or a Republican"), but that doesn't generally detract from the actual content.
Despite these issues, I enjoyed Oerter's writing the further I got into the book. It often didn't have the details I was interested in, but the result was exactly what I wanted: a springboard to go learn more. By the end, I felt I had enough of a rudimentary grasp of the known elementary particles to comfortably dig into more rigorous materials.
The book was published in 2006, before the recent LHC experiments and Higgs boson. Oerter spends a good bit of time explaining what was thought about the Higgs boson, what it could mean if it was found, and what approaches might be tried if the Higgs doesn't exist after all. Even without the last seven years of history, the context is sufficient to provide a much better understanding of recent news.
Recommended for the intended audience: people who know nothing about the Standard Model but are interested!
(As a follow-up, I think I might get one of these.)
May 13, 2016
Once again, another book that was an amazing read right up to the part about string theory. Though this particular book was twenty years old, which was right around the time of the rebirth of interest in string theory, so I guess I can't really get too upset.
All of that having been said, it was an excellent primer to the intricacies of the Standard Model, which is so often skimmed over in popular science and physics books. Definitely give it a read; just keep in mind that we 1) have official discovered the Higgs, and 2) think string theory is bunk. Okay, I think string theory is bunk. Take that for what it's worth.
All of that having been said, it was an excellent primer to the intricacies of the Standard Model, which is so often skimmed over in popular science and physics books. Definitely give it a read; just keep in mind that we 1) have official discovered the Higgs, and 2) think string theory is bunk. Okay, I think string theory is bunk. Take that for what it's worth.
December 27, 2019
Overall, this book serves as a relatively good starting point for understanding the standard model of particle physics. The explanations are generally straightforward, and the author is a great guide into the world of the infinitesimally small. I especially liked his analogy describing special relativity; after reading it, I felt like I finally understood Einstein's theory for the first time. That's not to say this book doesn't have it's flaws. The author sometimes painstakingly points out very obvious things (like how a particular word is pronounced or the ways in which a sphere can be rotated) while simultaneously glossing over extremely difficult concepts at a brisk pace.
Twice in the book, the author makes a quip about a particular group of people. In the second instance, when explaining the fusion reactions taking place in our sun, he cautions the reader not to tell environmentalists about this, presumably because they might have concerns about nuclear power plants (nuclear fission) or might be against the development of nuclear fusion reactors here on Earth. Either way, these statements detract from the content of the book and might needlessly alienate readers.
Having finished the book, I have more questions than answers, which would be true of having completed any introduction into a complex scientific field. This is a great starting point for other, more complex treatments on the subject; I can't wait to read more!
Twice in the book, the author makes a quip about a particular group of people. In the second instance, when explaining the fusion reactions taking place in our sun, he cautions the reader not to tell environmentalists about this, presumably because they might have concerns about nuclear power plants (nuclear fission) or might be against the development of nuclear fusion reactors here on Earth. Either way, these statements detract from the content of the book and might needlessly alienate readers.
Having finished the book, I have more questions than answers, which would be true of having completed any introduction into a complex scientific field. This is a great starting point for other, more complex treatments on the subject; I can't wait to read more!
September 26, 2016
Recommended for: people who love abstract things and would like to get up to speed on the latest (well, almost) physics.
Reading this book raises interesting philosophical questions in my mind: is the layman of the future doomed to encounter increasingly dry, mathematical theories about the nature of reality, with the march of science? It certainly seems so. Is reality, at bottom, just math? I sure hope not.
Turns out modern particle physics is just not at all captivating, unlike 20th century physics. No wonder the popular media steers clear of it, except when a massive discovery occurs like the Higgs boson (see what I did there? Not a fan of puns? Nevermind). It feels way too abstract (not to mention unwieldy), with no metaphorical ledge for intuition to hang on to. The only things I'm likely to remember after a few months is random catchy phrases like "spontaneous symmetry breaking", "Mexican Hat potential" and "SU(3) symmetry". Yeah, not fun stuff.
But this is not a knock on the author, he writes well enough - especially since the material is not easy to deal with.
Reading this book raises interesting philosophical questions in my mind: is the layman of the future doomed to encounter increasingly dry, mathematical theories about the nature of reality, with the march of science? It certainly seems so. Is reality, at bottom, just math? I sure hope not.
Turns out modern particle physics is just not at all captivating, unlike 20th century physics. No wonder the popular media steers clear of it, except when a massive discovery occurs like the Higgs boson (see what I did there? Not a fan of puns? Nevermind). It feels way too abstract (not to mention unwieldy), with no metaphorical ledge for intuition to hang on to. The only things I'm likely to remember after a few months is random catchy phrases like "spontaneous symmetry breaking", "Mexican Hat potential" and "SU(3) symmetry". Yeah, not fun stuff.
But this is not a knock on the author, he writes well enough - especially since the material is not easy to deal with.
March 14, 2014
Well.. This is a very well written book. I decided begin to read this work of Oerter because I was very much interested in a very unkown (to me) part of the physics. It was a mixed surprise. Mr Oerter is a very lucid man, he write in a very straightforward and clear way. It is assertive and imaginative explaining the not so intuitive results. Writting style aside I must confess that the content was not so pleasant at all. The modern theories are very difficult to prove by recurring to evidence as a consequence of the nature of the study itself. Personally, a very interesting point, was to acknowledge the importance of some mathematical abstractions for the purpose of this kind of studies. Things such as mathematical groups, symmetries and so on were put in a very different context than I was used to, was refreshing.
February 16, 2018
I'm a little biased since this is one of the books that really propelled my interest in physics back in university, but I love this book and rereading it a decade later was still an absolute pleasure. So much clarity in such a little book.
September 6, 2009
Great book, it really is brilliant. He shows that the standard model is actually a brilliant accomplishment of dial turning. However, it is still flawed, as he even admits himself.
July 21, 2019
Pretty good book, my only real complaint being that the first half covers the same material as Gribbin’s “In Search of Schrödinger’s Cat”, which I felt did a better job.
January 3, 2017
An Unloved Model of the Universe
Would you name your newborn baby “The Standard Child”? Even the founders of “The Standard Model” not seem to especially love this very successful theory of the fundamental forces of nature. In their words, it was “repulsive” and that “It was such an extraordinarily ad hoc and ugly theory that it was clearly nonsense.” Robert Oerter walks us through the theory to show us its beauty and accomplishments, along with its problems. He does this mainly with words and diagrams rather than symbolic mathematics, so the reader in principle does not even need algebra. However, he cannot resist throwing in the Schrödinger equation (twice) and the Standard Model equation just so we can join him in admiring their beauty.
Here is one problem with this beautiful theory: it is largely based on a technique called “renormalization”. I will let the author describe it:
“Renormalization amounts to subtracting infinity from infinity and getting a finite number. According to the mathematicians, ‘infinity minus infinity’ is meaningless. Physicists are not a picky as mathematicians. They went on doing it as long as it worked, and ignored the contemptuous glares of their mathematical colleagues.”
It is hard to love something based on breaking the rules of its very foundation, which is mathematics. As for being a theory of almost everything, well, there are a few things missing, starting with gravity, one of the four fundamental forces. It also cannot describe “dark” matter and “dark” energy, with make up about ninety five percent of the contents of the universe. So how about calling it a theory of a lot of important things that works really well, at least for those things.
Emergence and Free Will
I am not a physicist. I understand physics mathematically at a first year undergrad level, and conceptually from reading books like this one on more advanced topics addressed to the educated public. It surprises me that some basic concepts that other authors take as central to understanding physics, or science in general, are ignored here. For example, he struggles to explain the problem with reductionism:
“So, in a sense, the Standard Model ‘explains’ everyday phenomena from the structure of the chair you sit on to your very thoughts. It is not possible, though, to write an equation that describes your chair using the equations of the Standard Model (much less an equation for your thoughts). The Standard Model equations can only be solved in very simple cases, say one electron interacting with one proton.”
When a system, such as a chair or your thoughts, becomes sufficiently complex, new rules are needed to understand them that cannot be derived from the simpler level. These new rules are known as Emergent Properties. I see many scientific articles that casually refer to emergence, which suggests they expect their readership to be familiar with the concept and not think it as very controversial. This is just one example where he seems out of touch with recent thinking.
I think he reads too much into the fact that quantum mechanics is a probabilistic rather than deterministic theory.
“Philosophically, the most astonishing thing about quantum mechanics is the extent to which it protects us from the existential despair of the clockwork universe. It is almost as though the rules of the universe were designed to protect our free will.”
Apparently, not knowing the future means that we have free will. While a clockwork universe may in principle be pre-determined, the vast complexity of it all, and the multiple layers of emergent properties, makes it impossible for us to know what is actually going to happen. So there is no need for existential despair, our free will is already safe. I don’t see how throwing in random quantum events, even if they take place inside our brain, makes any difference. If someone were to randomly mess with your life, does that make you a freer individual? I would argue instead that some predictability means you are more capable of making meaningful choices, which is what I consider to be the essence of free will.
A Relativity Imagination Game
I loved the way he gets us to visualize the meaning of Special Relativity by imagining a world where the speed of light is only thirty miles per hour (this is written for an American audience, but here I will use his units). We learn that when we travel near that speed, say on an airplane, the “travel” time (how long you spend on the plane) is much shorter than the “ground” time (the time you arrive at your destination). Thus the one hour (of your travel time) flight that leaves Washington on Sunday will arrive in Los Angeles the following Thursday in ground time. He did not really explain that the reason you can get to Los Angeles in one hour (of your time) travelling at only thirty miles per hour is because the space in front of the traveller contracts when travelling close to the speed of light.
It is fun to take this imaginary world a little further. For example, there is a problem with this Thursday thing, given that the real Earth rotates at about one thousand miles per hour at the equator. Slowing it down enough to avoid violating relativity would make Sunday (and every other day) over one month long. Thursday is four months away, unless by “month” you mean the time for the moon to orbit the Earth, which, slowed down to make it possible in this universe, would require more than six years. And it will take more than 22,000 of our years for the Earth to orbit the sun to keep the speed under that of light. That makes for rather long winters.
I could point out that an airplane is not going to get off the ground at only thirty miles per hour. But there is a bigger problem - light won’t get off the ground either. Light is attracted by the gravity of the Earth the same way a falling stone is. The difference is that light travels so fast that we do not notice the gravitational effect. Throw a stone in the air, and it falls back to the ground. In this imaginary world, light will also fall back down. This means we essentially live inside a black hole. Worse, the sun is also a black hole, so no light or heat can escape from it. That makes things a bit cold and dark here on Earth. There are good reasons the speed of light is so fast in the real world. It makes the universe work.
This story suggests that that the speed of light is some arbitrary speed limit. He does not explain it from a space-time perspective, in which the speed of light is the only possible speed. You may think you are sitting still while reading this, but you are zooming through the time dimension at the speed of light. If you want to move through space, you have to slow down moving through time. The tricky part is keeping track of whose time is relative to what. You always experience your time as going the usual speed, while it is everybody else’s time that seems to be running slower.
“Here we have an apparent paradox: If each reference frame sees the other as slowed down, whose clock will be ahead when the passengers get off the plane?”
Ah, yes, it seem that every book has its own way to explain away this problem, which is that Special Relativity is only valid for uniform motion. The plane must accelerate to begin the journey, and decelerate to end it, which is not uniform motion. Yet using Special Relativity’s Lorentz transform gives us the correct answer, as long as we arbitrarily choose who is doing the travelling. Here the author points out that we need to use General Relativity, which can handle acceleration, but leaves it at that. I would like a better explanation, but of course General Relativity is the other theory, not what this book is about.
Here is a stray thought: Quantum Electrodynamics is the combination of quantum mechanics with Special Relativity. So does it only work when quantum particles are in uniform motion? Is this a problem when we do our research on them in devices called particle accelerators?
The Meaning of Light – Particles, Waves and Fields
A recurring theme throughout the book is to ask what is real? Physics has seen a long argument between those who visualize light as a stream of particles or as a series of waves. Are the waves and particles real? Isaac Newton’s clockwork universe was a particle model, where each object exerts a direct force on the next one. This makes intuitive sense, so it seems real enough. Perhaps this led him to believe that light was also a stream of particles, although other scientists at the time recognized its wave nature. However, gravity is a mysterious force that seems to involve action at a distance. It is obviously real, but where do the forces come from?
Action at a distance can be understood using the concept of a field. Gravity can be seen as a field coming from the Earth (or any other body), which acts upon any object within that field. But have we not just hidden the magic of action-at-a-distance behind an equally magical field?
In the nineteenth century physicists used the field concept to describe the nature of both electricity and magnetism. This turned out to be more than just a mathematical trick. An electromagnetic wave arises by changes in an electric field causing corresponding changes in a magnetic field, which in turn modifies the electric field again. Here we see the essential link between waves and fields. These waves are real; they carry energy and information across great distances. A local force model simply cannot explain this behaviour, suggesting that the fields physicists imagined are indeed real.
My Attempt to Visualize a Quantum Field
Imagine the springs in a bed mattress, which form a two dimensional grid. If we connect the neighbouring springs to each other, they now resemble a field. Press down on one spring, and watch the energy spread to the connected springs. This is how waves propagate through space. Now think of a three-dimensional cube filled with these imaginary springs. We have to visualize a wave moving through this field in three dimensions.
A quantum field may be pictured as a continuous collection of tiny springs (or harmonic oscillators) spread throughout every point in the entire universe. Energy is defined by the amount of oscillation of these “springs”. In a quantum field, the energy in each spring cannot be just any amount; it must be in multiples of a small fundamental size. More interesting is the fact that an energy value of zero is not permitted. The springs must always be in motion. In other words, energy is everywhere in space, and there is no such thing as nothing.
The quantum springs have another interesting property – they can be oscillating in a lot of different ways at once. Each one can be moving both quickly and slowly at the same time. We can now replace our strange springs with “qubits”, the fundamental data unit of a quantum computer that can hold multiple values at the same time. I am now departing from the book to turn the universal spring mattress into something resembling a universal computer.
The thing we call a “particle” is really a wave that passes through the field. They are a part of the field in the same way as waves in the ocean are part of the water. They are not something separate that sits in the field or on the water. They are the consequence of the accumulation of energy in the field. This is the meaning of mass being equivalent to energy. We can say that particles are an emergent property of the underlying field. While ocean waves can have any height, the quantum waves seem to emerge into only a small number of particle types, depending on how much energy is available. It is as if particles represent some kind of quantum unit. A smaller amount of energy will create an electron, while it takes the power of the Large Hadron Collider to produce a Higgs Boson.
Caught up in Entanglement
What is it that connects the springs? Let us look at the author’s strange and confusing description of the phenomenon known as entanglement:
“Because of the strange, non-local nature of the quantum field, any two electrons that interact carry a strange sort of correlation, an instantaneous connection that can be ascribed neither to a property that the electron has of itself nor to a communication (in the usual sense) between the electrons. But before these two electrons interacted, they interacted with other electrons, and before that with other electrons. It seems unavoidable that all the electrons in the universe are caught in this web of interactions, so that any given electron has a kind of mystical instantaneous connection with every other object in the universe.”
He never actually mentions the word “entanglement” or any of the standard terminology associated with it. His writing on this topic seems so out of date. I do not claim to fully understand it, but then I am not a physics professor writing a book on the subject. I am merely writing this humble review of his book.
Entanglement seems to be a central mechanism in particle physics. I get the impression that any interaction between particles begins with entanglement and ends with its opposite, called decoherence. Decoherence means breaking entanglement. Only two particles can be fully entangled, while partial entanglement between multiple particles is possible, but is weaker. Entanglement of freely moving particles does not last long. It seems clear that the mystical web of interactions he is so worried about cannot occur.
A Simulated Universe?
I will again depart from the content of the book. Entanglement may be what connects the “springs” to each other. Some theorists even suggest that space, time and gravity are all emergent properties of the entanglement between the qubits of the underlying quantum fields. We can now let go of the idea that the universe is really a three-dimensional grid. The qubits may be arranged in a higher-dimensional structure, which would allow far more connections between them.
Now we can take a second look at the action-at-a-distance aspect of the entanglement between two particles. A single particle is a three dimensional wave. Mathematically the Schrödinger equation describes a pair of particles as a single wave in six dimensions. What if this is more than a mathematical oddity, and actually is evidence of some kind of multi-dimensional field structure? The apparent distance between two entangled particles is due to our perception of the familiar three dimensions that emerges from the deeper underlying field.
The result resembles a universal computer simulating the universe that we experience. The speed of light may be the “clock speed”, or the time it takes to move energy and information between each entangled connection. I am suggesting this only as a model, which is no different than using other every day objects like particles, springs and waves to describe the universe. I think it is a fallacy of anthropomorphic thinking to suggest that we are really a simulation running on some alien’s computer.
[I would appreciate it if someone who know what they are talking about wants to shoot down any misconceptions here.]
Pieces of the Particle Puzzle
Although our author provides us with a good introduction to quantum fields, he prefers to follow Richard Feynman in using a particle metaphor to explain the standard model. Forces between particles are carried by other particles, leaving me with the visual impression of a pinball machine. But the force particles are not as simple as they first appear. For example, a photon may temporarily become an electron-positron pair and then turn back into a photon. Our author asks if these “virtual particles” are real:
“They live on borrowed momentum, borrowed energy and borrowed time. They don’t even travel at the speed of light! If you put a detector in the space between the electrons, you will never detect a photon. Because you can never detect them, they aren’t considered real. If you like, you can consider them to be purely artifacts of the way we calculate, without any actual existence. But they are such useful artifacts that physicists often talk about them as if they had an existence of their own.”
If you ignore the virtual particles in your calculations you will get the wrong answer. Using them, the author tells us, “The accuracy of the prediction of the magnetic moment of an electron is equivalent to the accuracy you would need to shoot a gun and hit a Coke can – if the can were on the moon!” Real or not, these things sure work.
[Leaving the book yet again, the interpretation that tells us that particles arise from the energy of the waves in a field also suggests that the virtual particles are essentially the energy of the turbulence caused by colliding waves.]
Although the Feynman diagrams suggest there is a simple path between particles, the calculations based on these diagrams must assume that the particles take every possible path, and turn into virtual particles along the way. If this resembles a description of a wave, Freeman Dyson thought so too, and mathematically proved the Feynman approach was equivalent to the field theory method. The “particles” are real only in the sense that they are a useful metaphor for what is happening in the underlying field.
A Well-Structured Introduction to the Standard Model
I think this book provides a well-structured introduction to the Standard Model, taking an historical approach to how the theories were developed. In particular, I found his description of how quarks are bound to each other by particle exchange to be fascinating. Electron “spin” is real in the sense that even though they are waves they actually have angular momentum. But the “colors” of the quarks have nothing to do with the wavelength of photons. They are a metaphor for the underlying symmetry of their wave interactions. Reality is elusive.
I am led to imagine a board game called Big Bang where the players create quark/anti-quark pairs out of pure energy to assemble working atoms held together by gluons and pions, being careful to keep the color symmetries balanced. OK, that is probably crazy. But my understanding of how the Standard Model works has been greatly improved by reading and thinking about this book. I highly recommend it for those who want to understand the nature of matter, including those without a strong mathematical background.
Would you name your newborn baby “The Standard Child”? Even the founders of “The Standard Model” not seem to especially love this very successful theory of the fundamental forces of nature. In their words, it was “repulsive” and that “It was such an extraordinarily ad hoc and ugly theory that it was clearly nonsense.” Robert Oerter walks us through the theory to show us its beauty and accomplishments, along with its problems. He does this mainly with words and diagrams rather than symbolic mathematics, so the reader in principle does not even need algebra. However, he cannot resist throwing in the Schrödinger equation (twice) and the Standard Model equation just so we can join him in admiring their beauty.
Here is one problem with this beautiful theory: it is largely based on a technique called “renormalization”. I will let the author describe it:
“Renormalization amounts to subtracting infinity from infinity and getting a finite number. According to the mathematicians, ‘infinity minus infinity’ is meaningless. Physicists are not a picky as mathematicians. They went on doing it as long as it worked, and ignored the contemptuous glares of their mathematical colleagues.”
It is hard to love something based on breaking the rules of its very foundation, which is mathematics. As for being a theory of almost everything, well, there are a few things missing, starting with gravity, one of the four fundamental forces. It also cannot describe “dark” matter and “dark” energy, with make up about ninety five percent of the contents of the universe. So how about calling it a theory of a lot of important things that works really well, at least for those things.
Emergence and Free Will
I am not a physicist. I understand physics mathematically at a first year undergrad level, and conceptually from reading books like this one on more advanced topics addressed to the educated public. It surprises me that some basic concepts that other authors take as central to understanding physics, or science in general, are ignored here. For example, he struggles to explain the problem with reductionism:
“So, in a sense, the Standard Model ‘explains’ everyday phenomena from the structure of the chair you sit on to your very thoughts. It is not possible, though, to write an equation that describes your chair using the equations of the Standard Model (much less an equation for your thoughts). The Standard Model equations can only be solved in very simple cases, say one electron interacting with one proton.”
When a system, such as a chair or your thoughts, becomes sufficiently complex, new rules are needed to understand them that cannot be derived from the simpler level. These new rules are known as Emergent Properties. I see many scientific articles that casually refer to emergence, which suggests they expect their readership to be familiar with the concept and not think it as very controversial. This is just one example where he seems out of touch with recent thinking.
I think he reads too much into the fact that quantum mechanics is a probabilistic rather than deterministic theory.
“Philosophically, the most astonishing thing about quantum mechanics is the extent to which it protects us from the existential despair of the clockwork universe. It is almost as though the rules of the universe were designed to protect our free will.”
Apparently, not knowing the future means that we have free will. While a clockwork universe may in principle be pre-determined, the vast complexity of it all, and the multiple layers of emergent properties, makes it impossible for us to know what is actually going to happen. So there is no need for existential despair, our free will is already safe. I don’t see how throwing in random quantum events, even if they take place inside our brain, makes any difference. If someone were to randomly mess with your life, does that make you a freer individual? I would argue instead that some predictability means you are more capable of making meaningful choices, which is what I consider to be the essence of free will.
A Relativity Imagination Game
I loved the way he gets us to visualize the meaning of Special Relativity by imagining a world where the speed of light is only thirty miles per hour (this is written for an American audience, but here I will use his units). We learn that when we travel near that speed, say on an airplane, the “travel” time (how long you spend on the plane) is much shorter than the “ground” time (the time you arrive at your destination). Thus the one hour (of your travel time) flight that leaves Washington on Sunday will arrive in Los Angeles the following Thursday in ground time. He did not really explain that the reason you can get to Los Angeles in one hour (of your time) travelling at only thirty miles per hour is because the space in front of the traveller contracts when travelling close to the speed of light.
It is fun to take this imaginary world a little further. For example, there is a problem with this Thursday thing, given that the real Earth rotates at about one thousand miles per hour at the equator. Slowing it down enough to avoid violating relativity would make Sunday (and every other day) over one month long. Thursday is four months away, unless by “month” you mean the time for the moon to orbit the Earth, which, slowed down to make it possible in this universe, would require more than six years. And it will take more than 22,000 of our years for the Earth to orbit the sun to keep the speed under that of light. That makes for rather long winters.
I could point out that an airplane is not going to get off the ground at only thirty miles per hour. But there is a bigger problem - light won’t get off the ground either. Light is attracted by the gravity of the Earth the same way a falling stone is. The difference is that light travels so fast that we do not notice the gravitational effect. Throw a stone in the air, and it falls back to the ground. In this imaginary world, light will also fall back down. This means we essentially live inside a black hole. Worse, the sun is also a black hole, so no light or heat can escape from it. That makes things a bit cold and dark here on Earth. There are good reasons the speed of light is so fast in the real world. It makes the universe work.
This story suggests that that the speed of light is some arbitrary speed limit. He does not explain it from a space-time perspective, in which the speed of light is the only possible speed. You may think you are sitting still while reading this, but you are zooming through the time dimension at the speed of light. If you want to move through space, you have to slow down moving through time. The tricky part is keeping track of whose time is relative to what. You always experience your time as going the usual speed, while it is everybody else’s time that seems to be running slower.
“Here we have an apparent paradox: If each reference frame sees the other as slowed down, whose clock will be ahead when the passengers get off the plane?”
Ah, yes, it seem that every book has its own way to explain away this problem, which is that Special Relativity is only valid for uniform motion. The plane must accelerate to begin the journey, and decelerate to end it, which is not uniform motion. Yet using Special Relativity’s Lorentz transform gives us the correct answer, as long as we arbitrarily choose who is doing the travelling. Here the author points out that we need to use General Relativity, which can handle acceleration, but leaves it at that. I would like a better explanation, but of course General Relativity is the other theory, not what this book is about.
Here is a stray thought: Quantum Electrodynamics is the combination of quantum mechanics with Special Relativity. So does it only work when quantum particles are in uniform motion? Is this a problem when we do our research on them in devices called particle accelerators?
The Meaning of Light – Particles, Waves and Fields
A recurring theme throughout the book is to ask what is real? Physics has seen a long argument between those who visualize light as a stream of particles or as a series of waves. Are the waves and particles real? Isaac Newton’s clockwork universe was a particle model, where each object exerts a direct force on the next one. This makes intuitive sense, so it seems real enough. Perhaps this led him to believe that light was also a stream of particles, although other scientists at the time recognized its wave nature. However, gravity is a mysterious force that seems to involve action at a distance. It is obviously real, but where do the forces come from?
Action at a distance can be understood using the concept of a field. Gravity can be seen as a field coming from the Earth (or any other body), which acts upon any object within that field. But have we not just hidden the magic of action-at-a-distance behind an equally magical field?
In the nineteenth century physicists used the field concept to describe the nature of both electricity and magnetism. This turned out to be more than just a mathematical trick. An electromagnetic wave arises by changes in an electric field causing corresponding changes in a magnetic field, which in turn modifies the electric field again. Here we see the essential link between waves and fields. These waves are real; they carry energy and information across great distances. A local force model simply cannot explain this behaviour, suggesting that the fields physicists imagined are indeed real.
My Attempt to Visualize a Quantum Field
Imagine the springs in a bed mattress, which form a two dimensional grid. If we connect the neighbouring springs to each other, they now resemble a field. Press down on one spring, and watch the energy spread to the connected springs. This is how waves propagate through space. Now think of a three-dimensional cube filled with these imaginary springs. We have to visualize a wave moving through this field in three dimensions.
A quantum field may be pictured as a continuous collection of tiny springs (or harmonic oscillators) spread throughout every point in the entire universe. Energy is defined by the amount of oscillation of these “springs”. In a quantum field, the energy in each spring cannot be just any amount; it must be in multiples of a small fundamental size. More interesting is the fact that an energy value of zero is not permitted. The springs must always be in motion. In other words, energy is everywhere in space, and there is no such thing as nothing.
The quantum springs have another interesting property – they can be oscillating in a lot of different ways at once. Each one can be moving both quickly and slowly at the same time. We can now replace our strange springs with “qubits”, the fundamental data unit of a quantum computer that can hold multiple values at the same time. I am now departing from the book to turn the universal spring mattress into something resembling a universal computer.
The thing we call a “particle” is really a wave that passes through the field. They are a part of the field in the same way as waves in the ocean are part of the water. They are not something separate that sits in the field or on the water. They are the consequence of the accumulation of energy in the field. This is the meaning of mass being equivalent to energy. We can say that particles are an emergent property of the underlying field. While ocean waves can have any height, the quantum waves seem to emerge into only a small number of particle types, depending on how much energy is available. It is as if particles represent some kind of quantum unit. A smaller amount of energy will create an electron, while it takes the power of the Large Hadron Collider to produce a Higgs Boson.
Caught up in Entanglement
What is it that connects the springs? Let us look at the author’s strange and confusing description of the phenomenon known as entanglement:
“Because of the strange, non-local nature of the quantum field, any two electrons that interact carry a strange sort of correlation, an instantaneous connection that can be ascribed neither to a property that the electron has of itself nor to a communication (in the usual sense) between the electrons. But before these two electrons interacted, they interacted with other electrons, and before that with other electrons. It seems unavoidable that all the electrons in the universe are caught in this web of interactions, so that any given electron has a kind of mystical instantaneous connection with every other object in the universe.”
He never actually mentions the word “entanglement” or any of the standard terminology associated with it. His writing on this topic seems so out of date. I do not claim to fully understand it, but then I am not a physics professor writing a book on the subject. I am merely writing this humble review of his book.
Entanglement seems to be a central mechanism in particle physics. I get the impression that any interaction between particles begins with entanglement and ends with its opposite, called decoherence. Decoherence means breaking entanglement. Only two particles can be fully entangled, while partial entanglement between multiple particles is possible, but is weaker. Entanglement of freely moving particles does not last long. It seems clear that the mystical web of interactions he is so worried about cannot occur.
A Simulated Universe?
I will again depart from the content of the book. Entanglement may be what connects the “springs” to each other. Some theorists even suggest that space, time and gravity are all emergent properties of the entanglement between the qubits of the underlying quantum fields. We can now let go of the idea that the universe is really a three-dimensional grid. The qubits may be arranged in a higher-dimensional structure, which would allow far more connections between them.
Now we can take a second look at the action-at-a-distance aspect of the entanglement between two particles. A single particle is a three dimensional wave. Mathematically the Schrödinger equation describes a pair of particles as a single wave in six dimensions. What if this is more than a mathematical oddity, and actually is evidence of some kind of multi-dimensional field structure? The apparent distance between two entangled particles is due to our perception of the familiar three dimensions that emerges from the deeper underlying field.
The result resembles a universal computer simulating the universe that we experience. The speed of light may be the “clock speed”, or the time it takes to move energy and information between each entangled connection. I am suggesting this only as a model, which is no different than using other every day objects like particles, springs and waves to describe the universe. I think it is a fallacy of anthropomorphic thinking to suggest that we are really a simulation running on some alien’s computer.
[I would appreciate it if someone who know what they are talking about wants to shoot down any misconceptions here.]
Pieces of the Particle Puzzle
Although our author provides us with a good introduction to quantum fields, he prefers to follow Richard Feynman in using a particle metaphor to explain the standard model. Forces between particles are carried by other particles, leaving me with the visual impression of a pinball machine. But the force particles are not as simple as they first appear. For example, a photon may temporarily become an electron-positron pair and then turn back into a photon. Our author asks if these “virtual particles” are real:
“They live on borrowed momentum, borrowed energy and borrowed time. They don’t even travel at the speed of light! If you put a detector in the space between the electrons, you will never detect a photon. Because you can never detect them, they aren’t considered real. If you like, you can consider them to be purely artifacts of the way we calculate, without any actual existence. But they are such useful artifacts that physicists often talk about them as if they had an existence of their own.”
If you ignore the virtual particles in your calculations you will get the wrong answer. Using them, the author tells us, “The accuracy of the prediction of the magnetic moment of an electron is equivalent to the accuracy you would need to shoot a gun and hit a Coke can – if the can were on the moon!” Real or not, these things sure work.
[Leaving the book yet again, the interpretation that tells us that particles arise from the energy of the waves in a field also suggests that the virtual particles are essentially the energy of the turbulence caused by colliding waves.]
Although the Feynman diagrams suggest there is a simple path between particles, the calculations based on these diagrams must assume that the particles take every possible path, and turn into virtual particles along the way. If this resembles a description of a wave, Freeman Dyson thought so too, and mathematically proved the Feynman approach was equivalent to the field theory method. The “particles” are real only in the sense that they are a useful metaphor for what is happening in the underlying field.
A Well-Structured Introduction to the Standard Model
I think this book provides a well-structured introduction to the Standard Model, taking an historical approach to how the theories were developed. In particular, I found his description of how quarks are bound to each other by particle exchange to be fascinating. Electron “spin” is real in the sense that even though they are waves they actually have angular momentum. But the “colors” of the quarks have nothing to do with the wavelength of photons. They are a metaphor for the underlying symmetry of their wave interactions. Reality is elusive.
I am led to imagine a board game called Big Bang where the players create quark/anti-quark pairs out of pure energy to assemble working atoms held together by gluons and pions, being careful to keep the color symmetries balanced. OK, that is probably crazy. But my understanding of how the Standard Model works has been greatly improved by reading and thinking about this book. I highly recommend it for those who want to understand the nature of matter, including those without a strong mathematical background.
December 2, 2020
This book November's OLLI Book Club selection here in Durham NC. I read the book. I couldn't understand 95% of what it was talking about....charm quarks, top quarks, strange quarks, muons, neutrinos, W bosons, gluons (are these like pasties?), leptons, muons, hadrons, baryons, hyperons, tau neutrinos, and then of course the "intermediate vector bosons." And then I read the reviews here on Goodreads. "How often can you find a lucid and compelling explanation...", "This book is a lucid basic look at modern physics," "Very clear and easy to understand description of history and beauty of the Standard Model" etc. All 4's and 5's. Who are these people? Are they all PhD's in physics?
Feynman himself said "If you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don't understand quantum mechanics."
Well it was mostly incomprehensible to me and I'm a smart, well educated guy.
So if you want to read about all these different little wave/particles that make up the world as we can't know it this is the book for you. It is short and doesn't have a lot of math, (it has no math that is comprehensible to me), and you do get to hear about the people and experiments that put together the "Standard Model." To say it is accessible to the lay reader is not true.
I have to say there was some amazement in reading it. I realized is that I have not a clue as to how our (quantum) world works.
PS: I have a daughter-in-law who has a PhD in quantum physics (really) and she could not explain the ideas in ways that I could say "Oh, I see, I got that." She said that it is not comprehensible except if you understand the math.
Feynman himself said "If you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don't understand quantum mechanics."
Well it was mostly incomprehensible to me and I'm a smart, well educated guy.
So if you want to read about all these different little wave/particles that make up the world as we can't know it this is the book for you. It is short and doesn't have a lot of math, (it has no math that is comprehensible to me), and you do get to hear about the people and experiments that put together the "Standard Model." To say it is accessible to the lay reader is not true.
I have to say there was some amazement in reading it. I realized is that I have not a clue as to how our (quantum) world works.
PS: I have a daughter-in-law who has a PhD in quantum physics (really) and she could not explain the ideas in ways that I could say "Oh, I see, I got that." She said that it is not comprehensible except if you understand the math.
April 18, 2022
This is an amazing book, an excellent introduction to modern particle physics. It is suited mainly for inquisitive people with some prior knowledge of physics (so that the concepts describe will not sound completely alien to them), but it is not a textbook for physicists and does not include all the details, equations, etc., that a real practicing physicist will need. Which is a good thing if you don't intend to actually become a practicing physics - and just want to *understand* physics and how the universe works.
While I already knew by name many of the concepts introduced in this book, such as quantum mechanics, QED, the strong and weak nuclear forces, many of the inhabitants of the zoo of elementary particles, and so on, my understanding on how all of these things actually fit together into one coherent model was very sketchy. Some things like "gauge theory" I only heard of by name, but I had no clue why most of these things "have" to exist, or how do we know they exist, and how these things are related to the other things I knew about. Oerter's book suddenly made of all that very clear to me. I came out of reading this book with a firm, even if not 100% complete, understanding of what the "standard model of particle physics" is all about.
This was one of the best popular-physics books I have read in a long time, and led me to buy a string of popular-physics book hoping to recreate the joy and even enlightenment of reading this book. Many of those other books failed to deliver on this hope, but some did (and I tried to review some of them).
While I already knew by name many of the concepts introduced in this book, such as quantum mechanics, QED, the strong and weak nuclear forces, many of the inhabitants of the zoo of elementary particles, and so on, my understanding on how all of these things actually fit together into one coherent model was very sketchy. Some things like "gauge theory" I only heard of by name, but I had no clue why most of these things "have" to exist, or how do we know they exist, and how these things are related to the other things I knew about. Oerter's book suddenly made of all that very clear to me. I came out of reading this book with a firm, even if not 100% complete, understanding of what the "standard model of particle physics" is all about.
This was one of the best popular-physics books I have read in a long time, and led me to buy a string of popular-physics book hoping to recreate the joy and even enlightenment of reading this book. Many of those other books failed to deliver on this hope, but some did (and I tried to review some of them).
June 23, 2017
This was a surprisingly clear overview of the state of play regarding the Standard Model at the time the book was written (in the meantime, the Higgs boson was found and I think (super)string theory lost a bit of its wind). There are other popular science books that cover individual aspects of the model better and in greater detail, but Oerter has managed to pack the basics of the whole thing into a single volume. In fact, I’d argue that this is not so much a popular science book in itself – certain parts of the model are skimmed over, others are explained in a very handwavy way and need to be read and re-read carefully to grasp the vaguest idea of the underlying concept – as it is a reference volume for further exploration. The author provides a bird’s eye view of the subject and a checklist of things you need to explore and understand to fully comprehend what is currently the best idea humanity has about how its Universe works – the Lagrangian approach to physics, the action principle, Lie groups, Noether’s theorem… However, this is not an objection to the book (the only true objection is about the occasional forced attempts at comedy). This is, in fact a very useful, comprehensive and readable interested layperson’s primer on one of the cornerstones of contemporary physics.
January 20, 2024
The book presents The Standard Model, which is the most up-to-date idea of a unifying theory in physics. Each chapter focuses on a development that impacts physicists' overall view of the nature of reality, including relativity, quantum mechanics, field theory, string theory, etc. With this equation, physicists can potentially describe anything...as long as gravity is completely left out. Great reading for people who want to catch up to the physicists (minus the math, of course). This is not everything. Wrong turns are omitted. Only pertinenet information is included. It's easy to get lost in the reeds towards the end of the book. I had to reread a couple areas several times. Great addition to A Brief History of Time, The Dancing Wu Li Masters, and other books in the field.
April 11, 2024
This is my first Reading into particle physics that transcends the early discoveries of quantum physics and the atomic model described by a nucleus of protons and neutrons surrounded by a cloud of electrons. The aim of the book is to elucidate in its entirety the "Standard Model of Elementary Particles" or simply the "Standard Model."
The Standard Model surpasses in precision, universality, and scope of application (from the very small to astronomically large bodies) any scientific theory that has ever existed. It serves to explain nearly all physical phenomena except gravity and some boundary phenomena for which new theories are still being explored.
Similar to the basic principles of quantum physics, the Standard Model is truly "a tapestry woven by many hands" (Dirac, Feynman, Schwinger, Gell-Mann, Higgs, etc.). In that regard, it is a much more accurate paradigm of how science is constructed than the myth of the solitary genius. It often clashes with our biases and with the way physics is typically presented to the general public.
The Standard Model belongs to a class of theories known as relativistic quantum field theories. These theories encompass the strangeness of special relativity, with its paradoxes about time and motion, and quantum mechanics, with its fields that are neither waves nor particles. The framework of relativistic quantum field theories adds its own peculiarities: particles that suddenly appear where there was only energy and disappear again, literally in a flash. This structure synthesizes the rather strange worldview held by physicists. It states what can be known about the universe and what will remain mysterious forever.
The book begins with a description of how physics in the 19th century was divided: Dynamics, Thermodynamics, Waves, Optics, Electricity, and Magnetism. From there, it progresses on the path of unification, which by the early 20th century had been reduced to a theory of fields and a theory of particles. That is to say, by the beginning of the 20th century, every force was a consequence of the existence of fields. Particles generate fields, fields influence particles: it is the only thing that has ever happened in the entire universe. Later, the unthinkable happens; not only does Einstein's discovery of the equivalence between matter and energy reveal that energy is as fundamental as matter, something similar occurs with particles and fields, which had seemed so different, and begin to show a certain family resemblance as the discoveries of quantum physics progress.
At the heart of it all is the relativistic quantum field: the idea that all interactions are fundamentally an exchange of particles, that these exchanges are completely random and unpredictable, and that we can only discern the probability of a particular process occurring.
Symmetries and symmetry breaking are essential components of the standard model. Oerter emphasizes symmetry’s importance to particle formation and quantum field theories. He discusses Noether’s theorem which states that each symmetry is associated with a conserved quantity. Time symmetry is associated with energy, spatial symmetry with momentum, rotational symmetry with angular momentum, color symmetry with the strong force. Spontaneous symmetry breaking allowed the Higgs particle to imbue other particles with mass creating ordinary matter, hence the term “God particle”. Without symmetry breaking and the Higgs there would be no matter. Without a symmetry unimaginatively named U(1) there would be no photons and hence no light. Without color symmetry there would be no elements.
The Standard Model is built upon the relativistic quantum field theories we already know. Quantum electrodynamics QED explaining the electromagnetic force was the first major building block of the Standard Model. Quantum chromodynamics QCD explaining the strong force was the second major building block. When the remaining weak force was explained and incorporated the result is intertwined to create a single theory whose essential elements can be expressed with a single equation. This equation is the simplicity at the core, the ultimate reason for the complex behaviors we observe in the physical world: atoms, molecules, solids, liquids, gases, rocks, plants, and animals.
The Standard Model surpasses in precision, universality, and scope of application (from the very small to astronomically large bodies) any scientific theory that has ever existed. It serves to explain nearly all physical phenomena except gravity and some boundary phenomena for which new theories are still being explored.
Similar to the basic principles of quantum physics, the Standard Model is truly "a tapestry woven by many hands" (Dirac, Feynman, Schwinger, Gell-Mann, Higgs, etc.). In that regard, it is a much more accurate paradigm of how science is constructed than the myth of the solitary genius. It often clashes with our biases and with the way physics is typically presented to the general public.
The Standard Model belongs to a class of theories known as relativistic quantum field theories. These theories encompass the strangeness of special relativity, with its paradoxes about time and motion, and quantum mechanics, with its fields that are neither waves nor particles. The framework of relativistic quantum field theories adds its own peculiarities: particles that suddenly appear where there was only energy and disappear again, literally in a flash. This structure synthesizes the rather strange worldview held by physicists. It states what can be known about the universe and what will remain mysterious forever.
The book begins with a description of how physics in the 19th century was divided: Dynamics, Thermodynamics, Waves, Optics, Electricity, and Magnetism. From there, it progresses on the path of unification, which by the early 20th century had been reduced to a theory of fields and a theory of particles. That is to say, by the beginning of the 20th century, every force was a consequence of the existence of fields. Particles generate fields, fields influence particles: it is the only thing that has ever happened in the entire universe. Later, the unthinkable happens; not only does Einstein's discovery of the equivalence between matter and energy reveal that energy is as fundamental as matter, something similar occurs with particles and fields, which had seemed so different, and begin to show a certain family resemblance as the discoveries of quantum physics progress.
At the heart of it all is the relativistic quantum field: the idea that all interactions are fundamentally an exchange of particles, that these exchanges are completely random and unpredictable, and that we can only discern the probability of a particular process occurring.
Symmetries and symmetry breaking are essential components of the standard model. Oerter emphasizes symmetry’s importance to particle formation and quantum field theories. He discusses Noether’s theorem which states that each symmetry is associated with a conserved quantity. Time symmetry is associated with energy, spatial symmetry with momentum, rotational symmetry with angular momentum, color symmetry with the strong force. Spontaneous symmetry breaking allowed the Higgs particle to imbue other particles with mass creating ordinary matter, hence the term “God particle”. Without symmetry breaking and the Higgs there would be no matter. Without a symmetry unimaginatively named U(1) there would be no photons and hence no light. Without color symmetry there would be no elements.
The Standard Model is built upon the relativistic quantum field theories we already know. Quantum electrodynamics QED explaining the electromagnetic force was the first major building block of the Standard Model. Quantum chromodynamics QCD explaining the strong force was the second major building block. When the remaining weak force was explained and incorporated the result is intertwined to create a single theory whose essential elements can be expressed with a single equation. This equation is the simplicity at the core, the ultimate reason for the complex behaviors we observe in the physical world: atoms, molecules, solids, liquids, gases, rocks, plants, and animals.
September 5, 2017
The book starts somewhat slowly, explaining at a very basic level special and general relativity, and (quantum) wave mechanics, but then gets to the right level in explaining the development and the current state of particle physics. No mathematical expressions (both good and bad), but a basic use of Feynman diagrams, which was exactly what I was looking for. Highly recommended for someone who wants to understand what particle physics is all about.
May 22, 2018
This book is a lucid basic look at modern physics, and the Standard Model specifically. Sure I did not understand it all, I don't have the math, but that should not deter a reader. I have read books in the past on physics, and find them great mental calisthenics. This book, and modern physics in general force you to think in different ways than you normally do. Stretching the mind is a good thing.
September 2, 2019
Enjoyed reasonably well. I hoped this would help me better understand just what exactly the Standard Model is, and it met that need.
Started strong & fun, but things got a bit incomprehensible in the latter chapters, at least for me. I had to do a mode switch from "reading & understanding to an extent" to "reading & trusting what the author was saying made sense". It's more fun to be in the first mode, though it's understandable that the second is necessary, especially given the subject matter.
Started strong & fun, but things got a bit incomprehensible in the latter chapters, at least for me. I had to do a mode switch from "reading & understanding to an extent" to "reading & trusting what the author was saying made sense". It's more fun to be in the first mode, though it's understandable that the second is necessary, especially given the subject matter.
April 15, 2024
Last chapter(s) are getting a little bit confusing, especially those which discuss the symmetries, but the theory around that is considered very complex, therefore no big surprise, that it can be quite heavy to understand.
May 9, 2019
Very clear and easy to understand description of history and beauty of the Standard Model.
June 30, 2019
A good explication of the standard model and particle physics, including a good section on future directions (although this is a little dated as the book was written in 2006).
July 22, 2020
I liked it, but my nearly a decade younger brother thought it was 'solidly okay'.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 60 reviews