Fearful Symmetry: The Search for Beauty in Modern Physics (Princeton Science Library) by A. Zee (PDF)

Description

An engaging exploration of beauty in physics, with a foreword by Nobel Prize–winning physicist Roger PenroseThe concept of symmetry has widespread manifestations and many diverse applications—from architecture to mathematics to science. Yet, as twentieth-century physics has revealed, symmetry has a special, central role in nature, one that is occasionally and enigmatically violated. Fearful Symmetry brings the incredible discoveries of the juxtaposition of symmetry and asymmetry in contemporary physics within everyone’s grasp. A. Zee, a distinguished physicist and skillful expositor, tells the exciting story of how contemporary theoretical physicists are following Einstein in their search for the beauty and simplicity of Nature. Animated by a sense of reverence and whimsy, Fearful Symmetry describes the majestic sweep and accomplishments of twentieth-century physics—one of the greatest chapters in the intellectual history of humankind.

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐This book attempts to give the reader a flavor of what ideas drive much of modern physics. In particular the search for symmetries. The book splits its time between classical physics and the symmetries that existed and then on to modern theories and how they too have been constructed from various symmetries.The book introduces symmetry from the intuitive notion of reflections and rotations and then goes into how we believe physics operates equivalently under such operations. The idea of the group is investigated this way and its a very lucid introduction. Galilean transformations (ie a transformation in which observers in uniform relative motion are equivalent) are described along with their intuitive foundation. The book dives into relativity and the condition of speed of light as a constant forces us to recognize that the lorentzian transformation is the world’s actual symmetry (to our current experimental observations). These classical introductions to symmetry and the groups under which classical physics transforms are the most clear in the book and very much worth the read.The book then starts to describe the other forces and the ideas of the action and calculus of variations in physics, in particular the lagrangian. Noether’s theorem of continuous transformations and their correspondence to a symmetry is described, and its deep consequences contemplated. The weak force and its assymetry is described (ie its handedness) so that one starts to see that at its core some basic forces dont portray the spacial symmetry one might expect. The book gets the reader a bit over their head at this point. It gets into particle physics and how representations of groups can be used for correspondence with elementary particles and how there are different dimensional representations of these groups. These are not easily communicated to the non-expert. Things like how the representations of SU groups can have different dimensions etc just isnt clear, nor should it be given these are graduate level mathematics ideas, but explanations are attempted nonetheless. These parts of the books I found less readable and interesting as they are hard to really associate with.In aggregate, the intuitive aspects of the book are very lucid, but as physics has gotten more abstract and it gets into Yang-mills theory it gets a lot more difficult to realistically follow. To put things into perspective for the reaser without familiarity, much of yang-mills theory is an open problem in mathematics that is so difficult it is within the category of being elligble for the millenium prize… So for the author to try to engage the reader with it, and how its used and its symmetry repurcussions is very difficult, and in my opinion, a bit too ambitious. Nonetheless, the earlier parts/first half of the book are very readable and for those alone the book is worth reading.

⭐I have read a small portion of Zee’s QFT in a nutshell. I liked it very much so thought I would try some of his other books. I consider myself a particle and nuclear physicist but I am not a theoretical physicist. I know a good deal of the symmetry that is being discussed in the book. Usually I find physics books that are targeted for the general public too simple, and often contain misconceptions to make the topic accessible. However, this is not the case for Zee’s Fearful Symmetry. In this book, Zee presented modern physics, from eightfold way, isospin symmetry, SU(3) color symmetry, electroweak unification, to Higgs field, GUT, and generations of quarks and leptons, all in a way that is both correct and accessible to people outside the immediate field of particle physics. It is also very humorous. Sometimes I can’t help but snapping a picture of the page at 3am and post it on facebook (yes with 3 young kids that’s the only time of the day for me to focus on some leisure reading), and watching my friends commenting on how funny it is and asking which book it is.I believe most people with the general scientific background (such as undergrads major in physical science) will like this book very much. I have almost finished the book and I plan to read it over and over again. It really intrigued me to think about the research I do from a different view. It reminds me that I should focus not only on the phenomenon — how things work, but more importantly the reason — why Nature works the way she works. At many points of the book the question is more philosophical and even theological than physical.One more point: this is a book for leisure reading so may not contain answers to many questions that a serious HEP/NP person might have. For example, I have been searching for the reason and the meaning of local gauge invariance and why (not the mathematically “how”) why it creates gauge bosons. I didn’t find the perfect answer in Zee’s Fearful Symmetry. But I will look for it in his other books (and books by other people).

⭐This book is not about symmetry of shapes. It is about a much more fundamental symmetry: the invariances observed in the most fundamental laws of physics. These invariances render modern physics theories simple and fundamentally austere, yet deep in abstract sense and with rich consequences. In this book Zee demonstrates there is no room for decorations in the architecture of physical reality, and opens the reader’s eyes to the intrinsic beauty of physics laws at the most fundamental level. Zee manages to do so without a single line of math (Zee occasionally uses a ‘ket’ notation to denote the states of a physical system, but thoroughly explains this shorthand notation).Zee’s enthusiasm and natural writing style ensures he not only conveys this message, but also gives the reader a clear insight in what modern physics is about. Zee explains how the work of Einstein, Noether and Heisenberg resulted in a history of ideas that inevitably led to a theory of supreme beauty: the non-Abelian gauge theory by Yang and Mills. I know of no other pop science book that explains the essence of this concept so well.The book reads like a novel. It contains interesting anecdotes, some funny sidelines, many simple – yet instructive – pictures, and is very easy to follow without any specialist knowledge in either math or physics.Five stars, easily.

⭐Symmetry feels so elegant, and the fact that we encounter so many broken symmetries does make you feel a desire for their restitution.

⭐Una introducción interesante al papel de la simetría en la física moderna. Muy bien informado. También interesa el relato histórico de como se ha desarrollado este concepto.

⭐

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