Atom Land: A Guided Tour Through the Strange (and Impossibly Small) World of Particle Physics by Jon Butterworth (PDF)

Description

Journey into an unseen world—and to the frontiers of human knowledge Welcome to Atom Land, the impossibly small world of quantum physics. With award–winning physicist Jon Butterworth as your guide, you’ll set sail from Port Electron in search of strange new terrain. Each discovery will expand the horizons of your trusty map—from the Hadron Island to the Isle of Quarks and beyond. Just beware of Dark Energy and other sea monsters! A masterful work of metaphor, Atom Land also gives form to the forces that shape the universe: Electromagnetism is a highway system; the strong force, a railway; the weak force, an airline. But, like Butterworth, you may find that curiosity is the strongest force of all—one that pulls you across the subatomic seas, toward the unknown realm of Antimatter, and to the very outer reaches of the cosmos.

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: Review A Choice Outstanding Academic TitleAn Amazon Best Book of March—Nonfiction “Take a tour through the subatomic world with a leading physicist at CERN as he explains the electron ports, boson continents and hadron islands you see along the way.”—The New York Times Book Review “Butterworth weaves a wonderful metaphor of the world of subatomic physics, sure to engage and enlighten laymen about the world of particle physics. . . . Written at a level accessible to a high school or liberal arts student, it still contains enough interesting material to make for enjoyable light reading for a science student. . . . A highly engaging and entertaining book.”—Choice “An amusing journey through the obscure world of particle physics . . . illuminates the murkiest of concepts.”—Scientific American “A charming, informative overview of particle physics . . . make[s] learning about this field almost effortless.”—Library Journal, starred review “Butterworth expertly handles even the thorniest theories and will satisfy world-weary scientists and amateur physics aficionados alike.”—Publishers Weekly “A noble . . . effort to demystify quantum physics.”—Kirkus Reviews “Yearning for a late holiday? Bosonia, the Isle of Leptons and farthest Antimatter beckon in this bracing voyage into particle physics, captained by experimental physicist Jon Butterworth. Ever an original writer, he maps the territory of the standard model and beyond, elucidating in turn wave—particle duality, the quantum field and the subatomic realm, all the way to ripples in space-time and the hunt for the Higgs boson (which, as a veteran of the Large Hadron Collider at Europe’s physics lab CERN, he navigates expertly). Sea legs achieved, you’re ready for wilder shores, such as the Dirac—Milne universe.”—Nature “A magnificent, compelling, and insightful voyage to the frontier of knowledge from a great writer with a deep understanding.”—Brian Cox, author of Why Does E=mc2? “These are exciting times for fundamental physics, and Butterworth describes with clarity, humor, and enthusiasm the lie of the land at the ultimate frontier. You will not find a better tour guide.”—Times Higher Education About the Author Jon Butterworth is a professor of physics and astronomy at University College London and a member of the ATLAS collaboration at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider. He writes the Life and Physics blog for the Guardian. In 2013, he received the Chadwick Medal of the Institute of Physics. He is also the author of Most Wanted Particle, shortlisted for Book of the Year by Physics World.

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

⭐An enjoyable journey via analogy. As with all journeys, preconceptions vanish when directly exposed to the landscape, and the “creatures” that reside within. Additionally, (we) pass quickly through various scenes, observing but with little time for great detail.This is a directed journey focused on the Standard Model, with potential “side trips” kept to a minimum. Time (book length) constraints passed over facts and concepts perhaps too quickly, leaving areas of potential confusion.The author did excellent work in attempting to build a 2-dimensional analogy from what we currently know/assume/have evidence of, and is most certainly at least 4-dimensional in nature. In particular, I enjoyed the book’s ending synopsis and speculations. I would have enjoyed further delving into areas such as further aspects of the double-slit experiment, quantum entanglement, and the like, but realize the constraints that the author stayed within.Recommended reading — educational, and provides the opportunity to view “reality” in a different perspective…

⭐Jon does a great job explaining particle physics using relatable examples. I wish I had read this book before all the other books on quantum physics I have attempted. This book is the best overview that explains WHY and HOW we know what we know using analogies that are easy to remember. I highly recommend it.

⭐As a general, up-to-date overview of particle physics, I would have given this book four stars, because that’s what I was looking for, and that’s what the book delivered, for the most part. I would not have given it five stars, though, because I found the explanations of several phenomena unsatisfying (such as “How could there possibly be a ‘massless particle’?” or “What causes a positive or negative charge to exist?”). That said, I realize I must allow for the fact that either the answers to such questions are still unknown or, if they are known, they would require more than a layperson’s knowledge of math or physics to appreciate. I bought the book because I expected that the metaphor of a map would help me visualize what is happening at the atomic and sub-atomic scale, but the reason I gave this book only three stars is that I feel the metaphor, which I found to be a little too cute, does more harm than good. My impression was that the author had to struggle to relate reality to the metaphor, and I continually had to struggle to make the connection. In my opinion, visual illustrations or diagrams could have been much more effective — less amusing, perhaps, but more effective.

⭐Well written but has to be read slowly to comprehend the information.

⭐I like the idea of exploring new lands as a metaphor to discuss the subject matter of particle physics, but I guess it is a lot to cover and the presentation is too over-simplified in many parts to have a clear understanding for the general public, so that it was really boring to read.

⭐Jon Butterworth, obviously a super-genius takes an extremely complicated subject, particle physics, and makes it interesting by making it into an adventure story of a magical land, complete with boats and seas and islands.

⭐The technical info presented is interesting and well written. But the whole map and travel analogy does not fit well for me. I think I will have to read his other book to see how that one flows

⭐The author’s approach of using a journey across a quantum mechanical world seemed like a good one, at first. But then it got very tedious until I got tired of trying to figure out what he was getting at. Sometimes an attempt to simplify a concept only makes it more difficult to understand.

⭐Perfect for a 12 year olds.

⭐Este livro é excessivamente complexo para quem não tem muitos conhecimentos de física de partículas, justamente o seu público alvo, mas também não atende um leitor com mais noção por ser bastante superficial.

⭐

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