Symmetry and the Beautiful Universe by Leon M. Lederman (PDF)

Description

When scientists peer through a telescope at the distant stars in outer space or use a particle-accelerator to analyze the smallest components of matter, they discover that the same laws of physics govern the whole universe at all times and all places. Physicists call the eternal, ubiquitous constancy of the laws of physics symmetry. Symmetry is the basic underlying principle that defines the laws of nature and hence controls the universe. This all-important insight is one of the great conceptual breakthroughs in modern physics and is the basis of contemporary efforts to discover a grand unified theory to explain all the laws of physics.Nobel Laureate Leon M. Lederman and physicist Christopher T. Hill explain the supremely elegant concept of symmetry and all its profound ramifications to life on Earth and the universe at large in this eloquent, accessible popular science book. They not only clearly describe concepts normally reserved only for physicists and mathematicians, but they also instill an appreciation for the profound beauty of the universe’s inherent design.Central to the story of symmetry is an obscure, unpretentious, but extremely gifted German mathematician named Emmy Noether. Though still little known to the world, she impressed no less a scientist than Albert Einstein, who praised her “penetrating mathematical thinking.” In some of her earliest work she proved that the law of the conservation of energy was connected to the idea of symmetry and thus laid the mathematical groundwork for what may be the most important concept of modern physics.Lederman and Hill reveal concepts about the universe, based on Noether’s work, that are largely unknown to the public and have wide-reaching implications in connection with the Big Bang, Einstein’s theory of relativity, quantum mechanics, and many other areas of physics. Through ingenious analogies and illustrations, they bring these astounding notions to life. This book will open your eyes to a universe you never knew existed.

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: Review “A tour de force of physics made simple….”— Times Literary Supplement “Thought-provoking….”— Discover “Few books about modern physics are as fascinating, far-ranging, and readable as this. It would be appreciated by anyone interested in the nature of science and the beauty of the universe….”— NSTA Recommends”A compelling and accessible discussion….”— Science Books & Films About the Author Leon M. Lederman, Nobel Laureate (Batavia, IL) is the author of Beyond the God Particle, Quantum Physics for Poets, and Symmetry and the Beautiful Universe (coauthored with Christopher T. Hill), as well as The God Particle (with Dick Teresi). He has served as the editor of Portraits of Great American Scientists and a contributor to Science Literacy for the Twenty-First Century. He is formerly the Resident Scholar at the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy and Pritzker Professor of Science at the Illinois Institute of Technology, and he is director emeritus of Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory.Christopher T. Hill, PhD (Batavia, IL) is the coauthor with Leon M. Lederman of Beyond the God Particle, Quantum Physics for Poets, and Symmetry and the Beautiful Universe. He is a theoretical physicist (Scientist III) and the former head of Theoretical Physics at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory.

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

⭐This is an amazing book explaining the remarkably simple “unifying” concept underlying all the fundamentals of physics. This concept is symmetry. Symmetry according to Webster’s dictionary starts with a poetic definition “Beauty of form arising from balanced proportions”. But it also has a more practical meaning when we say that it is “An expression of equivalence between things”. Scientists reformulated these poetic and prosaic meanings of symmetry into the following mathematically precise definition “symmetry is invariance to a transformation”. In this book the amazing consequences of the fact that our universe is intrinsically symmetrical in all it defining properties is explained. The laws of physics are invariant to translation, rotation, motion, passage of time, etc. This is a direct and intuitive consequence of the notion that our universe does not have a center. It also does not have a well defined point in space and time from where it all started with the big bang. The remnant of the big bang can only be observed in the Cosmic Microwave Background uniformly surrounding us 13.7 billion light years away. This is what inflation did.A relatively unknown female mathematician has formulated and proven one of the most fundamental theorems in mathematics and physics. I am embarrassed by the fact that the world has ignored, and is still ignoring, Emmy Noether who has proven the following theorem in 1915. “For every continuous symmetry of the laws of physics, there must exist a conservation law, and conversely for every conservation law, there must exist a continuous symmetry”. From this all basic concepts like conservation of momentum, conservation of energy, Galilean relativity, inertia, Newton’s laws, conservation of angular momentum, Kepler’s laws of orbits, etc. can be explained and interlinked. When you subsequently add the ultimate symmetry of the invariance of the speed of light to any frame of reference whether this is moving, rotating, or accelerating, everything changes very fundamentally through Einstein’s Special and General Relativity. All of a sudden time is no longer linear and we have to include “singularities” (black holes) into our equations. Still “Time” is the odd one out which becomes clear when we look in the “mirror” and reflection symmetry or parity symmetry is introduced, here things start to fall apart a bit and to maintain time reversal symmetry concepts like entropy and even more foreign notions of anti matter need to be introduced. Richard Feynman already referred to anti particles as particles moving back in time. This in itself creates a new form of particle – anti particle symmetry, also called charge conjugation. It appears that at the subatomic level symmetry is broken. An example is the weak interaction force, which does not obey the rules of reflection or parity symmetry. Later it was assumed that perhaps the combination of parity symmetry and charge conjugation would be a symmetry which applies to the weak force. Alas, this also appeared through experiments (with a special type of subatomic particles called K-mesons) not to be true. Intriguingly, if it were true there would be the same amount of matter and anti matter in our universe and if that would be true the universe as we know it cannot exist! Our universe was born when, at the moment of the big bang, symmetry was “broken”.The only way to construct a symmetry to which the weak force succumbs is when we add a third discrete symmetry transformation, i.e. the reversal of time. This is required to ensure that there is conservation of “probability” in quantum mechanics (All probabilities added together will always have to equal one. Remember Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle and Schrodinger’s “probability” Wave Equation). Clearly at subatomic level a lot of “tricks” are required! Here the search for “hidden symmetries” begins and the mysterious Gauge Symmetry is slowly revealing itself in the “standard model” and its quarks, leptons and gluons unifying all the basic forces in our universe. Now we only need to find the missing Higgs (or God’s) Particle.”

⭐The use of symmetry in physics is everywhere but its meaning to the non physicist isnt always clear. Symmetry and the Beautiful Universe is an overview of symmetry in physics and the ways in which the fundamental physical processes are defined by their summetries. It goes through early physics intuition and takes us through the modern times and discusses results through the lens of Noether’s Theorem which is described early in the book. The book covers many parts of physics, both classical and modern, and does it all intuitively.The book starts with analogy and discusses the early universe as well as the early Greek gods. The authors focus on some simple parallels between the gods and their narratives and physics which creates a light introduction and sets the stage for how scientific reasoning takes over from religious narratives. The authors then go on to describe fundamental concepts like energy. The authors then introduce as a historical figure, Emmy Noether, one of the centuries greatest mathematicians who proved a theorem of deep importance for physics which is more fully detailed later. The authors then start to describe basic movements in physical space and time and then ponders whether these movements in space and time are actually symmetric for physics. Noether is revisited and the result of the theorem are detailed which say that a continuous symmetry in physics implies a conservation of some physical quantity. The result is then reapplied to momentum, energy and angular momentum. The book then goes on to describe inertia, acceleration and gravity. Then relativity and the symmetry of space and time. The book then discusses certain discrete symmetries like reflections and time reversals and poses the questions of whether these are symmetries for real physics. The answer is an interesting no due to the handedness of the weak nuclear force. This is shown to not contradict Noether’s Theorem given these are discrete symmetries not continuous. The authors then go on to discuss how symmetries can be broken and how the energy levels required for different symmetries are different. Modern Physics is then discussed with a discussion of quantum mechanics and QED. Particle physics is the last real subject tackled and the zoo of particles modern physics predicts is covered briefly. The authors finish with discussing results from QCD and the higgs field, this is written before the higgs boson was detected.Symmetry and the Beautiful Universe is a fairly detailed overview of how symmetry is so important for so many aspects of physics. It does this in an understandable and illuminating fashion. The math is not discussed but the bigger ideas are described intuitively. I think the first 2/3 of the book are stronger than the last 1/3 as the symmetries of particle physics are harder to be intuitive about, but i think the authors do as good of a job as can be expected. Definitely recommend reading this- it is a good addition to the physics literature to the layperson on symmetry in physics.

⭐This is an excellent book as such for non-experts wishing to gain an understanding of the pivotal role of symmetry in theoretical physics. It is full of helpful insights into relativity, QED etc. too, many of which I have not encountered before.Having said that, the KINDLE VERSION IS A WASTE OF MONEY. The problem is the rendering of symbols, numbers in scientific notation, equations and tables. There are numerous in-line typos, but, worse, many critical equations and tables are rendered in faint grey and are unreadable. This is annoying if you know the stuff, or can guess, but for somebody new to the material, and this is a popular book, it would be a fatal flaw. Did the people who produce Kindle edition not check their work? It would seem not.I would now like the hard-copy, but have paid for the Kindle and am reluctant to reward Amazon twice. There seems to be no way of complaining about a Kindle edition, nor of returning one, or of claiming refund. It is not good enough. SO, …… FIVE STARS for the BOOK, ZERO stars for the KINDLE VERSION.(I obtained a refund eventually: unlike with physical books, one has to go to the Kindle web-site, rather to one’s order).

⭐Leon Max Lederman premio Nobel per la fisica nel 1988 per la ricerca dei neutrini, è un divulgatore formidabile, è capace di prendere concetti molto complessi di fisica, la cui dimostrazione necessita della conoscenza della matematica ad un livello superiore, e li “riduce” a concetti digeribili anche da chi è fornito di una normale cultura, meglio se di tipo scientifico ma non è indispensabile. Lo stile di scrittura è brillante, infarcisce concetti astrusi con una vena quasi umoristica rendendo la lettura piacevole e interessante.Ho letto tutti i suoi libri divulgativi ma, questo credo il primo (in ordine di pubblicazione) è di base, è da dove parte il suo percorso divulgativo… purtroppo questo testo non è reperibile in lingua italiana, non so se mai tradotto oppure esaurito nella tiratura. Faccio fatica a leggere l’inglese e a maggior ragione per seguire ragionamenti che richiedono una certa attenzione… il mio inglese non è proprio perfetto, mi piacerebbe venire in possesso di una copia in italiano. Anzi colgo l’occasione per comunicare a chi dovesse leggere il mio commento e fosse in possesso del libro in questione di essere disposto ad acquistarlo anche ad un prezzo superiore a quello di copertina nuovo o usato che fosse. Grazie

⭐

⭐Lederman is really a leader to display the conceptual framework of symmetry and laws of physics. I have purchased and read manybooks on symmetry but this one is a gem. At the end mathematics of group is an extra bonanza.

⭐A somewhat challenging read (and really understand), but well worth the effort. If you love physics, you’ll love this book!

⭐E’ un libro abbastanza interessante, ma molto al di sotto delle mie aspettative. Anche l’ordine dei capitoli non mi soddisfa.

⭐

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