Beyond Weird

Why Everything You Thought You Knew about Quantum Physics Is Different

Nonfiction, Science & Nature, Science, Physics, Quantum Theory, Other Sciences, Philosophy & Social Aspects
Cover of the book Beyond Weird by Philip Ball, University of Chicago Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Philip Ball ISBN: 9780226594989
Publisher: University of Chicago Press Publication: October 18, 2018
Imprint: University of Chicago Press Language: English
Author: Philip Ball
ISBN: 9780226594989
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Publication: October 18, 2018
Imprint: University of Chicago Press
Language: English

“Anyone who is not shocked by quantum theory has not understood it.”

Since Niels Bohr said this many years ago, quantum mechanics has only been getting more shocking. We now realize that it’s not really telling us that “weird” things happen out of sight, on the tiniest level, in the atomic world: rather, everything is quantum. But if quantum mechanics is correct, what seems obvious and right in our everyday world is built on foundations that don’t seem obvious or right at all—or even possible.

An exhilarating tour of the contemporary quantum landscape, Beyond Weird is a book about what quantum physics really means—and what it doesn’t. Science writer Philip Ball offers an up-to-date, accessible account of the quest to come to grips with the most fundamental theory of physical reality, and to explain how its counterintuitive principles underpin the world we experience. Over the past decade it has become clear that quantum physics is less a theory about particles and waves, uncertainty and fuzziness, than a theory about information and knowledge—about what can be known, and how we can know it.  Discoveries and experiments over the past few decades have called into question the meanings and limits of space and time, cause and effect, and, ultimately, of knowledge itself. The quantum world Ball shows us isn’t a different world. It is our world, and if anything deserves to be called “weird,” it’s us.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

“Anyone who is not shocked by quantum theory has not understood it.”

Since Niels Bohr said this many years ago, quantum mechanics has only been getting more shocking. We now realize that it’s not really telling us that “weird” things happen out of sight, on the tiniest level, in the atomic world: rather, everything is quantum. But if quantum mechanics is correct, what seems obvious and right in our everyday world is built on foundations that don’t seem obvious or right at all—or even possible.

An exhilarating tour of the contemporary quantum landscape, Beyond Weird is a book about what quantum physics really means—and what it doesn’t. Science writer Philip Ball offers an up-to-date, accessible account of the quest to come to grips with the most fundamental theory of physical reality, and to explain how its counterintuitive principles underpin the world we experience. Over the past decade it has become clear that quantum physics is less a theory about particles and waves, uncertainty and fuzziness, than a theory about information and knowledge—about what can be known, and how we can know it.  Discoveries and experiments over the past few decades have called into question the meanings and limits of space and time, cause and effect, and, ultimately, of knowledge itself. The quantum world Ball shows us isn’t a different world. It is our world, and if anything deserves to be called “weird,” it’s us.

More books from University of Chicago Press

Cover of the book The Iconoclastic Imagination by Philip Ball
Cover of the book Picturing America by Philip Ball
Cover of the book Selling Fear by Philip Ball
Cover of the book Fast, Easy, and In Cash by Philip Ball
Cover of the book Combating Jihadism by Philip Ball
Cover of the book "Do You Know...?" by Philip Ball
Cover of the book Fragments and Assemblages by Philip Ball
Cover of the book West of Sex by Philip Ball
Cover of the book Mies van der Rohe by Philip Ball
Cover of the book Bodies in Flux by Philip Ball
Cover of the book Thinking Like a Political Scientist by Philip Ball
Cover of the book Plant Physics by Philip Ball
Cover of the book Why Parties Matter by Philip Ball
Cover of the book Fada by Philip Ball
Cover of the book On Knowing--The Social Sciences by Philip Ball
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy