Lake Views: This World and the Universe - Softcover

Weinberg, Steven

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0674062302 ISBN 13: 9780674062306

Publisher: Harvard UP, 2011

Synopsis

Rare Book

About this title

Review:

It would be putting it mildly to say that Weinberg triumphantly lives up to what it says on the Nobel tin: a true intellectual as well as a brilliant theoretical physicist.--Richard Dawkins

An excellent collection from an extraordinary physicist. Weinberg is a deep thinker and a graceful writer.--Ken Ford, author of The Quantum World: Quantum Physics for Everyone

This is a great collection of essays. Steven Weinberg is one of the greatest contemporary physicists. He is also a scholar in a broad sense, a good scholar. Add to this, he writes well.--John S. Rigden, author of Einstein 1905

Steven Weinberg has become a role model for the rest of us who attempt to communicate to the broader public. No one writing on matters of science or of science and society has more wisdom to impart, nor can they impart it better than Weinberg. Scientists and lay people alike will find this remarkable collection both thought provoking and thoroughly engaging.--Lawrence M. Krauss, Foundation Professor and Director of the Origins Initiative at Arizona State University, and the author of The Physics of Star Trek, and most recently, Hiding in the Mirror, the Mysterious Allure of Extra Dimensions.

Steven Weinberg is one of the most highly accomplished and respected scientists in the world. But even among this elite group he holds a unique position as a scientist-scholar and a writer of unparalleled clarity. He has become a role model for the rest of us who attempt to communicate to the broader public. As this second collection of fascinating essays makes manifest, no one writing on matters of science or of science and society has more wisdom to impart, nor can they impart it better than Weinberg. Scientists and lay people alike will find this remarkable collection both thought provoking and thoroughly engaging.--Lawrence M. Krauss, Foundation Professor and Director of the Origins Initiative at Arizona State University, and the author of The Physics of Star Trek, and most recently, Hiding in the Mirror, the Mysterious Allure of Extra Dimensions.

Many of the themes in Weinberg's work remain timeless. He is in his element at the interface between science and philosophy, such as musing what will happen when science reaches a "final theory" that explains all knowable phenomena. The answer? Well, it involves an extended riff including both nuclear-particle decay and Shakespeare, but Weinberg brilliantly illuminates why he thinks humanity can still find purpose in studying the universe through scientific methods...Weinberg can, within several eloquent pages, distill the essence of why science is important...Unlike nearly any writer living today, Weinberg interpolates science, philosophy and history into a rich and meaningful tapestry of our world.-- (01/17/2010)

This collection of essays proves once again that Weinberg is more than just a top--tier physicist. He is also one of the few scientists brave enough--and knowledgeable enough--to successfully take on the role of public intellectual...It's essential reading.-- (02/06/2010)

Weinberg fans will find nuggets of insight and wisdom.--Publishers Weekly (11/02/2009)

Of all top-class theoretical physicists no one, apart from Freeman Dyson, writes with the same combination of authority and grace...The overwhelming impression one has when reading Weinberg is that we are seeing the world through the eyes of someone who not only loves physics but regards the physicist's way of looking at the world as uniquely valuable...All physicists will take pleasure from this book. Many others will enjoy it, too...Dawkins' admirers [should] read Weinberg if they are in the least bit curious about modern physics and how a great physicist thinks about science policy. Lake Views is an excellent place to start.-- (01/28/2010)

Steven Weinberg is famous as a scientist, but he thinks deeply and writes elegantly about many other things besides science. This collection of his writings is concerned with history, politics, and science in roughly equal measure.-- (06/10/2010)

About the Author:

Steven Weinberg won the Nobel Prize in Physics for his theory unifying two forces of nature, laying the foundation for the Standard Model of subatomic physics. His other awards include the National Medal of Science and eighteen honorary degrees. Among Weinberg's books are the classic The First Three Minutes and To Explain the World. He is a frequent contributor to the New York Review of Books and teaches at the University of Texas.

About this edition

• Publisher: Harvard UP
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0674062302
• ISBN 13: 9780674062306
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 272