How to Build a Time Machine - Softcover

Davies, Paul

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0142001864 ISBN 13: 9780142001868

Publisher: Penguin Books, 2003

Synopsis

With his unique knack for making cutting-edge theoretical science effortlessly accessible, world-renowned physicist Paul Davies now tackles an issue that has boggled minds for centuries: Is time travel possible? The answer, insists Davies, is definitely yes--once you iron out a few kinks in the space-time continuum. With tongue placed firmly in cheek, Davies explains the theoretical physics that make visiting the future and revisiting the past possible, then proceeds to lay out a four-stage process for assembling a time machine and making it work. Wildly inventive and theoretically sound, How to Build a Time Machine is creative science at its best--illuminating, entertaining, and thought provoking.

About this title

Product Description:

Paperback. Pub Date: 2003 Pages: 144 Publisher: Penguin U.S. Description of This Book The Fascinating story of Fred Waitzkin and his son Josh from the moment six-year-old Josh first sits down at a chessboard until he wins the national championship. Now a feature film starring Ben Kingsley. Max Pomerenc. Joe Mantegna. and Larry Fishburne. (Penguin)

Review:

In How to Build a Time Machine, Paul Davies, Professor of Theoretical Physics and a veteran of the popular science writing genre, has produced a delightful little book about time and time-travel. The format of the book is reader-friendly, written in his usual clear, lucid and engaging style with text linked to relevant sketches, photographs and diagrams of machinery. At the heart of the book is an explanation of Einstein's theory of relativity and what that theory tells us about the possibility of time-travel. Einstein's theory tells us that travel into the future is certainly possible while the possibility of travel into the past has not yet been ruled out. What makes this book such a fascinating and fun read is finding out about the practicalities of building a time machine. If we want to travel into the future, Davies tells us, all we need do is build a machine that moves fast enough. Any machine will do so long as it can move at a velocity close to the speed of light. Things become really interesting however, when we start to think about how to travel backwards in time. The method Davies outlines in the book involves using a wormhole adapted to form a time machine. You jump into the hole and come out in another place and in another, past time. This is a "machine" that is part of the structure of the universe, a machine you step through into the past. Davies then presents a step-by-step guide to building such a machine with illustrations of the various components and descriptions of the processes involved before discussing some of the paradoxes of time-travel. A more interesting way of learning about Einstein's theory than this is difficult to imagine; this is a highly entertaining read and an excellent introduction to the subject of theoretical physics. --Larry Brown

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin Books
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0142001864
• ISBN 13: 9780142001868
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 144