The World According to Physics

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Being a big fan of Jim Al-Khalili's radio programme/podcast “The Life Scientific", I decided to read The World According to Physics. From the preface to the book's end you can feel the author's enthusiasm. As he says, "This book is an ode to physics". He wants to inspire other people with physics, just as he was inspired when he first started learning about it as a teenager.

After studying physics at Surrey, Al-Khalili stayed on for a DPhil on nuclear reaction theory and has spent most of his career there, apart from a brief interlude as a postdoctoral fellow at University College London. Along with a number of publications devoted to making his field accessible to non-specialists, he drew on his bilingual upbringing to write Pathfinders: The Golden Age of Arabic Science (2010). If Kaluza-Klein theory piques your interest, you might have to wade through a Lisa Randall book to wrap your mind around tiny curled up dimensions. CF: Well, the challenge was to create minimal design with maximum impact. It was a challenge I was eager to accept! I’ve written books specifically about quantum mechanics, cosmology, the history of science and quantum biology—so there have been topics that fired me up or that my own research has been involved in. But the opening sentence of The World According to Physics is, “This book is an ode to physics.” It’s my love affair with a subject that I’ve had a passion for since my early teens.Let’s turn to first book on your list, which is Subtle is the Lord: The Science and the Life of Albert Einstein by Abraham Pais. I’m not expecting a person to read my book and say, ‘OK. I now understand the subtleties of quantum gravity or the nature of space and time.’ That takes a lifetime of effort and dedication.”

This book is a refreshing, equations-free, occasionally philosophical take on what physics is all about that should appeal to physicists and the public alike."— Nature Astronomy Ever wanted to get into quantum physics, but been afraid to try? This book might be the answer. Bestselling author and BBC host Jim Al-Kahlili invites us to understand reality and the universe better as he explains modern physics to us."—Claire Handscombe, Book Riot

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It depends how much you want to understand. I used to think that anything can be explained, provided you use the right language, remove the jargon and find the right analogies and examples and metaphors. To a large extent, I think that is still true. Good science communicators should be able to get across the basics of any idea. But, actually, there are concepts in physics that are tough. They require a lot of investment of effort and thinking to get your head around. Sometimes, getting an idea simplistically can confuse people even more, particularly with things like quantum mechanics. Before we get to the books about physics that inspired you, I wanted to ask about the book you’ve written to inspire others. You’ve been on a valiant quest to make physics accessible to the rest of us for a while, but am I right to say that The World According to Physics is the first book where you’ve tried to give an overview of the entire field? I wouldn’t say disputes. There are other areas of science where people get much more competitive and aggressive in promoting and pushing their own theory or hypothesis, but there’s certainly different camps in physics.