Friday, November 3, 2017

Book review: Quantum man: Richard Feynman's life in Science by Lawrence Krauss








There are many biographies of Richard Feynman, including three autobiographical volumes.  Why, then, has Lawrence Krauss taken the time to write another? Because this one is different.  This one spends relatively little time discussing Feynman’s personality, his childhood, his romances and so on and concentrates on his role in physics.

Feynman contributed to a remarkably wide range of physics, but his major area was quantum physics.  This makes Krauss’s job hard for two reasons: First, Krauss has to understand that same range of physics well enough to be able to consider Feynman’s contribution.  Second, quantum physics is notoriously tricky to explain. 

Krauss is up to the task. His description of science is perfect for his audience which is the educated lay person. He manages to convey the central importance of Feynman’s work without either dumbing it down too much or overwhelming us with equations – indeed, I don’t recall any equations.  

Krauss also comments on what made Feynman more than just another really smart person.  Two 
things that stood out are Feynman’s powers of concentration, which were remarkable even among top ranked physicists and Feynman’s insistence on working everything out for himself and not accepting anything just because it was in a textbook. 

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