John Gribbin

'A gripping account of a physicist whose speculations could prove as revolutionary as those of Albert Einstein . . . Its combination of erudition, warmth, robustness, and wit is entirely appropriate to their subject' New Statesman'Intriguing . . . There are larger questions here than the life of even this singular man' Peter Ackroyd, The TimesStephen Hawking was no ordinary scientist. He managed to do more than perhaps any other physicist to broaden our basic understanding of the universe. This skilful portrait of an indefatigable genius traces the course of Hawking's life and science, marrying biography and physics to tell the story of a remarkable man.

A concise and engaging investigation of six interpretations of quantum physics. Rules of the quantum world seem to say that a cat can be both alive and dead at the same time and a particle can be in two places at once. And that particle is also a wave; everything in the quantum world can described in terms of waves--or entirely in terms of particles. These interpretations were all established by the end of the 1920s, by Erwin Schr dinger, Werner Heisenberg, Paul Dirac, and others. But no one has yet come up with a common sense explanation of what is going on. In this concise and engaging book, astrophysicist John Gribbin offers an overview of six of the leading interpretations of quantum mechanics. Gribbin calls his account "agnostic," explaining that none of these interpretations is any better--or any worse--than any of the others.Gribbin presents the Copenhagen Interpretation, promoted by Niels Bohr and named by Heisenberg; the Pilot-Wave Interpretation, developed by Louis de Broglie; the Many Worlds Interpretation (termed "excess baggage" by Gribbin); the Decoherence Interpretation ("incoherent"); the Ensemble "Non-Interpretation"; and the Timeless Transactional Interpretation (which theorized waves going both forward and backward in time). All of these interpretations are crazy, Gribbin warns, and some are more crazy than others--but in the quantum world, being more crazy does not necessarily mean more wrong.

'A primer for the magical, near inexplicable world of quantum mechanics... Mind-blowing' Dara Ó BriainQuantum theory is so shocking that Einstein could not bring himself to accept it. It is so important that it underpins all modern sciences. Without it, we'd have no molecular biology, no understanding of DNA, no genetic engineering, no computers.A century after the development of quantum mechanics, In Search of Schrödinger's Cat tells the full story of how scientists reckoned with a truth stranger than any fiction. John Gribbin leads us into the ever more bizarre and fascinating world of the smallest particles we have discovered, requiring only that we approach it with an open mind. He introduces the scientists who developed quantum theory. He investigates the atom, radiation, time travel, the birth of the universe, super conductors and life itself. And in a world full of its own delights, mysteries and surprises, he searches for Schrödinger's Cat - a search for quantum reality - as he brings every reader to a clear understanding of the most important area of scientific study today - quantum physics.Featuring a new preface to mark the centenary of the field, this bestselling classic remains a fascinating and delightful introduction to the strange world of the quantum - an essential element in understanding the modern world.'John Gribbin is unsurpassed in his ability to convey scientific ideas in lively and accessible language. This new edition of his classic book deserves wide readership. It's specially welcome in the year that marks the centenary of quantum theory – which revolutionised our concept of nature and underpins most of modern technology.' Professor Martin Rees, astronomer royal

Kvantovaja fizika - ochen strannaja shtuka. Ona utverzhdaet, chto odna chastitsa mozhet nakhoditsja v dvukh mestakh odnovremenno. Bolshe togo, chastitsa - eto esche i volna, i vse proiskhodjaschee v kvantovom mire mozhet byt predstavleno kak vzaimodejstvie voln - ili chastits, kak vam bolshe nravitsja. Vse eto bylo ponjatno uzhe k kontsu 1920-kh godov. Za eto vremja bylo isprobovano nemalo raznykh bolee ili menee ubeditelnykh interpretatsij. Izvestnyj populjarizator nauki Dzhon Gribbin otpravljaet nas v zakhvatyvajuschee puteshestvie po "bolshoj shesterke" takikh objasnenij, ot kopengagenskoj interpretatsii do idei mnozhestvennosti mirov. Vse eti varianty v raznoj stepeni bezumny, no v kvantovom mire bezumnost ne ravnosilna oshibochnosti, i byt bezumnee drugikh ne objazatelno znachit byt bolee nevernym. "Shest nevozmozhnostej" - porazitelno lakonichnyj putevoditel po poistine udivitelnomu miru.

Time travel is a familiar theme of science fiction, but is it really possible?Surprisingly, time travel is not forbidden by the laws of physics - and John Gribbin argues that if it is not impossible then it must be possible.Gribbin brilliantly illustrates the possibilities of time travel by comparing familiar themes from science fiction with their real-world scientific counterparts, including Einstein's theories of relativity, black holes, quantum physics, and the multiverse, illuminated by examples from the fictional tales of Robert Heinlein, Larry Niven, Carl Sagan and others.The result is an entertaining guide to some deep mysteries of the Universe which may leave you wondering whether time actually passes at all, and if it does, whether we are moving forwards or backwards. A must-read for science fiction fans and anyone intrigued by deep science.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt said that “Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and Count Rumford are the greatest minds that America has produced,” and indeed, Rumford was a peer of theirs, and arguably contributed more to the scientific canon, and yet is nowhere near as well known. Born in the British Americas as Benjamin Thompson, he died a count and a knight, and lived a fascinating, eventful life in between, founding the Royal Institution in London, inventing a better chimney (still in widespread use) for open fires, finding time along the way to invent the coffee percolator and the enclosed oven, and most importantly pioneering our modern understanding of heat. White Knight, Red Heat tells the story of this notable figure in book form for the first time in over twenty years.Sir Benjamin Thompson, Count von Rumford, was an American-born British physicist, government administrator, and a founder of the Royal Institution of Great Britain, London. His investigations of heat overturned the theory that heat is a liquid form of matter and established the beginnings of the modern theory that heat is a form of motion.Loyal to the British crown, he served as a spy after the outbreak of the American Revolution, but in 1776 he was forced to flee to London, leaving his wife and daughter behind. Knighted by King George III in 1784, Thompson introduced numerous social reforms and brought James Watt’s steam engine into common use... He was created a Count of the Holy Roman Empire in 1791. Interest in gunpowder and weaponry stimulated his physical investigations, and in 1798 he began his studies of heat and friction, making one of the earliest measurements of the equivalence of heat and mechanical energy.

'Gribbin casts a wide net and displays his breadth of knowledge in packing a lot into each chapter . . . a brief read, but one that may inspire readers to dig deeper.' Giles Sparrow, BBC Sky at Night MagazineA mind-warping excursion into the wildly improbable truths of science.Echoing Sherlock Holmes' famous dictum, John Gribbin tells us: 'Once you have eliminated the impossible, whatever is left, however improbable, is certainly possible, in the light of present scientific knowledge.' With that in mind, in his sequel to the hugely popular Six Impossible Things and Seven Pillars of Science, Gribbin turns his attention to some of the mind-bendingly improbable truths of science. For example:We know that the Universe had a beginning, and when it was - and also that the expansion of the Universe is speeding up. We can detect ripples in space that are one ten-thousandth the width of a proton, made by colliding black holes billions of light years from Earth.And, most importantly from our perspective, all complex life on Earth today is descended from a single cell - but without the stabilising influence of the Moon, life forms like us could never have evolved.

The revolution is here. In breakthrough after breakthrough, pioneering physicists are unlocking a new quantum universe which provides a better representation of reality than our everyday experiences and common sense ever could. The birth of quantum computers - which, like Schrödinger's famous dead-and-alive cat, rely on entities like electrons existing in a mixture of states - is starting to turn the computing world on its head.In his fascinating study of this cutting-edge technology (first published as Computing with Quantum Cats and now featuring a new foreword), John Gribbin updates his previous views on the nature of quantum reality, arguing for a universe of many parallel worlds where 'everything is real'. Looking back to Alan Turing's work on the Enigma machine and the first electronic computer, Gribbin explains how quantum theory developed to make quantum computers work in practice as well as in principle. He takes us beyond the arena of theoretical physics to explore their practical applications - from machines which learn through 'intuition' and trial and error to unhackable laptops and smartphones. And he investigates the potential for this extraordinary science to allow communication faster than light and even teleportation, as we step into a world of infinite possibility.

Looking back to Alan Turing's work on the Enigma machine and the first electronic computer, and featuring a new introduction on the recent evolution of quantum computing, author John Gribbin explains how quantum theory developed to make quantum computers work in practice as well as in principle, taking us beyond the arena of theoretical physics to explore the potential for this extraordinary science.

Time travel is a familiar theme of science fiction, but is it really possible?

A scintillating collection of short essays that really does cover 'life, the Universe, and everything'.

The theory of evolution by natural selection did not spring fully formed and unprecedented from the brain of Charles Darwin. The idea of evolution had been around, in various guises, since the time of Ancient Greece. And nor did theorizing about evolution stop with what Daniel Dennett called "Darwin’s dangerous idea." In this riveting new book, bestselling science writers John and Mary Gribbin explore the history of the idea of evolution, showing how Darwin's theory built on what went before and how it was developed in the twentieth century, through an understanding of genetics and the biochemical basis of evolution, into the so-called "modern synthesis" and beyond. Darwin deserves his recognition as the primary proponent of the idea of natural selection, but as the authors show, his contribution was one link in a chain that extends back into antiquity and is still being forged today.

The seven fundamental â?? and surprising â?? scientific truths of our existence.

Born in Vienna, Austria, Erwin Schr dinger (1887-1961) was the only child of a Catholic father and an Austrian-English Lutheran mother. He attended the University of Vienna, receiving his doctorate in 1910. For the next 45 years, he held positions at many different universities in Europe, the U.K., and the U.S., a result both of his antipathy to Nazism, as well as his unconventional lifestyle, which often involved living with multiple women at a time. After appointments at Oxford, Princeton, and the University of Graz in Austria, Schr dinger was invited in 1938 to help set up the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, where, from 1940 until his retirement in 1955, he served as the director of the School for Theoretical Physics. In addition to his groundbreaking work in physics-for which he received the Nobel Prize in 1933-Schr dinger had a lifelong interest in philosophy and Eastern religion, and his lectures and writings included discussions of such topics as consciousness, free will, and the nature of reality.In Simply Schr dinger, acclaimed science writer John Gribbin takes the measure of this singular scientist, who stands with Einstein, Heisenberg, and Dirac as one of the creators of a new scientific reality. While the focus is primarily on Schr dinger's particular contributions to quantum physics-including wave mechanics and wave-particle duality, as well as the famous feline-Gribbin also delves into Schr dinger's fascination with Eastern philosophy and the other distinctive traits that differentiated him from his peers and made him who he was.Written in a personable and accessible style that minimizes jargon and doesn't require a degree in physics, Simply Schr dinger is a fascinating introduction to one of the giants of the 20th century, who blazed his own trail in science and in life.

A Waterstones Best Book of 2020 The theory of evolution by natural selection did not spring fully formed and unprecedented from the brain of Charles Darwin. Rather it has been examined and debated by philosophers the world over for thousands of years.

'Gribbin casts a wide net and displays his breadth of knowledge in packing a lot into each chapter . . . a brief read, but one that may inspire readers to dig deeper.' Giles Sparrow, BBC Sky at Night MagazineA mind-warping excursion into the wildly improbable truths of science.Echoing Sherlock Holmes' famous dictum, John Gribbin tells us: 'Once you have eliminated the impossible, whatever is left, however improbable, is certainly possible, in the light of present scientific knowledge.' With that in mind, in his sequel to the hugely popular Six Impossible Things and Seven Pillars of Science, Gribbin turns his attention to some of the mind-bendingly improbable truths of science. For example:We know that the Universe had a beginning, and when it was - and also that the expansion of the Universe is speeding up. We can detect ripples in space that are one ten-thousandth the width of a proton, made by colliding black holes billions of light years from Earth.And, most importantly from our perspective, all complex life on Earth today is descended from a single cell - but without the stabilising influence of the Moon, life forms like us could never have evolved.

SHORTLISTED FOR THE ROYAL SOCIETY INSIGHT INVESTMENT SCIENCE BOOK PRIZE 2019.'An accessible primer on all things quantum' - Sunday TimesQuantum physics is strange. It tells us that a particle can be in two places at once. Indeed, that particle is also a wave, and everything in the quantum world can be described entirely in terms of waves, or entirely in terms of particles, whichever you prefer. All of this was clear by the end of the 1920s. But to the great distress of many physicists, let alone ordinary mortals, nobody has ever been able to come up with a common sense explanation of what is going on. Physicists have sought 'quanta of solace' in a variety of more or less convincing interpretations. Popular science master John Gribbin takes us on a delightfully mind-bending tour through the 'big six', from the Copenhagen interpretation via the pilot wave and many worlds approaches. All of them are crazy, and some are more crazy than others, but in this world crazy does not necessarily mean wrong, and being more crazy does not necessarily mean more wrong.

A Waterstones Best Book of 2020 The theory of evolution by natural selection did not spring fully formed and unprecedented from the brain of Charles Darwin. Rather it has been examined and debated by philosophers the world over for thousands of years.