List of books that are acceptable as evidence

[ydoaPs]

I meant more the video lectures which I think are one of the great contributions to online pedagogy - but the book was brilliant nevertheless

Ah, yes, I forgot they were based on the video lectures. I liked the video lectures, but they didn't do them in studio (they just filmed actual lectures), so you get all of the misspeaks that are corrected in the text. It was somewhat distracting for me. Then again, I also like to hold a book and be able to flip through pages and literally write in margins.

 

For those interested:

Volume 1 (Classical Mechanics)

Volume 2 (Quantum)

 

These are actually the only popsci books that I'd recommend (seen the lectures 2 is based on, so unless he went insane during writing, it should be just as good) for anyone who actually wants to learn what the theories say instead of learning oversimplified cartoon versions of things like you'd find in anything written by Greene.

[Schneibster]

Hi Schneibster! I think you mean "pedagogic" not "pedantic", right? (Being a pedant and all, I thought I'd make that clear....)

 

Well, Lizzie, I wondered if that was you. Perhaps here we can talk about science instead of board politics.

 

You are of course correct.

 

Does TRIUMF count? (I think it does) Because the answer is yes; I have done research there.

 

——

 

I really don't want to get dragged into this quagmire, but the notion that everything written in a book by a well-regarded scientist is correct and can't be challenged is nonsense. Especially in a pop-sci book.

 

I've seen claims that Susskind has been "denounced" and called a crank by someone (presumably me). The only real interest I have in this thread at this point is a post either supporting those claims with evidence (i.e. actual quotes), or retracting them.

 

OK, well if you want to have a urinating match regarding pedagogic techniques with Leonard Susskind please include me out.

 

I was OK with his pedagogic technique. It was obvious to me that he was speaking metaphorically. Electrons flying along the beam inside a TV tube don't randomly emit photons as his description would require if taken literally.

 

So, you're a PI? May I ask if you're running any experiments right now? Do you have any teaching duties?

What are popsci books evidence of, exactly?

 

So would you call Gravitation pop-sci?

 

How about Quantum Field Theory, A Modern Introduction?

 

How about The Feynman Lectures in Physics?

I think scientists who are contemptuous of popular science forgot where their money comes from, quite frankly.

Edited February 21, 2014 by Schneibster

[ydoaPs]

So would you call Gravitation pop-sci?

Out-dated, yes. Popsci, no.

 

How about Quantum Field Theory, A Modern Introduction?

Same as above.

 

I think scientists who are contemptuous of popular science forgot where their money comes from, quite frankly.

They're 'contemptuous', because it's so oversimplified to being wrong. Popsci, with very few exceptions, is actually misinformation.

[Schneibster]

They're 'contemptuous', because it's so oversimplified to being wrong. Popsci, with very few exceptions, is actually misinformation.

 

This strikes me as very ideological and approximately equivalent to banning girls from the treehouse.

And BTW Gravitation is not "out-moded."

 

 

How about Thomas-Finney?

 

Do you even know what that is?

OK, let's start with Thomas-Finney: ISBN 0-201-53174-7 Calculus Ninth Edition Addison-Wesley 1996

I'm sure that's totally obsolete by now, right?

Dude, do you own a copy or have you ever see a copy of Gravitation?

 

Misner/Thorne/Wheeler 1970 ISBN 0-7167-0334-3 Gravitation Twenty-fourth Printing W. H. Freeman and Co. 2005

 

It's like a telephone book, like the Principia only bigger. Really. I own a recent translation of the Principia and can attest Gravitation is bigger.

 

Newton, (transl. by) Cohen/Whitman 1999 ISBN 978-0-520-08817-7 Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, University of California Press

 

I cannot imagine the arrogance necessary to call it "outmoded." It's like calling relativity "obsolete."

 

Morrison 1990. ISBN 0-13-747908-5 Understanding Quantum Physics Prentice-Hall.

Itzykson/Zuber 1980 ISBN 0-486-44568-2 Quantum Field Theory Dover Press.

Icke 1995 ISBN 0-521-40495-9 The Force of Symmetry Cambridge University Press.

Meijer/Bauer 1964, with a 2005 preface, ISBN 0-486-43798-1 Group Theory Dover Press.

Harrison 1980 ISBN 0-486-66021-4 Electronic Structure and the Properties of Solids Dover Press.

Hughes 1989 ISBN 0-674-84392-4 The Structure and Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics Harvard University Press

Moore 1962 ISBN Not Applicable "Physical Chemistry" Prentice-Hall Third edition

 

So far. I'll keep looking. That's in addition to every other book I've mentioned.

 

Kaku 1993 ISBN 0-19-507652-4 Quantum Field Theory: a Modern Introduction Oxford University Press

Feynman/Leighton/Sands 1963 ISBN 0-201- 02116-1 The Feynman Lectures on Physics Addison-Wesley Sixth Printing 1977

Kaku 1988 ISBN 0-387-98589-1 Introduction to Superstrings and M-Theory Springer-Verlag, New York, 2nd edition, 1999

When we're done with the textbooks I'll talk about some of the popular science books. They're actually fairly accurate; mostly they're just incomplete and imprecise. OTOH their audience is just trying to understand, not invent new physics (except the nutjobs). So I would rate the accuracy as more important than either the completeness or the precision. OTO, OH, I also wouldn't criticize a good try at pedagogy. Or, heh, even pedantry.

 

It's always amusing watching "physics is super difficult" cranks try to deal with Feynman explaining QED. But that's for later. Let's start with the textbooks first.

I'm almost out of physics books. It's about time for the electronics textbooks.

 

Then we can discuss the software textbooks.

 

And the networking textbooks.

 

That list will be about two hundred volumes. That is, after all, what I do for a living: systems engineering for large Internet sites. Physics is only my hobby; I only have a few books on it.

 

Oh and there are the astronomy books; and the astrophotography and wildlife photography books. And the books about filters, and films, and CCDs, and computer image processing, and digital processing, and so forth. That's another twenty volumes.

 

I'll wait until tomorrow.

Edited February 22, 2014 by Schneibster

[Acme]

This thread strikes me as very querulous and approximately equivalent to braggadocio. What am I supposed to be learning here?

[Schneibster]

Actually I hope you're getting a list of books you should read. And if you think it's too many I will pare it down to the bare essentials for you. I think these bare essentials are what everyone should know before they discuss 21st century cosmology.

 

And I am open to correction and eagerly anticipate updates which will result in the purchase of more books.

 

Ask my opinion and I will freely give it; but most of what I say is simply fact and I strive to delineate opinions with statements that they are opinions.

 

How can I help you understand?

 

I hate to say it but I fail to see why you should consider the size of someone else's library excessive when you presumably have access to a scientific university library which is no doubt more extensive than mine.

Not to mention I was requested to make this list.

 

Perhaps you should criticize the person who asked. I'm not minded to; I think it was a legitimate question and will help people understand where I'm coming from, to know what I've read. I'd say that pretending it's "bragging" is evidence of a prejudice.

BTW I have these books in two stacks next to my couch seat. I'm going to keep them there for a week or so, but after that sorry they need to be put back away in the shelves so I can vacuum.

 

So can we finish this up soon please?

Seriously you guys better get over this before I trip over this stuff. It's like really two stacks a foot tall in the way of me getting food. Rhhhhggggahhhh>crunch<!!!

Edited February 22, 2014 by Schneibster

[Implicate Order]

 

BTW I have these books in two stacks next to my couch seat. I'm going to keep them there for a week or so, but after that sorry they need to be put back away in the shelves so I can vacuum.

 

 

 

LOL. Your lounge sounds like mine. The only problem is I am finding it hard to get the books into the library. Each book is taking about 2 to 3 reads each as I am shifting between relativity, quantum mechanics, thermodynamics, complexity theory, information theory, genetics and cognitive sciences......... and I am sufferring from a growing backlog and acute anxiety /TIC.

Edited February 22, 2014 by Implicate Order

[Schneibster]

You're a genius if it only takes 2 or 3!!!

 

 

And I haven't gone shopping for linear algebra books. Which is my next step up in the implicate order.

[Implicate Order]

You're a genius if it only takes 2 or 3!!!

 

 

Well I may be fibbing a bit. I am constantly cross-referring between books as when I come across something it reminds me to have a re-read of an earlier book to get a different perspective on the matter. Things like food, sleep, kids, wife, dog, cat and other classical emergent phenomena don't seem to get a look-in at the moment.

[Schneibster]

Wife cats and heart disease for me, and hopefully shortly less heart disease and more job.

[Implicate Order]

Wife cats and heart disease for me, and hopefully shortly less heart disease and more job.

 

Good to see you are getting your health back......but I don't like the trade-off that's occurring with the job. I am working out the 'death' thing at the moment. After that I suppose I have to look at the 'tax' thing, but a monastery is looking good at the moment. Some polytechnic somewhere in the Alps has a certain appeal.

[Schneibster]

Don't get me started. I come here to escape from that crap.

[Implicate Order]

Don't get me started. I come here to escape from that crap.

 

Your secret is safe. No more mention of the job from me Herr Schneibster

[studiot]

 

This thread strikes me as very querulous and approximately equivalent to braggadocio. What am I supposed to be learning here?

 

 

 

+1

 

querulous

 

I would start my list with the The Shorter Oxford.

[ajb]

Let me just take the book Graviton as a specific example. It is a good book that contains lots of material that anyone serious about making contributions to general relativity should know (or at least be aware of) before attempting to make such contributions. It is good for well established mathematical structures and calculations in GR and some field theory. However, there has been lots of papers since the book was published and it cannot properly represent the most current thinking. This is especially true of the applications in cosmology.

 

Similar things can be said about any textbook or monograph.

 

Thus you have to be a little careful with any textbook, but for the most part when discussing well established physics they should be fine as a reference.

 

Again, similar things can be said about published papers that are now dated. They may not properly represent modern thinking and this should be taken into account.

 

As a side remark, the oldest paper I have cited is from 1855! But that is a well known results and maybe I could have skipped it.

Edited February 22, 2014 by ajb

[swansont]

 

OK, well if you want to have a urinating match regarding pedagogic techniques with Leonard Susskind please include me out.

 

 

You asked a question, and I answered it. I didn't start the discussion down this path and I doubt anyone following along is going to be fooled by the misdirection.

[Ophiolite]

I am not qualified to comment on popular science books on physics and cosmology. I do feel competent to comment on those on geology, some aspects of evolutionary biology, exobiology and planetology. (If I am not, then the staff should revoke my Expert status.) I find these generally to be of a high standard. I find the almost blanket rejection of popsci in general, by some posters, to be worrisome, as it lacks objectivity and due diligence.

[Implicate Order]

Nice post Ophiolite.

 

While there is a stigma attached with pop-sci books in many science forums I have frequented, for those avid readers of pop-science it becomes patently obvious through the analogies given by many of the ardent critics, that they themselves are utilising pop-science contributions in their forum contributions. To a well read enthusiast it stands out like proverbial hanging bits on canines. To the cynics amongst us, this reads to us as perhaps an ardent critic who does not wish to come clean where all there wordly knowledge has been drawn from. How many times do we have to hear the trampoline being pulled out onto the lawn to describe gravitation from those that perhaps should know better. How many expanding balloon analogies do we need to hear to explain space-time expansion, how many Einstein's biggest blunder remarks do we have to hear from the authoritative camps.....and it goes on and on thanks to the regurgitative use in pop-science. I don't see these analogies for example coming from peer reviewed papers but then again, I don't see better analogies coming from the scientists themselves.

 

Furthermore to the pop-sci reader (dare I say it) who actually may have some inclination about the science involved from their readings, it also stands out when a supposed expert writes a few lines of dribble in an attempt to profess a statement about their very special knowledge that they are unwilling to divulge to the forum community.

 

In a Science Forum (or perhaps a pop-science forum such as this) it would be healthy to discuss science in a way that has general appeal for all the community as opposed to leaving bits of morse code as posts that offer nothing to discussion with the false perception that the mystical post somehow adds value to the discussion. More openness and transparency in forums such as these adds to dialogue and increases membership. Please note that while this post is directed at many forums, it is my experience that this forum is actually one of the better ones. That's why I am here for example, as I enjoy discussion with all forms of contributor. It is far more tolerant than many others where peer pressure turns them into pseudo fundamentalist camps for science enthusiasts of a particular leaning.

 

Unfortunately, while the critics might not want to admit it, it is the pop-sci books which give us the tools to be able to discuss things on a science forum such as this so that the discussions can be held across a wide audience.

 

What scientists have to realise is that it is essential that there ideas can be relayed to the masses in a coherent and understandable way, for their very funding depends on it. Not only that, but the material contained in these pop-sci books may actually spark and interest from a scientists heavily involved in a related or disparate field to 'new ideas' that may spark a new approach in their methodology. The pop-sci books also have probably made a significant contribution to encouraging a greater interest in science and also in inspiring the lay-person to join the ranks of the scientific elite.

 

If we can climb down from our high horses for a second, then perhaps we can appreciate the contributions a large number of eminent scientists have made to popular science including the likes of Hawking, Smolin, Greene, Kaku, Susskind, Penrose, Stenger, Fritszch, Livio, Atkins, Reiss, Carroll, Gleick, Gould, Dawkins, Krauss, Barrow, Gribbin, Feynman, Hofstadter, Stewart, Tegmark....etc., etc. etc.. I don't think all these contributions are worthless. There might actually be some science in them despite their *apparent* mass appeal and simplicity. Furthermore where do you draw the line between pop-sci and authoritative works. Do we dispatch all of Dawkins works to the pop-sci trash can?

Edited February 22, 2014 by Implicate Order

[Strange]

Actually I hope you're getting a list of books you should read.

 

Maybe you should ask a mod to change the title then (and delete the rather silly opening post).

[swansont]

While there is a stigma attached with pop-sci books in many science forums I have frequented, for those avid readers of pop-science it becomes patently obvious through the analogies given by many of the ardent critics, that they themselves are utilising pop-science contributions in their forum contributions. To a well read enthusiast it stands out like proverbial hanging bits on canines. To the cynics amongst us, this reads to us as perhaps an ardent critic who does not wish to come clean where all there wordly knowledge has been drawn from. How many times do we have to hear the trampoline being pulled out onto the lawn to describe gravitation from those that perhaps should know better. How many expanding balloon analogies do we need to hear to explain space-time expansion, how many Einstein's biggest blunder remarks do we have to hear from the authoritative camps.....and it goes on and on thanks to the regurgitative use in pop-science. I don't see these analogies for example coming from peer reviewed papers but then again, I don't see better analogies coming from the scientists themselves.

 

There's another physics blogger who goes by zapperz who made an apt comment on this subject in a review of a (very good) pop-sci book

 

To me, this is not teaching physics. It is teaching ABOUT physics. There's a difference. There is value in teaching about physics, and many pop-science books do a tremendous service to the field by introducing people to it. But it should not be confused with teaching physics. The latter involves imparting knowledge in such a way that the recipient obtains the ability and skill to use and apply the information. I consider being able to use F=ma and solve kinematical problems as a sign that someone has a knowledge of F=ma.

 

 

I agree with this, in general. Pop-sci books can do a tremendous service in people learning about science, but they are extremely limited in allowing the readers to do any science themselves. It's somewhat related to Feynman's story of the students who simply memorized facts, but learned no concepts. (The difference between leaning words and concepts pops up in several places in his talks and writing)

Which is a reason why peer-reviewed papers are not going to contain analogies (at least anywhere near the extent you see them in pop-sci books) because the papers contain the science itself. They are actually doing and communicating physics, not telling people about physics.

 

 

If we can climb down from our high horses for a second, then perhaps we can appreciate the contributions a large number of eminent scientists have made to popular science including the likes of Hawking, Smolin, Greene, Kaku, Susskind, Penrose, Stenger, Fritszch, Livio, Atkins, Reiss, Carroll, Gleick, Gould, Dawkins, Krauss, Barrow, Gribbin, Feynman, Hofstadter, Stewart, Tegmark....etc., etc. etc.. I don't think all these contributions are worthless. There might actually be some science in them despite their *apparent* mass appeal and simplicity. Furthermore where do you draw the line between pop-sci and authoritative works. Do we dispatch all of Dawkins works to the pop-sci trash can?

 

I don't think anyone has said they were trash or worthless. They can de-mystify science and make it (and the people who do it) less intimidating. It allows people to discuss things at some reasonable level. As imatfaal said, they can inspire people to learn more.

 

But let's face it. Some pop-sci is trash. What fraction of pop-sci articles on quantum entanglement claim tell us, in effect, that's it's a form of remote control — that if you wiggle one particle, its partner will wiggle in response? (Pretty sure Kaku has done this) How many teleportation articles imply that matter is being teleported, and (even worse) mention Star Trek? These are convenient analogies, but they're wrong, and they aren't the only ones.

 

The danger there is that the reader has no basis for knowing if it's trash or not, so these misconceptions get ingrained in the discussion, and that's a hurdle for discussion on a site like this — having to first un-do that damage.

[Ophiolite]

I don't think anyone has said they were trash or worthless.

I find it difficult to interpret this comment from ydoaPs in any other way:

 

"They're 'contemptuous', because it's so oversimplified to being wrong. Popsci, with very few exceptions, is actually misinformation."

[swansont]

I find it difficult to interpret this comment from ydoaPs in any other way:

 

"They're 'contemptuous', because it's so oversimplified to being wrong. Popsci, with very few exceptions, is actually misinformation."

 

Fair enough. I missed that one.

[Implicate Order]

Nice considered case Swansont and I agree with your sentiments. My post was directed at less considered viewpoints particularly from those apparent professionals out there whose hostile stance actually discourages enquiry from the lay audience.

Edited February 22, 2014 by Implicate Order

[studiot]

It's difficlt to know what to say in a thread that has clearly wandered off topic from a discussion of the general provenance of sources of any form to the specific bashing of a particle genre of writing.

 

I have been following this thread but so far only objected to some of the attitude of the OP, and it seems that several others have agreed with me.

 

I agree with Ophiolite.

 

There are many popsci writings that are far from trash.

 

The writings of the late Martin Garden and the not so late Ian Stewart come to mind.

 

Further surely the response to any input should be tailored to the level of sophistication of any discussion.

We do not try to explain Joule's experiment to a 16 year old via Noether's theorem for good reason.

 

So it follows that the level of any references should be commensurate with the level of the discussion.

[Schneibster]

I seriously doubt much of anything in Gravitation is superceded.

 

I would say a modern curriculum in relativity would be incompetently incomplete if it didn't include this textbook.

 

I'd look pretty askance at any paper that claimed to refute something in Gravitation. It would need to include extraordinary evidence.

 

I have to say I find the idea that relativity is "obsolete" or "superceded," well, quaint.

Edited February 22, 2014 by Schneibster