The Character of Physical Law - Softcover

Richard Feynman

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0262560038 ISBN 13: 9780262560030

Publisher: Mit Pr, 2001

Synopsis

In these Messenger Lectures, originally delivered at Cornell University and recorded for television by the BBC, Richard Feynman offers an overview of selected physical laws and gathers their common features into one broad principle of invariance. He maintains at the outset that the importance of a physical law is not "how clever we are to have found it out, but... how clever nature is to pay attention to it," and tends his discussions toward a final exposition of the elegance and simplicity of all scientific laws. Rather than an essay on the most significant achievements in modern science, The Character of Physical Law is a statement of what is most remarkable in nature. Feynman's enlightened approach, his wit, and his enthusiasm make this a memorable exposition of the scientist's craft. The Law of Gravitation is the author's principal example. Relating the details of its discovery and stressing its mathematical character, he uses it to demonstrate the essential interaction of mathematics and physics. He views mathematics as the key to any system of scientific laws, suggesting that if it were possible to fill out the structure of scientific theory completely, the result would be an integrated set of mathematical axioms. The principles of conservation, symmetry, and time-irreversibility are then considered in relation to developments in classical and modern physics, and in his final lecture Feynman develops his own analysis of the process and future of scientific discovery. Like any set of oral reflections, The Character of Physical Law has special value as a demonstration of the mind in action.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

Richard Feynman was perhaps the most brilliant, iconoclastic, and influential physicist of modern times. The Character of Physical law, first published in 1965, contains the text of seven brilliant lectures, originally delivered to standing-room-only audiences at Cornell University, that demonstrate Feyman's unique ability to bring his subject to life to the non-physicist.

About the Author:

Richard Feynman (1918–1988), awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1965 for work on quantum electrodynamics, was Professor of Theoretical Physics at CalTech. He was the author of QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter, Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! Adventures of a Curious Character, and other books.

About this edition

• Publisher: Mit Pr
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0262560038
• ISBN 13: 9780262560030
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 173