Tales of the Quantum: Understanding Physics? Most Fundamental Theory

Art Hobson

ISBN 10: 0190679638 / ISBN 13: 9780190679637

Published by Oxford University Press Inc, 2017

Num Pages: 304 pages, 31. BIC Classification: PHQ. Category: (G) General (US: Trade). Dimension: 242 x 163 x 23. Weight in Grams: 590. . 2017. 1st Edition. Hardcover. . . . . Seller Inventory # V9780190679637

Synopsis:

Everybody has heard that we live in a world made of atoms. But far more fundamentally, we live in a universe made of quanta. Many things are not made of atoms: light, radio waves, electric current, magnetic fields, Earth's gravitational field, not to mention exotica such a neutron stars, black holes, dark energy, and dark matter. But everything, including atoms, is made of highly unified or "coherent" bundles of energy called "quanta" that (like everything else) obey certain rules. In the case of the quantum, these rules are called "quantum physics." This is a book about quanta and their unexpected, some would say peculiar, behavior--tales, if you will, of the quantum.

The quantum has developed the reputation of being capricious, bewildering, even impossible to understand. The peculiar habits of quanta are certainly not what we would have expected to find at the foundation of physical reality, but these habits are not necessarily bewildering and not at all impossible or paradoxical. This book explains those habits--the quantum rules--in everyday language, without mathematics or unnecessary technicalities. While most popular books about quantum physics follow the topic's scientific history from 1900 to today, this book follows the phenomena: wave-particle duality, fundamental randomness, quantum states, superpositions (being in two places at once), entanglement, non-locality, Schrodinger's cat, and quantum jumps, and presents the history and the scientists only to the extent that they illuminate the phenomena.

About the Author: Art Hobson is a Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, where he continues to keep a campus office and remains quite active in research.

Bibliographic Details

Title: Tales of the Quantum: Understanding Physics?...
Publisher: Oxford University Press Inc
Publication Date: 2017
Binding: Hardcover
Condition: New
Edition: 1st Edition