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Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Einstein
You're no idiot of course. You know that Albert Einstein came up with the famous "E=mc" equation and that his hair looked like it had survived a nuclear test blast. But when it comes to understanding his theories and how they changed the world--well, you're no Einstein. Don't go nuclear yet! The Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Einstein shows how relatively easy--and fun--it can be to learn and appreciate the world of physics and Einstein's brillant accomplishments.
- GenresScienceNonfiction
400 pages, Paperback
First published October 4, 1999
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
February 28, 2022
The book provides a good overview of the backdrop to Einstein’s theories, the theories themselves, and then the world of quantum physics that, though prompted by Einstein, quickly moved into its own orbit, putatively leaving Einstein behind.
From the author’s account, the relationship between matter, energy, light, mass, particle and wave is unclear. In his description of de Broglie, energy’s properties seem to be mass or light, or matter’s properties seem to be particles containing energy and waves containing (non-particle) energy. Then, writing about Einstein, the author also seems to say that light is the overarching term and it contains particle energy and wave energy. (1)
Particles can be massless, yet they contain energy via waves (not just light energy but all particles). Yet, as mass is defined as a measure of a body’s energy content, how is it that light is massless, i.e., void of energy? Or, if as the author says, an object without mass is a wave, how is it that an object is the term used, i.e., how is nothing (no mass, only momentum) an object? It’s said that matter (or energy) has a dual particle-wave nature, but this is situational and not at the same time/situation (or is it?), so then the question is how is it that a wave can be a particle (object) at the same time? (2)
The author divides energy into (a) mass energy and (b) momentum energy to further describe this particle (mass) and massless (wave momentum) energy. (3) So, here energy seems to be the umbrella concept that comes in two forms: particle (with mass; objects with dimension) and wave (massless; non-particle/object). It’s almost as if mass energy is locked up, concentrated energy and light is released energy, manifested as momentum (massless waves, and maximally, the speed of light). (4)
Since these are key terms, it would have been helpful if the author had sorted this out in one place. The Glossary, unfortunately, was no help. It contained a full suite of fluffy (for a book on Einstein’s theories) terms (self, Reich, Socratic method, I Ching, etc.) but not key terms like particle, wave, momentum, matter, light, and energy.
A few other questions prompted by reading this book:
If gravity is an inward force, and as the Earth is a sphere, is not the center of the Earth a singularity where gravitational force is both at its maximum (in this “local” situation) and minimum force (zero, as the gravitational attraction can be no more)?
The term “propagation” is expressed as movement (the transmission of something through space, particularly light waves), yet it is without an explanation of why there is movement or what creates it.
Why is heat released by the movement of molecules? We know it is, but what’s going on to make this happen?
Under entropy, in a closed system, where does energy go? Presumably, it is rearranged but how does this work in an open-ended (no known boundary) cosmic system where one of the three scenarios is said to be the dissipation of heat and, eventually, “heat death?”
Einstein is said to have been engaged in a futile quest to unite macro (gravity) and micro (quantum) worlds, and faulted for doing such, including the fact that quantum physics passed him by. While this “charge” is repeated by other writers on Einstein, what could be more important than to attempt to address this question that was and is one of physics’ central questions?
This thing about momentum and position and the uncertainty principle is said to be proof of quantum randomness, as opposed to linear-like causality (a point of view that Einstein refused to concede?). Isn’t this taking some liberties as it seems that there is the possibility, even though it is physically impossible, given current technology, to measure both at the same time (light influences the object seen)?
There is said to be no repulsive force to gravity, yet there is inertia that resists movement (from the attractive force). Is resistance the same as repulsion, in the sense that both say “no” to gravitational attraction (the movement toward a more massive body)?
Regular matter is said by the author to contain only 1% of the cosmos’s mass (the author refers to the rest as dark matter, and says nothing about dark energy; he wrote the book in 1999 - and later books say that the 1% figure is as high as 15%). Does this 1% figure roughly estimate the creation of mass after the matter and antimatter annihilation just after the big bang and, if so, is there any connection?
Are neutron stars (energy-matter collapse into ultra compact neutron states) a clue about the pre-matter state that existed in the pre-big bang?
If the big bang creates time and space (and pre-big bang singularities eliminate time and space), what does the big bang explode into? The answer is typically, “Nothing.” That answer is not satisfying. It’s the same question about what lies at the outer reaches of the big bang energy field today (i.e., 13 billion years ago). We know/suspect there is a boundary, and we know what lies on one side, but why do we presume that on the other side is and can only be “nothing?”
The author spends a lot of time in this book on non-Einstein theories. Boiled down, the author extensively floats his own paradigm for a world that incorporates Einsteinian science with religious or semi-religious (Plato, Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism) ways of knowing the world. The author points out possible parallels in both modes of thinking - science as we know it (a body of objective knowledge as verified by others and experiment) and the assertions of belief and faith. The problem in this book is not only that the author strays from Einstein proper, but that he formulates in effect his own principle of equivalence: both are valid ways of knowing the world. Such assertions take liberties. Just because we don’t know that much about the big bang (or its precursors) is not the same thing as an assertion that it was God’s emergence in the world. A most serious treatment of these ultimate questions that both science and religion attempt to answer was provided by Herbert Spencer: We not only do not know, we cannot know the answers to these questions. This philosophical humility contrasts, dramatically, with the author’s approach who fills that void with his own narrative that gives credence to a body of thought that very possibly results from an evolutionarily-derived need to live forever.
Toward the end of the book, the author relates an Einstein death bed story: "Around 1:00 a.m. on April 18, his night nurse came in to check on him and found that his breathing was labored. She raised his head on a pillow and heard him mumble something in German. She didn't know the language, so she had no idea what he said. Shortly thereafter he died."
(1) In extreme big bang or black hole scenarios, matter breaks down into some pre-particle state, so that then, energy itself (in some kind of “foam”) seems to be primary and matter/particle secondary.
(2) The author states that the motion of a particle is as a wave, and it becomes an object/particle “upon contact” with another object - “quantum particles travel like waves, but arrive as particles.”
(3) But, again, if mass is defined as a measure of a body’s energy level, does this mean (non-body) light has no energy?
(4) The confusion thickens when photons that transfer (carry) light as a wave are described as particles. So here, a particle is a wave?
From the author’s account, the relationship between matter, energy, light, mass, particle and wave is unclear. In his description of de Broglie, energy’s properties seem to be mass or light, or matter’s properties seem to be particles containing energy and waves containing (non-particle) energy. Then, writing about Einstein, the author also seems to say that light is the overarching term and it contains particle energy and wave energy. (1)
Particles can be massless, yet they contain energy via waves (not just light energy but all particles). Yet, as mass is defined as a measure of a body’s energy content, how is it that light is massless, i.e., void of energy? Or, if as the author says, an object without mass is a wave, how is it that an object is the term used, i.e., how is nothing (no mass, only momentum) an object? It’s said that matter (or energy) has a dual particle-wave nature, but this is situational and not at the same time/situation (or is it?), so then the question is how is it that a wave can be a particle (object) at the same time? (2)
The author divides energy into (a) mass energy and (b) momentum energy to further describe this particle (mass) and massless (wave momentum) energy. (3) So, here energy seems to be the umbrella concept that comes in two forms: particle (with mass; objects with dimension) and wave (massless; non-particle/object). It’s almost as if mass energy is locked up, concentrated energy and light is released energy, manifested as momentum (massless waves, and maximally, the speed of light). (4)
Since these are key terms, it would have been helpful if the author had sorted this out in one place. The Glossary, unfortunately, was no help. It contained a full suite of fluffy (for a book on Einstein’s theories) terms (self, Reich, Socratic method, I Ching, etc.) but not key terms like particle, wave, momentum, matter, light, and energy.
A few other questions prompted by reading this book:
If gravity is an inward force, and as the Earth is a sphere, is not the center of the Earth a singularity where gravitational force is both at its maximum (in this “local” situation) and minimum force (zero, as the gravitational attraction can be no more)?
The term “propagation” is expressed as movement (the transmission of something through space, particularly light waves), yet it is without an explanation of why there is movement or what creates it.
Why is heat released by the movement of molecules? We know it is, but what’s going on to make this happen?
Under entropy, in a closed system, where does energy go? Presumably, it is rearranged but how does this work in an open-ended (no known boundary) cosmic system where one of the three scenarios is said to be the dissipation of heat and, eventually, “heat death?”
Einstein is said to have been engaged in a futile quest to unite macro (gravity) and micro (quantum) worlds, and faulted for doing such, including the fact that quantum physics passed him by. While this “charge” is repeated by other writers on Einstein, what could be more important than to attempt to address this question that was and is one of physics’ central questions?
This thing about momentum and position and the uncertainty principle is said to be proof of quantum randomness, as opposed to linear-like causality (a point of view that Einstein refused to concede?). Isn’t this taking some liberties as it seems that there is the possibility, even though it is physically impossible, given current technology, to measure both at the same time (light influences the object seen)?
There is said to be no repulsive force to gravity, yet there is inertia that resists movement (from the attractive force). Is resistance the same as repulsion, in the sense that both say “no” to gravitational attraction (the movement toward a more massive body)?
Regular matter is said by the author to contain only 1% of the cosmos’s mass (the author refers to the rest as dark matter, and says nothing about dark energy; he wrote the book in 1999 - and later books say that the 1% figure is as high as 15%). Does this 1% figure roughly estimate the creation of mass after the matter and antimatter annihilation just after the big bang and, if so, is there any connection?
Are neutron stars (energy-matter collapse into ultra compact neutron states) a clue about the pre-matter state that existed in the pre-big bang?
If the big bang creates time and space (and pre-big bang singularities eliminate time and space), what does the big bang explode into? The answer is typically, “Nothing.” That answer is not satisfying. It’s the same question about what lies at the outer reaches of the big bang energy field today (i.e., 13 billion years ago). We know/suspect there is a boundary, and we know what lies on one side, but why do we presume that on the other side is and can only be “nothing?”
The author spends a lot of time in this book on non-Einstein theories. Boiled down, the author extensively floats his own paradigm for a world that incorporates Einsteinian science with religious or semi-religious (Plato, Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism) ways of knowing the world. The author points out possible parallels in both modes of thinking - science as we know it (a body of objective knowledge as verified by others and experiment) and the assertions of belief and faith. The problem in this book is not only that the author strays from Einstein proper, but that he formulates in effect his own principle of equivalence: both are valid ways of knowing the world. Such assertions take liberties. Just because we don’t know that much about the big bang (or its precursors) is not the same thing as an assertion that it was God’s emergence in the world. A most serious treatment of these ultimate questions that both science and religion attempt to answer was provided by Herbert Spencer: We not only do not know, we cannot know the answers to these questions. This philosophical humility contrasts, dramatically, with the author’s approach who fills that void with his own narrative that gives credence to a body of thought that very possibly results from an evolutionarily-derived need to live forever.
Toward the end of the book, the author relates an Einstein death bed story: "Around 1:00 a.m. on April 18, his night nurse came in to check on him and found that his breathing was labored. She raised his head on a pillow and heard him mumble something in German. She didn't know the language, so she had no idea what he said. Shortly thereafter he died."
(1) In extreme big bang or black hole scenarios, matter breaks down into some pre-particle state, so that then, energy itself (in some kind of “foam”) seems to be primary and matter/particle secondary.
(2) The author states that the motion of a particle is as a wave, and it becomes an object/particle “upon contact” with another object - “quantum particles travel like waves, but arrive as particles.”
(3) But, again, if mass is defined as a measure of a body’s energy level, does this mean (non-body) light has no energy?
(4) The confusion thickens when photons that transfer (carry) light as a wave are described as particles. So here, a particle is a wave?
January 5, 2020
I can’t say that I understand Einstein’s theories a whole lot better than I did before, but his life was fascinating. The lives and thoughts of the other intellectuals he interacted with were also mind expanding.
June 8, 2019
Some of the books in this kind of series are actually well-written and useful. In this case we have an overview of Einstein's science starting with the ancient Greeks and continuing past Einstein's death in 1955. The design includes sidebars that are very helpful in understanding the science.
This book also covers Einstein's biography including much about his life and work outside of science.
It can serve either as a very good introduction to physics and related sciences or as a starting point for learning more about those fields.
This book also covers Einstein's biography including much about his life and work outside of science.
It can serve either as a very good introduction to physics and related sciences or as a starting point for learning more about those fields.
March 16, 2013
Not entirely about Einstein, but a deeply interesting and well-written book. The author is good at putting Einstein's discoveries in a grand context, starting with the classical physics of Newton and Kepler. This is a good general book for some aspects of science history. But hey, the copy editor here didn't check the spelling of 'Schrodinger', as in the guy that made the 'Schrodinger's Cat' critique of one school of quantum mechanics. It's mispelled here about a dozen times as sort of a Charlie Brown/Peanuts' 'Schroedinger'....a middling point, i know. This book is a must-read for trivia buffs, as the vital knowledge that Einstein and Szilard co-patented a kitchen refrigerator design is an essential factoid in the repertoire of any true science geek.
April 27, 2023
As far as the book goes, this is a perfectly reasonable introduction to popular physics through the lens of being about "Einstein".
I certainly enjoyed reading it as a teenager and while there are much better resources out there now for understanding both physics and science history, this isn't necessarily for that.
Taken as a light guide for a curious mind I think it's a reasonable book to have on your shelves.
I certainly enjoyed reading it as a teenager and while there are much better resources out there now for understanding both physics and science history, this isn't necessarily for that.
Taken as a light guide for a curious mind I think it's a reasonable book to have on your shelves.
March 4, 2009
I love the "Dummies" and "Idiots" books. You can learn enough to decide if you want to explore a subject further or simply be motivated to read more about a particular event or piece of information you've been newly introduced to. This was a fantastic book, well written and entertaining as well as educational.
October 1, 2015
This is a good book for introducing young people to the works of Albert Einstein. The book surveys his life, but also explains his contributions in an accessible manner. This is not a math book, so the depth of it only goes so far into physics. Nonetheless, if all you have heard about Einstein is E=MC2, then you will be astounded by the work that Einstein accomplished in his lifetime.
February 26, 2016
Fun little book...cool facts...and a good distraction from the day. Enjoy it an learn that one of the greatest minds was also very attuned to the practical and that resulted in elegant thoughts. Something most leaders should consider....practial and elegant thought.
March 18, 2025
Einstein can be hard to understand even when broken down and made simple for idiots like me! This was a very good book, informative and enjoyable
May 30, 2013
I must be a real idiot because I couldn't keep up. :)
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews