Gravity from the Ground Up: An Introductory Guide to Gravity and General Relativity

by Bernard F. Schutz

This book invites the reader to understand our Universe, not just marvel at it. From the clock-like motions of the planets to the catastrophic collapse of a star into a black hole, gravity controls the Universe. Gravity is central to modern physics, helping to answer the deepest questions about the nature of time, the origin of the Universe and the unification of the forces of nature. Linking key experiments and observations through careful physical reasoning, the author builds the reader's insight step-by-step from simple but profound facts about gravity on Earth to the frontiers of research. Topics covered include the nature of stars and galaxies, the mysteries of dark matter and dark energy, black holes, gravitational waves, inflation and the Big Bang. Suitable for general readers and for undergraduate courses, the treatment uses only high-school level mathematics, supplemented by optional computer programs, to explain the laws of physics governing gravity.

Genres: Physics, Science, Nonfiction, Textbooks

490 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 30, 2003

Reviews

[Rachael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Schutz sets out to present an introductory text available to anyone with a basic math background. He covers many basic physics concepts through his exploration of gravity from simple Newtonian physics, to special and general relativity, to quantum mechanics. The first half of the book covers the Newtonian physics aspects of things, and manages to cover astronomy and seemingly unrelated things like some thermodynamics. In this I think he was successful. The second half, particularly when he attempts to introduce general relativity to the lay reader given basic algebra, becomes a bit bewildering and frustrating. I cannot be too harsh though because I appreciate the attempt. In fact despite getting a BS in physics I never really learned about general relativity and I was excited for the exposure. Unfortunately covering some concepts without the mathematical rigor necessary to see how the concepts are derived is for me at least an exploration in frustration.

However, with these caveats in mind and with a willingness to move beyond some fuzziness Schutz goes over some fascinating and cutting edge concepts including the nature of dark matter and dark energy, the inflationary model of the big bang and the quantum reasons for postulating it, zero point energy, Higgs fields, and finally quantum gravity and the implications of coming up with a theory for it.

[Fred Kohn · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a comprehensive book which sits somewhere between textbook and popular science book. Although a bit out of date, I think it would fit well in the library of a large range of people from non-professional science enthusiasts to trained scientists. I appreciated the fact that Schultz took the more technical discussions out of the main text and framed them as "investigations." When I first approached this book, I tried to do so comprehensively; reading each investigation as I came to it. I soon realized that there were just some topics I wasn't interested enough in to care very much about the details. So the second time I read the book I only read the investigations on the topics that interested me. This worked a lot better.

[Tue Le · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a dependable guide to general relativity for those who have taken some introductory physics and some collegiate mathematics. It is suitable for self-study.