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Hidden In Plain Sight 4: The Uncertain Universe
You never knew theoretical physics could be so simple! It was once believed that the universe ran like clockwork. However, several revolutionary discoveries in the twentieth century revealed that there is a fundamental uncertainty at the heart of reality. Take a tour of chaos theory, the uncertainty principle, and enter the Matrix. Discover how uncertainty is the only certainty.
157 pages, Paperback
First published January 28, 2015
182 people are currently reading
114 people want to read
About the author
Andrew H. Thomas
14 books11 followersDr. Andrew H. Thomas studied physics in the James Clerk Maxwell Building in Edinburgh University, and received his doctorate from Swansea University in 1992.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
January 8, 2021
I don't know about this one. I have really enjoyed the other books in this series but this one started to make me consider going elsewhere.
It starts off alright, and similar to the other books. It explains scientific concepts and presents the proof etc. However, Andrew Thomas then went and did what he promised he wouldn't do; he started to delve into the biography of scientists rather than just explain their concepts. Don't get me wrong, I know some people enjoy biographies, however I don't. Especially when I want to read interesting scientific concepts. Where someone drank coffee or what university they went to is of no interest to me.
The book then takes a strange turn and tries to go philosophical. I can understand that there is a requirement to explain a few concepts in order to get uncertainty across but I think he over did it in this book. What I enjoyed about the others is the explanations, the formulas providing proof. This book didn't really gave any of that, I'm going to read the reviews of number 5 to see if I want to go on or go elsewhere.
It starts off alright, and similar to the other books. It explains scientific concepts and presents the proof etc. However, Andrew Thomas then went and did what he promised he wouldn't do; he started to delve into the biography of scientists rather than just explain their concepts. Don't get me wrong, I know some people enjoy biographies, however I don't. Especially when I want to read interesting scientific concepts. Where someone drank coffee or what university they went to is of no interest to me.
The book then takes a strange turn and tries to go philosophical. I can understand that there is a requirement to explain a few concepts in order to get uncertainty across but I think he over did it in this book. What I enjoyed about the others is the explanations, the formulas providing proof. This book didn't really gave any of that, I'm going to read the reviews of number 5 to see if I want to go on or go elsewhere.
February 21, 2018
Excellent
Andrew Thomas did it once again. A continuation of the saga, this fourth volume has all the ingredients of the previous one and all the elements that foreshadow the expected fifth volume. Entertained, informative, full of insights, you can read it even as a detective inquiry onto the misteries of the universe.
Andrew Thomas did it once again. A continuation of the saga, this fourth volume has all the ingredients of the previous one and all the elements that foreshadow the expected fifth volume. Entertained, informative, full of insights, you can read it even as a detective inquiry onto the misteries of the universe.
February 7, 2018
Another good installment
The author does a great job of explaining uncertainty and of explaining how people like goedel, Bohr and Heisenberg made their discoveries. Nice discussion of Einstein Bohr debates. On to the next volume
The author does a great job of explaining uncertainty and of explaining how people like goedel, Bohr and Heisenberg made their discoveries. Nice discussion of Einstein Bohr debates. On to the next volume
August 26, 2019
Mind exercise
I like to learn about science and ideas. This book gets me to hear about current scientific ideas. I am a beginner to most of the ideas in the book and I now exercised a little thinking.
I like to learn about science and ideas. This book gets me to hear about current scientific ideas. I am a beginner to most of the ideas in the book and I now exercised a little thinking.
July 14, 2015
A Concise Grand Tour of Modern Physics
If you haven't read the other books in Andrew Thomas's series, you should read "Hidden In Plain Sight 4." It describes radical changes scientific thinking has undergone, from the determinism of the 19th century through the quantum revolution of the early 20th century to chaos theory and fractal geometry of the late 20th century. I was happy to see that Thomas barely mentions the "block universe" model, which he highlighted in the first book of this series. In my review of that book, I pointed out the fallacy of the "block universe" is nothing more than a deterministic fantasy that should have been buried along with Descartes and Laplace. In this book, it seems that Thomas has seen the light, as it were, and realised that a fundamental property of reality is uncertainty.
I liked the description of Bell's theorem, and I agree with the claim that it was one of the most profound discoveries of the 20th century. The experiments that showed violations of Bell's inequality put to rest any notion that there are deterministic mechanisms that underlie reality.
The book brings up the very important point that descriptions of self-referential systems must be incomplete; that is the very reason that uncertainty exists in a universe that can only refer to itself.
Another important point this book makes is that natural processes are non-linear, and are prone to chaotic behavior. These include seemingly unrelated phenomena such as weather, sock markets, an war. Chaos produces fractal properties, which are evident everywhere in nature. I need to point out, however, that there is an important difference between the unpredictable behavior of a chaotic system, which is pseudo random yet deterministic, and the truly random stochastic behaviors exhibited by elementary particles. Experiments based on Bell's theorem put to rest any notion that quantum randomness could be attributed to hidden variables operating in a deterministic manner.
Thomas takes us from stochastic randomness at the subatomic quantum level up through deterministic certainty exhibited by solving the outcome of a roulette wheel using Newton's laws, and back again to uncertainty -- this time because of chaotic behavior of nonlinear systems operating on the "human" scale. Much more could be said about the role of chaos in biological processes, but evidently the author is not a biologist, so he is forgiven for not covering that.
The book ends oddly on cosmological topics like the inflationary model and the question of the multiverse. I agree with Thomas that it is a giant cop out to invoke parallel universes to eliminate uncertainty or to "explain" why the universe is finely-tuned for life. John Wheeler's "Big U" feedback mechanism explains fine tuning in a very elegant manner, and this principle virtually guarantees a finely-tuned with the emergence of intelligent life without having to resort to an infinite number of random universes. As in so many instances, nonlinearity coupled with feedback is all that is required for self organization to occur.
The final chapter serves as a warning that scientific triumphalism often less to embarrassment. It seems that in an effort to prove the validity of the inflationary model by measuring the polarization of microwaves in the cosmic background, the researchers inadvertently measured galactic foreground dust instead, giving a false positive. I surmise the reason that Thomas included this vignette is because he's not a huge fan of inflation. He has a competing theory that gravity becomes a repulsive force when matter is squeezed inside its Schwarzshild radius. I'm also not a fan of inflation theory -- the "problems" of flatness and uniform cosmological temperature have more plausible solutions than inflation -- but I'm not convinced that the author's modified theory of gravity holds any water.
I recommend reading "Hidden In Plain Sight 4" and give it five stars.
https://sites.google.com/site/amateur...
If you haven't read the other books in Andrew Thomas's series, you should read "Hidden In Plain Sight 4." It describes radical changes scientific thinking has undergone, from the determinism of the 19th century through the quantum revolution of the early 20th century to chaos theory and fractal geometry of the late 20th century. I was happy to see that Thomas barely mentions the "block universe" model, which he highlighted in the first book of this series. In my review of that book, I pointed out the fallacy of the "block universe" is nothing more than a deterministic fantasy that should have been buried along with Descartes and Laplace. In this book, it seems that Thomas has seen the light, as it were, and realised that a fundamental property of reality is uncertainty.
I liked the description of Bell's theorem, and I agree with the claim that it was one of the most profound discoveries of the 20th century. The experiments that showed violations of Bell's inequality put to rest any notion that there are deterministic mechanisms that underlie reality.
The book brings up the very important point that descriptions of self-referential systems must be incomplete; that is the very reason that uncertainty exists in a universe that can only refer to itself.
Another important point this book makes is that natural processes are non-linear, and are prone to chaotic behavior. These include seemingly unrelated phenomena such as weather, sock markets, an war. Chaos produces fractal properties, which are evident everywhere in nature. I need to point out, however, that there is an important difference between the unpredictable behavior of a chaotic system, which is pseudo random yet deterministic, and the truly random stochastic behaviors exhibited by elementary particles. Experiments based on Bell's theorem put to rest any notion that quantum randomness could be attributed to hidden variables operating in a deterministic manner.
Thomas takes us from stochastic randomness at the subatomic quantum level up through deterministic certainty exhibited by solving the outcome of a roulette wheel using Newton's laws, and back again to uncertainty -- this time because of chaotic behavior of nonlinear systems operating on the "human" scale. Much more could be said about the role of chaos in biological processes, but evidently the author is not a biologist, so he is forgiven for not covering that.
The book ends oddly on cosmological topics like the inflationary model and the question of the multiverse. I agree with Thomas that it is a giant cop out to invoke parallel universes to eliminate uncertainty or to "explain" why the universe is finely-tuned for life. John Wheeler's "Big U" feedback mechanism explains fine tuning in a very elegant manner, and this principle virtually guarantees a finely-tuned with the emergence of intelligent life without having to resort to an infinite number of random universes. As in so many instances, nonlinearity coupled with feedback is all that is required for self organization to occur.
The final chapter serves as a warning that scientific triumphalism often less to embarrassment. It seems that in an effort to prove the validity of the inflationary model by measuring the polarization of microwaves in the cosmic background, the researchers inadvertently measured galactic foreground dust instead, giving a false positive. I surmise the reason that Thomas included this vignette is because he's not a huge fan of inflation. He has a competing theory that gravity becomes a repulsive force when matter is squeezed inside its Schwarzshild radius. I'm also not a fan of inflation theory -- the "problems" of flatness and uniform cosmological temperature have more plausible solutions than inflation -- but I'm not convinced that the author's modified theory of gravity holds any water.
I recommend reading "Hidden In Plain Sight 4" and give it five stars.
https://sites.google.com/site/amateur...
December 14, 2016
Love love love it's simplicity
I love this subject and have read many books to educated myself but never really understood fully what the authors were trying to convey. It wasn't them it was me I just wasn't getting it. However now that I have found Mr Thomas's books it's like the light has been lit and now I see what it all means maybe not 100% but at 60% I am so thrilled. He explains in plain language how the universe works on the quantum level and the interactions of the different forces at work it's like I can almost see it happening. I feel that I can actually hold a somewhat intelligent conversation on this subject as close to a student who majors in physics and hold my own minus the mathematics. I am so looking forward to reading all his other books. What a splendid joy. Thank you Mr Thomas
I love this subject and have read many books to educated myself but never really understood fully what the authors were trying to convey. It wasn't them it was me I just wasn't getting it. However now that I have found Mr Thomas's books it's like the light has been lit and now I see what it all means maybe not 100% but at 60% I am so thrilled. He explains in plain language how the universe works on the quantum level and the interactions of the different forces at work it's like I can almost see it happening. I feel that I can actually hold a somewhat intelligent conversation on this subject as close to a student who majors in physics and hold my own minus the mathematics. I am so looking forward to reading all his other books. What a splendid joy. Thank you Mr Thomas
September 18, 2015
Certain clarity
I have read many, many popular books concerning physics, especially quantum physics. I have also read biographies of a number of the major physicists. Andrew Thomas has written what to me is a major presentation of these themes in terms of interest and clarity. I am delighted that I found his book. Of equal importance is Thomas's willingness to be honest and clear about the history of physics. So many writers want to claim infallibility both for physics and mathematics. Unfortunately I have not yet read his other books. I just bought them, though, and look forward to many enjoyable hours reading and considering them.
I have read many, many popular books concerning physics, especially quantum physics. I have also read biographies of a number of the major physicists. Andrew Thomas has written what to me is a major presentation of these themes in terms of interest and clarity. I am delighted that I found his book. Of equal importance is Thomas's willingness to be honest and clear about the history of physics. So many writers want to claim infallibility both for physics and mathematics. Unfortunately I have not yet read his other books. I just bought them, though, and look forward to many enjoyable hours reading and considering them.
May 3, 2015
The uncertain universe....
The fourth book of the series. This book concentrates on the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, Chaos theory, the uncertainties of mathematics at times and what is the conundrum of Quantum mechanics. I have to say that I really enjoyed the section on Albert Einstein and Niels Bohr legendary era of debate regarding quantum physics. I was sad to come to the end of the series, but was informed by my kindle that a fifth of the series is in the making. I truly do enjoy Andrew Thomas's style of writing and am looking forward to the next installment.
The fourth book of the series. This book concentrates on the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, Chaos theory, the uncertainties of mathematics at times and what is the conundrum of Quantum mechanics. I have to say that I really enjoyed the section on Albert Einstein and Niels Bohr legendary era of debate regarding quantum physics. I was sad to come to the end of the series, but was informed by my kindle that a fifth of the series is in the making. I truly do enjoy Andrew Thomas's style of writing and am looking forward to the next installment.
April 11, 2015
There is nothing new in this book, all the revolutionary theories Dr Thomas had to present were already introduced on the previous books. This book emphasizes too much the mathematical incompleteness theorem and fractals. And in chapter 6 there is the theory that we all live in a game simulation reality! I’m hoping the next book will go back to explaining physics behavior of fundamental particles, as the title suggests.
March 21, 2015
If you've read the first three in this series, there's little new here. At least it's very short.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews