Play Book Tag discussion

This book is an (historical fiction)* account of several famous physicists and mathematicians. I don't really like physics, but somehow I really liked this book. I won't retain all of it of course, but it was engaging. I finally understand what "the Singularity" means, and why it frightens physicists when they learn about it.

The competition over conceptions of Quantum theory was fascinating. Public conferences provided feedback, as opposed to anonymous peer review of papers. It was interesting that Schrodinger eventually disavowed his work on the theory. When he created the story about the cat (that could be both alive and dead at the same time), he was attempting to show that the concept was ridiculous. Instead, the story of 'Schrodinger's Cat' has became a popular way to discuss quantum theory and alternate realities in fiction. For several years I saw this odd story pop up frequently in both science fiction and literary fiction. I confess that's part of what got me to read this book. I appreciate the true story and I enjoyed reading about him.

One recurring theme in the book is that maybe there are some things that scientists or people are simply not supposed to know. For instance, after searching hard to understand everything he could, the highly accomplished Grothendieck fell into the abyss. He saw too much. He fretted about what horrors his work would bring upon the world. He insisted on teaching ecology and pacifism along with his other topics, but then dropped out completely (this was the late 60's). What did he and others see in that dark abyss that caused them to want to stop their work? The end of the world? God? Hell?

The last story, The Night Gardener, is set in the near future with a damaged environment. It is about a former scientist who now works as a night gardener in Chile (where the author lives). "The night gardener used to be a mathematician, and now speaks of mathematics as former alcoholics speak of booze, with a mixture of fear and longing." One reason he left the field was because of "the sudden realization that it was mathematics—not nuclear weapons, computers, biological warfare or our climate Armageddon—which was changing our world to the point where, in a couple of decades at most, we would simply not be able to grasp what being human really meant."

(view spoiler)[
"But it’s not just regular folks; even scientists no longer comprehend the world. Take quantum mechanics, the crown jewel of our species, the most accurate, far-ranging and beautiful of all our physical theories. It lies behind the supremacy of our smartphones, behind the Internet, behind the coming promise of godlike computing power."

"It has completely reshaped our world. It’s as if the theory had fallen to earth from another planet, and we simply scamper around it like apes, toying and playing with it, but with no true understanding."

* This book is historical fiction, but it has some non-fiction tags as well. The author said that the first story is mostly non-fiction (with one paragraph of fiction), and each story adds more fiction. The final story is all fiction. (hide spoiler)]

I am reading this now and finding it mind-blowing.

I'm on the library hold list for this one! I think I might not get a copy before the end of January, but I'm looking forward to reading it whenever I get ahold of it.

It's not very long - less than 200 pages. I have a feeling everyone could get different messages from the book. I kept wondering - what did they see? If this was a fantasy story, what might happen next? What about horror? What if it took a religious point of view? Or Sci-fi with aliens?