Book Reviewed: The Biggest Ideas in the Universe: Space, Time, and Motion by Sean Carroll

This book is not a theoretical minimum If you ever regretted not taking physics in college or like to think like a physicist, then this is not the book for you. Author Sean Carroll is a respected theoretical physicist and has authored several books for physics professionals and also for general readers, but this book intended for a lay person to learn mathematical aspects of physics falls too short. There are too many physics equations and limited explanations, and no exercises at the end of each chapter to recapitulate your learning. The entire physics falls within the "classical" or "quantum" frameworks. General Relativity is a physics framework, not a theory, and specific theories could be "non-relativistic" (like Newtonian gravity) or "relativistic" (like Maxwell's theory of electromagnetism). The distinction comes down to how we think about spacetime, the non-relativistic theories feature absolute space and time and instantaneous action at a distance, but the relativistic theories describe spacetime that amalgamates space and time. This places a limit on the speed of signaling. That is, information cannot travel faster than the speed of light. which is 186,000 miles per second. In classical mechanics, a physical system is described by the position and momentum or appropriate generalizations thereof. It is the study of the dynamics at the comic scales, human scales or at the subatomic particle level. I recommend physicist Leonard Susskind’s book “The Theoretical Minimum,” an introduction to classical mechanics for the ardent amateur to learn physics at their own pace. There is a second book by Susskind that teaches quantum mechanics. Susskind’s book is reader-friendly and introduces mathematics in an enjoyable fashion. YouTube also features many videos that help aspiring physicists to learn mathematical aspects of physics.

Book Reviewed: On the Origin of Time: Stephen Hawking's Final Theory by Thomas Hertog

Time and physical laws are emergent phenomenon Stephen Hawking in his final theory, no­ boundary hypothesis proposes that our universe is a self-containing entity with no sharp starting point. Instead, it is described as a smooth finite wave function that extends back infinitely. According to this there is no singularity, the tiniest space where the big bang is supposed to have occurred. Therefore, the universe has no true beginning, and hence no need to invoke a cause or creator for its existence. Stephen Hawking strove much of his life to give a fundamentally causal explanation of the universe's origin. But his holographic cosmology tells us that physics and its laws fade away when we journey back into the big bang. This no-boundary hypothesis emerges from holography not so much as a law of the beginning but more as a beginning of the physics laws. The ultimate cause of the big bang becomes irrelevant in this theory. In a quantum universe, a tangible past and future emerge out of a haze of possibilities by means of a continual process of questioning and observing. This interactive process transforms and constantly draws the universe more firmly into existence. Observers in this quantum sense acquire a sort of creative role in cosmic affairs that imbues a delicate subjective touch. Conscious observation introduces a subtle backward-in-time element into cosmological theory. The act of observation today retroactively fixes the outcome of the big bang "back then.” Hence Hawking referred to his final theory as “top-down cosmology.” This meta-evolution has a Darwinian flavor, with its interplay of variation and selection playing out in the primeval environment of the early universe. Variation enters because random quantum jumps cause frequent small excursions from deterministic behavior. Selection enters because some of these excursions, especially the larger ones, are amplified and frozen with new new rules that help shape the subsequent cosmic evolution. The interaction between these two competing forces in the furnace of the hot big bang produces a branching process analogous to how biological species emerged on this planet. The biological and cosmological evolutions aren't fundamentally separate phenomena but two vastly different levels of one giant evolutionary path that freed from any claims of divine involvement in the creation of life or the cosmos. One of the shortcomings of this book is that physicist Lee Smolin proposed the cosmological natural selection that is analogous to biological natural selection. Smolin published the idea in 1992 and summarized it in a book called The Life of the Cosmos. His work is never mentioned in this book. Secondly, the recent advances in physics seem to suggest that physical reality is the same as described by the Advaita Vedanta philosophy of Hinduism. The current theory of Stephen Hawking is not any different, but the author never invokes this school of thought.

Book Reviewed: Celebrating Diwali: History, Traditions, and Activities – A Holiday Book for Kids by Anjali Joshi

The festival of lights explained to kids This book is written for Hindu children to help them understand and enjoy the spirit of the holy festival of Diwali. This is important not only for Hindus living outside India but also for kids growing up in India. Hindu children and their parents are badly in touch with their culture that stands for four thousand years of Vedic Dharma. The author teaches the young readers with a brief introduction to the history and beliefs behind the celebration of the festival of lights, but certain descriptions are confounding. In some pages the term “South Asia” is used, and at other places the term “India” is used. Diwali was celebrated long before the neighboring countries were even born, hence uniform use of “India” is more appropriate. Some of the illustrations in this book reminds me of the character “Apu” from the sitcom Simpsons, an Indian store owner whom colorists rendered in a deep dark brown tone. His character/illustrations were particularly problematic that incorporated inherent racism. It was just a normal representation of blackness that white people promote. I wished the author, and the illustrator could have been more conscious about their work.

Book Reviewed: What's Gotten into You: The Story of Your Body's Atoms, from the Big Bang Through Last Night's Dinner by Dan Levitt

Itsy bitsy of cosmos and biological evolution This book is all talk but no substance. It is a hotchpotch of news items and history told in a non-stimulating way. The readers learn extraordinarily little from this author. A summary of the book is as follows: Understanding the origin and evolution of life in the Universe is a multi-disciplinary problem: from the astrophysics describing the processes giving rise to stars and planets to the chemistry and biology of organic matter and evolution of living organisms. Solar system is 4.5 billion years old, and the Earth was formed within a residual disk of gas surrounding the young Sun. Starts are living physical entities, they are born, physically exist with some order, and eventually die. But for most of their lives, stars fuse elemental hydrogen into helium in their cores (nuclear fusion reaction). Two atoms of hydrogen are combined in a series of steps to create helium 4. These reactions account for 85% of the Sun’s energy. The remaining 15% comes from reactions that produce the elements beryllium and lithium. When a star’s core runs out of hydrogen, the star begins to die out. The dying star expands into a red giant, which begins to manufacture carbon atoms by fusing helium atoms. More massive stars begin a further series of nuclear burning or reaction stages. The elements formed in these stages range from oxygen through to iron. During a supernova, explosion of massive stars, the star releases huge amounts of energy as well as neutrons, which allows elements heavier than iron to be produced. In the supernova explosion, all of these elements are expelled out into space. Other heavier elements are created when pairs of neutron stars collide cataclysmically and explode. Light elements like hydrogen and helium formed during the big bang when spacetime emerged and laws of physics began to operate. All the elements we have in our body are the ashes of long dead stars. Simple organic molecules could have been synthesized in the atmosphere of early Earth and rained down into the oceans. RNA and DNA molecules, the genetic material for all life, just long chains of simple nucleotides were formed on earth. Some of them may have been rained down to earth from comets and asteroids. Life may have formed on earth 3.8 billion years ago, and there were six major extinctions, the first being about 2.4 billion years ago. The emergence of life from non-life (biomolecules) was a thermodynamic wonder. A living cell (ordered structure, more information, and fully self-regulated) was produced from a state of disordered structures (less information and non-regulated).

Book Reviewed: The Summer of 1876 by Chris Wimmer

The outlaws of the Northfield Raid The summer of 1876 was an important time in the Old West era. In a ninety-day period from mid-June to mid-September, three major events happened: the Battle of the Little Bighorn, the murder of Wild Bill Hickok, and the Northfield Raid. Around this same time, Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson patrolled the streets of Dodge City, and Deadwood in South Dakota was becoming the richest and a notorious boomtown in the American West. Northfield was a growing Minnesota community, which had two colleges, the completion of a railroad, with many prominent business leaders and a healthy bank. The latter drew the attention of America’s most notorious bank robbers: the James-Younger Gang. In late August 1876, the James-Younger Gang headed for Minnesota. The gang consisted of brothers Jesse and Frank James; brothers Bob, Jim, and Cole Younger; Clell Miller; Charlie Pitts; and Bill Stiles. Upon arriving in the state, the gang divided into scouting parties of two, three, and four men. Looking for sites to execute their plans, they considered several banks in Minnesota, and their last choice was Northfield. It was a difficult time when the Battle of the Little Bighorn resulted in the biggest defeat to the American military. That was an armed engagement between combined forces of the Lakota Sioux, Northern Cheyenne, and Arapaho tribes and the 7th Cavalry Regiment of the United States Army. It took place on June 25–26, 1876, along the Little Bighorn River in the Crow Indian Reservation in southeastern Montana Territory. Much of this book deals with these historical facts and the most relevant story of the Northfield raid are found in the last three chapters of the book. The detail of the raid is based on the facts discussed in many other books, and on the History cable channel.