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By CategoryThe Elegant Universe - Brian Greene
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The Elegant Universe - Brian GreeneSuperstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory
2005-05-15
Article Written by: Lance Yamada
In The Elegant Universe, Brian Greene attempts to simplify the pursuit of something tantamount to the "theory of everything" into a manuscript capable of being read by the masses. Greene masterfully succeeds. Using tools of vivid metaphors and simple diagrams, he conveys difficult past and present theories to a reader that may otherwise have been lost in a jungle of Greek symbols.
Greene has a method by which he invites the reader to board a train of thought. He elegantly shows the vistas of the journey with its beautiful rolling hypotheses and lush mathematical proofs. The reader's ignorance is truly bliss and they are mesmerized by the constant sound of progress until the tracks make the bend around the mountain of uncertainty only to reveal that the bridge to reality has been utterly decimated. He then decides to retrace the tracks until he discovers the correct junction from which to proceed. In retrospect, Greene has recognized the importance of the journey and where those tracks took him and the reader in tow. Einstein himself had even made mistakes he tried to undo; such was the reason for revoking the cosmological constant.
The normally unapproachable topic of physics is elegantly, for lack of a better word, explained in adequate detail. Greene includes relevant advancements as rungs for building an ascendable ladder to the newest level of theoretical physics inciting excitement, curiosity, and calamity along the way.
Greene brings to the forefront the colossal rift that still exists in physics today. The battle between gargantuan heavenly bodies governed by general relativity and minuscule atoms ruled by quantum theory has yet to be won. The probabilistic nature of quantum theory seems at odds with Einstein’s smooth general relativity. “God does not place dice with the universe”, Einstein had once said. Unification seemed impossible until string theory showed hope for consolidating the realms.
String theory and now M-theory are on the verge of bearing the fruits that Greene elaborates in this volume. The Large Hadron Collider in Geneva will be coming online soon, and, after reading this book, the reader will appreciate the dedication, genius, and work it took to innovate theories that such a machine may one soon day put to scientific scrutiny.
