Not the best book on QFT but worth considering
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I agree with the (so far) two other reviews to some extent, especially about the typos! And if you're looking for a deep insight into QFT and you are a recent graduate or have studied Quantum mechanics recently, then yes, there are many other better books. That said, for someone like me - starting an MSc after 20 years away from physics - I found it easier to understand at the most basic levels than other more advanced books where my eyes were glazing over by page 2 - and so this is bridging my gap quite well. Def buy other books, but don't pass on this one if you need the basics with a pinch of salt...and its cheap!
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Another poor demistified book
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This book shares with the other books in the series in one respect. Each advertises itself as suitable for anyone to master the basics without formal training.
Few books could achieve introducing "anyone" to tensor notation on p7! This aside, the whole approach of this book is woolly. It is difficult to see at any time where we are going or whether we have gotten there. The notations used make for obfuscation of the theory rather than demystification. Why not use the notations a pure maths undergraduate would understand if you want to "demystify", then throw in those a physicist would use later? The latter only add to the mystery of half-understood mathematics.
As an illustration of how difficult to follow this book is, on p4 we are promised that fields are to be made into operators, and the Schrodinger probability density function is to become a field. Also, position and time are no longer operators but (classical) scalars. On p118 we are about to achieve this, and this aim is stated twice for emphasis. OK, we are all ready, but wait! the author takes us back to the harmonic oscillator and produces a creation and annihilation operator out of a hat, without any explanation of why.
On p122 the mechanism of second quantization is given, without emphasis, mid-page and mid-paragraph, by taking the Fourier transform of a preceding formula. The poor reader who looks up Fourier transforms in the index will find the only reference to be...p122.
Most mathematicians would fail to understand most of this book. Mr Anyone on the back cover is going to be entirely at sea.
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A shame!
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This book is full of errors and bad explanations. The author says in the preface that many books on quantum field theory are impossible to read. It's a shame that this one is just one more of that kind!
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