Good book, but limited appeal
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None of the previous reviews matched my own experience of this book. For a start there is only one picture (of Dirac); perhaps the comment refered to the feynman diagrams?
To start with this book contains two lectures by two different people. Weinberg's lecture is very general, but contains insights from 20+ yearsago. I personally prefer 'road to reality' by penrose, but the explanation of why the lagrangian form of the standard model cannot be the form of any final understanding is very clear.
Feynman's lecture is the better one. It leaps forward through some of Dirac's work, but follows a very unique route. The speed is sometimes rapier like, and there are a couple of changes in direction that you have to read and re read to catch, but it is a wonderful journey and very accessible to people outside of university physics departments (I graduated 25 years ago) despite the plethora of equations.
Worth the £2.70 I paid, for a new book, to an amazon dealer.
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Make sure you have a firm grip on quantum physics
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I have purchased many books with Richard feynman name on the front cover, for example, Q.E.D the strange theory of light and matter, was an excellent book, I actually understood what was going on. This books fails in just about every area. It is pointless to go into detail, but if you are not in your 2nd or 3rd year at university studying quantum physics, don't waste your time.
On a good note, his writing does seem to improve towards the ending i.e. Towards the final laws of physics, is easier to comprehend. It has more reading material and less mathematical equation which have useless meanings. The best thing he said was " specifying the symmetry group of nature may be all we need to say about the physical world, beyond the principles of quantum mechanics", but he wasn't certain. Ha! anyhow If he feels that the government does not fund particle physist enough, maybe they ought to find better ways of explaining themselves. especially through mathematics...
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Two of the best give great insight into fundamentals.
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Feynman yet again gives great insight into the laws of physics, this time exploring the reasons for existence of anti-particles, starting from the dirac equation etc.. Plus some really outstanding photographs, that fella Weinberg will be chuffed to have his name mentioned on the book cover!
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