The Book
| “ | People are always asking for the latest developments in the unification of this theory with that theory, and they don't give us a chance to tell them anything about what we know pretty well. They always want to know the things we don't know. — | ” |
Much of Feynman's discussion springs from an everyday phenomenon: the way any transparent sheet of glass partly reflects any light shining on it. Feynman also pays homage to Isaac Newton's struggles to come to terms with the nature of light.
Feynman's lectures were originally given as the Sir Douglas Robb lectures at the University of Auckland, New Zealand in 1979. Videotapes of these lectures were made publicly available on a not-for-profit basis in 1996 and more recently have been placed online by the Vega Science Trust.
The book is based on Feynman's delivery of the first Alix G. Mautner Memorial Lecture series for the general public at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in 1983. The differences between the book and the original Auckland lectures were discussed in June 1996 in the American Journal of Physics.
In 2006, Princeton University Press published a new edition with a new introduction by Anthony Zee. He introduces Feynman's peculiar take at explaining physics, and cites: "According to Feynman, to learn QED you have two choices: you can go through seven years of physics education or read this book".
Read more about this topic: QED: The Strange Theory Of Light And Matter
Famous quotes containing the word book:
“This book should be read as one would read the book of a dead man.”
—Victor Hugo (1802–1885)
“There is a difference between a book of two hundred pages from the very beginning, and a book of two hundred pages which is the result of an original eight hundred pages. The six hundred are there. Only you don’t see them.”
—Elie Wiesel (b. 1928)