Physics Bibliography

While this, for the most part, isn't a physics web site, a lot of my readers do have some interest in physics. The following is a list of books, most of which are written for a fairly general audience, about physics.

Carl Sagan, Cosmos. Ballantine Books, 1980.

Sagan was certainly a brilliant astrophysicist. While his opinions on history, theology, or environmental science weren't always as brilliant, this book is very well-written and interesting. I found the sections on ancient Greek science interesting.

Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time. Bantam Books, New York, 1988.

A definite classic and a must-read. This book makes manifest Hawking's brilliance.

Gary Zukav, The Dancing Wu Li Masters: An Overview of the New Physics. Bantam Books, New York, 1979.

I found this book quite interesting. Zukav mingles particle physics and oriental philosophy in an interesting manner in this book, showing that the "real" world isn't as real as it appears to the eye. Zukav also has attempted (with a fair bit of success in my opinion) not only to make the book accessible to those with no scientific background, but also to make each chapter accessible to those who haven't read previous chapters. My only objection is that the books information is, after over twenty years, somewhat out of date. By the way, the numbering of the chapters is interesting...

Paul Davies and John Gribbin, The Matter Myth: Dramatic Discoveries That Challenge Our Understanding of Physical Reality. Simon & Schuster/Touchstone, New York, New York, 1992.

Like the above book, this one also attempts to show that, at a quantum level, "reality" is very different from what we perceive. Somewhat similar to the above book (except that there's no Oriental flavour), although Davies and Gribbin have another decade of research to draw from (e.g. discoveries about the Weak Nuclear Force).