3 ms·

This is fantastic. I always wanted to learn relativity. But almost all the books I borrowed were so deep targeted towards students who will think about that day

This is fantastic. I always wanted to learn relativity. But almost all the books I borrowed were so deep targeted towards students who will think about that day in and out. I think a lot of avenues of core sciences need books like these that are deeper than popular science but are accessible to someone who is not doing it for a living.

ericbarrett 5y ago
I recommend Sean Carroll’s “Biggest Ideas in the Universe” series on YouTube for modern physics. He’s a professor at CalTech. Each is 60-90 minutes with an accompanying 60-90 minute Q&A—don’t miss the latter, they’re just as interesting. You won’t get a PhD after watching them but he gets a lot mathier than e.g. a Kurzgesagt video while only assuming a high school education (basic calculus, trig, vectors).
oefrha 5y ago
(Physicist here.) Looked at TOC, then skimmed some chapters. The special relativity part of the book is about as deep and denser than most undergraduate introductions, with less motivations and intuitive discussions. The general relativity part is dense by necessity (after all 95% of it is differential geometry, no way around it), and this book apart from being way more condensed isn’t in any way diluted. It’s a compact book of essentials for mathematically minded people*. It’s not a shallower-than-textbooks accessible introduction one step up from pop science. * If you only ever took some linear algebra and calculus for engineering students, this probably doesn’t describe you.
- fferen 5y ago
  This is fair enough. Hopefully some will still find it useful. I will note that I took a special relativity course in university that did things the "slow and intuitive" way, and many years later realized I still had some fundamental misconceptions about it. Eventually learned it the right way mostly by osmosis. More examples and motivation doesn't necessarily lead to correct understanding.
  - oefrha 5y ago
    > Hopefully some will still find it useful. Yes, I definitely think it will be useful for mathematically minded people who don’t find the “slow and intuitive” approach helpful. However, I suspect the fact that it is posted to HN where most of the audience would be people who only took some math for engineering students and that “popular physics book” is even mentioned on the homepage (it clearly says “unlike”, but for most textbooks this comparison isn’t even needed) might give rise to the misconception that it’s between pop science and other textbooks in terms of depth, as the root of this thread seems to demonstrate.
MathMonkeyMan 5y ago
Just read a textbook. It's not easy, but it's what you want: - rigorous treatment of the material - no bullshit fluff - exercises that you can do to think about the material and test your comprehension (often 50-100% of the answers are available online) - systematic treatment used to train real physicists In my experience, it's all about the homework. The rest just supports that.
chisquared 5y ago
I quite like this lecture series, and I normally hate learning from YouTube videos: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFeEvEPtX_0S6vxxiiNPrJbLu9aK1UVC_ https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFeEvEPtX_0S6vxxiiNPr...
- Koshkin 5y ago
  Dr. Schuller’s lectures is one of the few recordings of this kind on YouTube that I can listen to without getting irritated by one thing or another. (Another one being the widely known physics lectures by L. Susskind.)

ericbarrett 5y ago

I recommend Sean Carroll’s “Biggest Ideas in the Universe” series on YouTube for modern physics. He’s a professor at CalTech. Each is 60-90 minutes with an accompanying 60-90 minute Q&A—don’t miss the latter, they’re just as interesting. You won’t get a PhD after watching them but he gets a lot mathier than e.g. a Kurzgesagt video while only assuming a high school education (basic calculus, trig, vectors).

oefrha 5y ago

(Physicist here.) Looked at TOC, then skimmed some chapters. The special relativity part of the book is about as deep and denser than most undergraduate introductions, with less motivations and intuitive discussions. The general relativity part is dense by necessity (after all 95% of it is differential geometry, no way around it), and this book apart from being way more condensed isn’t in any way diluted. It’s a compact book of essentials for mathematically minded people*. It’s not a shallower-than-textbooks accessible introduction one step up from pop science. * If you only ever took some linear algebra and calculus for engineering students, this probably doesn’t describe you.

fferen 5y ago
This is fair enough. Hopefully some will still find it useful. I will note that I took a special relativity course in university that did things the "slow and intuitive" way, and many years later realized I still had some fundamental misconceptions about it. Eventually learned it the right way mostly by osmosis. More examples and motivation doesn't necessarily lead to correct understanding.
- oefrha 5y ago
  > Hopefully some will still find it useful. Yes, I definitely think it will be useful for mathematically minded people who don’t find the “slow and intuitive” approach helpful. However, I suspect the fact that it is posted to HN where most of the audience would be people who only took some math for engineering students and that “popular physics book” is even mentioned on the homepage (it clearly says “unlike”, but for most textbooks this comparison isn’t even needed) might give rise to the misconception that it’s between pop science and other textbooks in terms of depth, as the root of this thread seems to demonstrate.

MathMonkeyMan 5y ago

Just read a textbook. It's not easy, but it's what you want: - rigorous treatment of the material - no bullshit fluff - exercises that you can do to think about the material and test your comprehension (often 50-100% of the answers are available online) - systematic treatment used to train real physicists In my experience, it's all about the homework. The rest just supports that.

chisquared 5y ago

I quite like this lecture series, and I normally hate learning from YouTube videos: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFeEvEPtX_0S6vxxiiNPrJbLu9aK1UVC_ https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFeEvEPtX_0S6vxxiiNPr...

Koshkin 5y ago
Dr. Schuller’s lectures is one of the few recordings of this kind on YouTube that I can listen to without getting irritated by one thing or another. (Another one being the widely known physics lectures by L. Susskind.)