Preamble
Prologue: Why Didn't Somebody Tell Me About All This Before?
1: The Complete Guide to Quantum Mechanics (Abridged)
2: Just What is This Thing Called 'Reality', Anyway?
3: Sailing on the Sea of Representation
4: When Einstein Came Down to Breakfast
5: ...So Just Shut Up and Calculate
6: ...But We Need to Reinterpret What it Says
7: ...So We Need to Add Some Things
8: ...So We Need to Add Some Other Thing
9: ...Because We Need to Include My Mind (Or Should that be Your
Mind?)
10: ...Because...Okay, I Give Up
Epilogue: I've Got a Very Bad Feeling About This
Acknowledgements
Endnotes
Bibliography
Jim Baggott is an award-winning science writer. He trained as a
scientist at the University of Oxford before embarking on
post-doctoral research studies at Oxford and at Stanford University
in California. He gave up a tenured lectureship at the University
of Reading after five years in order to gain experience in the
commercial world. He worked for Shell International Petroleum for
11 years before leaving to establish his own business consultancy
and training
practice. Jim's many books include Quantum Space (OUP, 2018), Mass
(OUP, 2017), for which he won the 2020 Premio Cosmos prize, Origins
(OUP, 2015), Higgs (OUP, 2012), The Quantum Story (OUP, 2011), and
A
Beginner's Guide to Reality (Penguin, 2005).
If you come to this book feeling that you do not really understand
quantum mechanics, at least after reading this book you will know
why. It makes a superb companion to 'Through Two Doors at Once: the
elegant experiment that captures the enigma of our quantum
reality'.
*Rick Marshall, Physics Education*
"Quantum Reality quickly justifies its existence... Baggotts
unique, smart- alecky- professor voice keeps you turning the pages,
and you regret that the book wasnt around when you were a
precocious teenager grappling with the mysteries of physics.
*Elise Cruss, Physics Today*
Engagingly written and although not requiring a background
knowledge in physics, it will help if you have at least some
familiarity with both the basic experimental results that exposed
the inadequacy of classical physics
*Rick Marshall, Physics Education *
Baggott is a master of taking complex concepts and making them
surprisingly accessible. For much of what's difficult and confusing
about quantum physics interpretations he succeeds in doing this
admirably.
*Brian Clegg, Popular Science*
[Baggott] carefully examines many quantum conundrums by leading
readers through an exhaustive, but entertaining, review of the
current thinking on them. The bibliography alone is worth the price
of the book. Especially enlightening is Baggott's admission that
metaphysics lies at the core of science: something that all
physicists know in their hearts but are reluctant to admit ...
Highly recommended.
*J. F. Burkhart, CHOICE connect*
Why is quantum mechanics different from the rest of physics? What
is reality? How could a theory of science explain a natural world
created by God? All these strange questions are answered in a very
profound and logical manner in Jim Baggott's Quantum Reality.
*Rupendra Brahambhatt, Interesting Engineering*
Here, former experimental physicist Jim Baggott says quantum
mechanics is "completely mad", but wrestles expertly with its
history and current state, integrating physics with
metaphysics.
*Andrew Robinson, Nature*
Quantum Reality is... an attempt to bring order to a confounding
subject. He succeeds only partly. But even that is a remarkable
achievement because, for almost a century, physicists have fought
over just which of over a dozen different interpretations of
quantum mechanics is correct, or what it even means to call one of
them "correct." ... Engagingly written, and requiring no background
knowledge in physics, it is likely to teach you something new. Even
I learned some new bits...
*Sabine Hossen, Nautilus*
... I highly recommend it... Baggott provides a refreshingly sane
and sensible survey of the subject... In Quantum Reality, Baggott
provides a well-informed, reliable and enlightening tour of the
increasingly complex and contentious terrain of arguments over what
our best fundamental theory is telling us about what is physically
"real".
*Peter Woit, Not Even Wrong*
This is a superb book. Indeed it is the book I wish I had read when
I was an undergraduate student in philosophy of science, keen to
understand the philosophical implications of various
interpretations of quantum mechanics. Jim Baggott has set for
himself a very ambitious task: namely, to unpack the realist
commitments at stake in the century-long debate on the completeness
(or incompleteness) of quantum mechanics that began with Niels Bohr
and Albert Einstein in the 1920s-1930s. It is rare to find this
level of philosophical engagement with thorny foundational issues
among physicists writing popular science books... This book is
sheer joy to read.
*Michela Massimi, Philosopher of Science and editor of Philosophy
and the Sciences for Everyone*
Jim Baggott proves once again to be a master popularizer, this time
investigating with wit, depth, very wide angle, and remarkable
equilibrium, what is perhaps the most obscure and fascinating
mystery of modern science: what does quantum theory tell us about
the world?
*Carlo Rovelli, author of The Order of Time and Seven Brief Lessons
on Physics*
Jim Baggott has written a highly readable, fair-minded and
well-researched account of the ongoing debate about the nature of
quantum reality. Amongst popular accounts of the subject, it is the
most accessible and enlightening one I have come across.
*Harvey R. Brown, Philosopher of Physics and author of Physical
Relativity: Space-time structure from a dynamical perspective*
An engaging tour of the mysteries of quantum mechanics and the
controversies of its interpretation, with the rare bonus of some
substantial and well-grounded philosophy of science, synthesised
from Baggott's wealth of knowledge and experience.
*Jon Butterworth, author of A Map of the Invisible*
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