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The God Particle: If the Universe Is the Answer, What Is the Question?

Authors:

Leon Lederman (author), Dick Teresi (co-author) and Christopher Moisan (covers)

Language:

English

Original language:

English

Publisher:

Mariner Books

Categories:

Physics and science

Publication year:

2006

Original publication year:

1993

ISBN:

978-0-618-71168-0

Pages:

434

Synopsis:

Details the history of physics from Thales in antiquity up to the present.

Review:

The title of the book refers to the Higgs boson, a particle now (at the time of writing, September 2009) being sought by the LHC (Large Hadron Collider) particle accelerator in Geneva. The book does a good job of explaining particle physics, and it's funny, too. The book is a little out-dated in that it refers to the now-cancelled SSC (Superconducting Super Collider) accelerator. There are some very entertaining passages in the book where Leon talks physics with an imaginary Democritus (Democritus of Abdera was the first Greek to suggest that the world was made of atoms), which I immensely enjoyed.

I heartily recommend this book if you want to learn a little bit of particle physics.

Has read?

Yes

Debut?

Yes

Images:

High-res images:

[Back (6.59 MB)] [Spine (1.02 MB)] [Front (6.58 MB)]

Table of Contents:

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• Preface
• Dramatis Personae
• 1 The Invisible Soccer Ball
• 2 The First Particle Physicist
• Interlude A: A Tale of Two Cities
• 3 Looking for the Atom: The Mechanics
• 4 Still Looking for the Atom: Chemists and Electricians
• 5 The Naked Atom
• Interlude B: The Dancing Moo-Shu Masters
• 6 Accelerators: They Smash Atoms, Don't They?
• Interlude C: How We Violated Parity in a Weekend ... and Discovered God
• 7 A-tom!
• 8 The God Particle at Last
• 9 Inner Space, Outer Space, and the Time Before Time
• Acknowledgments
• A Note on History and Sources
• Index

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