Black Holes and Time Warps: Einstein's Outrageous Legacy (Commonwealth Fund Book Program)

I cannot stress enough how well Kip Thorne explicates on this subject. The amount of technical and mathematical detail instead of being a deterrent was the strenth and potency of this book. Even the history dimension of the book I found interesting. There is a sense of awe, to a person interesting in Astrophysics, in finding out how these people came to be the best in their field and their contribution as well as an understanding of thier contributions.

If I had to recommend one book for someone interested in Black Holes, Time Travel and the like, it would definately be this book! A Cosmic tour-de-force!

HIGHLY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!


A brilliant introduction for the lay person   January 17, 2001
Anil Kalagatla
16 out of 18 found this review helpful

The true secrets of universe can only be understood by a deep understanding of highly complicated mathematical and physical concepts. For mere mortals like me, books like these offer a good taste of such pleasures. Kip Thorne, a relativist of very high caliber (coauthor of the classic textbook "Gravitation"), takes the reader through a exciting journey through the history of modern cosmology starting with Einstein's Field Equation.

Unlike most popular physics books dealing with such a topic, he actually spends (relatively) little time dwelling on Einstein's work itself (just a couple of chapters) -- there are several books that deal with relativity itself (I'm talking books for the layperson). Instead he quickly starts talking about the "Legacy" of Einstein's great theory. We are led through drama of 20th century cosmology as different solutions were found for the Field Equations which challenged human reason and intuition, ultimately leading to the great crisis: the black hole.

As the author himself is a very active and very highly respected member of the scientic community, the book is full of very interesting (and sometime illuminating) anecdotes about various luminories (I love the one about his bet with Stephen Hawking about the existence of Cygnus X-1 black hole).

If you are a layperson (as far as modern astrophysics is concerned, probably most are lay people) interested in science in general and astronomy in particular, I'd strongly recommend this book (heck, I'd recommend it for any one who's even mildly curious). This is one of the best books in its field (if not the best) that caters to the lay readers (not unlike Richard Dawkins's "Blind Watch Maker" for evolution).


From General Relativity to Quantum Gravity.   October 19, 2002
Wojciech Langer (Toronto, Ontario)
8 out of 8 found this review helpful

Kip Thorne's excellent book should be updated every year and kept in national archives for future generations of scientists and historians.
It is as much historical as popular scientific masterpiece, teaching us about life of many important mathematicians, theoretical and experimental physicists and astrophysicists, trying to solve the mystery of imploding stars and created later black holes. The author chronicles every character, their successes and failures- with precision, meticulously and painstakingly. Each and everybody is scrutinized , weaknesses and strong sides are exposed. It is a great and often humorous analysis of personalities, for example: "Zel'dovitch, who knew hardly any relativity, had demonstrated it using deep physical inside and crude calculations".
I have not had any problem accepting this mixture of science and history, since I like both.

Book starts with Einstein and GR (which book of this type would not?), but then continues through almost 90 years of many top relativists' work, John Wheeler's being the most important.
Thorne writes with passion and honesty about his predecessors, mentors, team players, colleagues and students.
I have never learned so much about scientists, exception perhaps being Guth's book "The Inflationary Universe", how they calculate, develop ideas, announce discoveries, and how they compete, confront each other and make mistakes.
For example, you will find that Einstein even at age 33 did not have a clue how to express his theory mathematically and managed to do it only with the help of mathematician Marcel Grossman! Also surprisingly, famous Subrahmanyan Chadrasekhar wrote an excellent summary science book " The Mathematical Theory of Black Holes" when he was 73 years old.

Especially interesting and dramatic are parts of the book where author writes about ingenious Soviet scientists developing nuclear bombs and at the same time suffering in isolation during the communism in former USSR. The author shows respect and gives them all credits they deserve.
His knowledge about life behind the "iron curtain" is impressive and he presents very open minded and unbiased descriptions. When comparing both political systems where cosmology science thrived, he understands his friends in Moscow, who contemplate that (quote): "one (system) is terrorized by KGB and miserable because of the power of incompetent officials and another (in America) is barbaric because of the way they treat poor and lack of medical care for everyone".
The author always tried to keep in touch with his colleagues in USSR and was able to travel there in many occasions. This benefited all of them, large group of Russian and American scientists. Book reads often like action packed sensational story where lots is at stake and tensions are high.

Kip Thorne immerges as a very colorful, free spirited and amicable person. He describes personal life and achievements with modesty - top notch, "super" scientists are as much humans as we "normal guys" are - this is his message.

As a scientific book, Black Holes" excels as well. Drawings and explanations in separate boxes are great and make everything easy to understand. Particle physics is hardly present (except where hole's radiation is explained) making concept of the book clear and digestible.
Text leads us from classic introduction to GR (the best I have ever read) through the physics of collapsing stars and speculations about creation of giant black holes arising from binary systems.
Consecutive chapters explain how scientists developed and created radio and X-ray instruments searching for radiating black holes.
Eventually we arrive at gravitational waves and quantum theory. These waves generated by black holes might revolutionize our understanding of the Universe even more than did radio and X-rays. In early 80s gravitational wave physicists, including influential Kip Thorne, started to develop interferometric detectors to confirm existence of waves. Gravitational waves when detected will teach us about black holes' properties, and knowledge about black holes will help to solve singularities dilemma. Consequently we will better understand beginning and evolution of the Universe.
Final chapters introduce Stephen Hawking and how he managed to partially unify GR with quantum mechanism and announce that black holes evaporate keeping entropy of the Universe in balance. We meet Roger Penrose and his concept of solving singularity by application of topology calculations.
Later author introduces law of quantum gravity: "One task of the laws of quantum gravity is to govern the probabilities for the various curvatures and topologies within a black hole's singularity. We do not really understand at all well the laws of quantum gravity and their consequences," he writes. This statement reminds actual today, 10 years after. Book ends with description of quantum foam and with fascinating speculations about wormholes and traveling in time.
Crazy science fiction physics about matricide paradox and time machines (close time curves) had got Kip almost insane, but he survived this "crisis".
Overall: what a spectacular book and voyage through its pages !...