About this ebook
Big Think's Best Science Book of 2024
A theoretical physicist takes readers on an awe-inspiring journey to discover how the universe generates everything from nothing at all.
"If you want to know what's really going on in the realms of relativity and particle physics, read this book" —Sean Carroll, bestselling author of The Biggest Ideas in the Universe
In Waves in an Impossible Sea, physicist Matt Strassler tells a startling tale of elementary particles, human experience, and empty space. He begins with a simple mystery of motion—our planet hurtles through the cosmos at 150 miles per second, and yet we feel nothing of it. How can our voyage be so tranquil?
The reason, Strassler reveals, is that empty space is a sea, albeit a paradoxical one. Much like water and air, it ripples in various ways, and we ourselves, made from its ripples, can move through space as effortlessly as waves crossing an ocean.
Deftly weaving together daily experience and fundamental physics—the musical universe, the enigmatic quantum, cosmic fields, and the Higgs boson—Strassler shows us how all things, familiar and unfamiliar, emerge from what seems like nothing at all.
Accessible and profound, Waves in an Impossible Sea is the ultimate guide to our place in the universe.
A theoretical physicist takes readers on an awe-inspiring journey to discover how the universe generates everything from nothing at all.
"If you want to know what's really going on in the realms of relativity and particle physics, read this book" —Sean Carroll, bestselling author of The Biggest Ideas in the Universe
In Waves in an Impossible Sea, physicist Matt Strassler tells a startling tale of elementary particles, human experience, and empty space. He begins with a simple mystery of motion—our planet hurtles through the cosmos at 150 miles per second, and yet we feel nothing of it. How can our voyage be so tranquil?
The reason, Strassler reveals, is that empty space is a sea, albeit a paradoxical one. Much like water and air, it ripples in various ways, and we ourselves, made from its ripples, can move through space as effortlessly as waves crossing an ocean.
Deftly weaving together daily experience and fundamental physics—the musical universe, the enigmatic quantum, cosmic fields, and the Higgs boson—Strassler shows us how all things, familiar and unfamiliar, emerge from what seems like nothing at all.
Accessible and profound, Waves in an Impossible Sea is the ultimate guide to our place in the universe.
Big Think's Best Science Book of 2024
A theoretical physicist takes readers on an awe-inspiring journey to discover how the universe generates everything from nothing at all.
"If you want to know what's really going on in the realms of relativity and particle physics, read this book" —Sean Car...
Discover more
Ratings and reviews
2 reviews
Mat Swenson
- Flag inappropriate
October 1, 2024
great read
About the author
Matt Strassler is a theoretical physicist and blogger. An associate of the Harvard University Physics Department and a former member of the Institute for Advanced Study, he was previously a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Washington, and Rutgers University. He lives in Massachusetts.
Matt Strassler is a theoretical physicist and blogger. An associate of the Harvard University Physics Department and a former member of the Institute for Advanced Study, he was previously a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Washington, and Rutgers University. He lives...
Rate this ebook
Tell us what you think.
Reading information
Smartphones and tablets
Install the Google Play Books app for Android and iPad/iPhone. It syncs automatically with your account and allows you to read online or offline wherever you are.
Laptops and computers
You can listen to audiobooks purchased on Google Play using your computer's web browser.
eReaders and other devices
To read on e-ink devices like Kobo eReaders, you'll need to download a file and transfer it to your device. Follow the detailed Help Center instructions to transfer the files to supported eReaders.
