A World Without Time: The Forgotten Legacy of Godel and Einstein | 
|  | | | Title: | A World Without Time: The Forgotten Legacy of Godel and Einstein | | Author: | Palle Yourgrau | | Publisher: | Basic Books | | Type: | Book / Paperback | | Publication Date: | 13 February, 2006 | | ISBN / ISBN-13: | 0465092942 / 9780465092949 | | List Price: | $15.00 | | You Save: | $4.80 | | Amazon Price: | $10.20 | |
 This book is also available, brand-new, from 3rd-party marketplace sellers at Amazon.com, from $3.54. |
The HTML code below can be pasted onto your web-site, your MySpace page, or blog - or any number of similar places - to create a link to this page: If, instead of a text link, you'd like to create a link to this page which will display the book cover, if it's available, then the code below will do exactly that:
Check for the same book at these other US book sites:
• [ Abebooks ] • [ Alibris ] • [ Barnes & Noble ] • [ Half.com ] • [ Powells ] … or check UK bookstores
| Editorial Review / Publisher's Information:
Product Description
In 1942, the logician Kurt Godel and Albert Einstein became close friends; they walked to and from their offices every day, exchanging ideas about science, philosophy, politics, and the lost world of German science. By 1949, Godel had produced a remarkable proof: In any universe described by the Theory of Relativity, time cannot exist. Einstein endorsed this result reluctantly but he could find no way to refute it, since then, neither has anyone else. Yet cosmologists and philosophers alike have proceeded as if this discovery was never made. In A World Without Time, Palle Yourgrau sets out to restore Godel to his rightful place in history, telling the story of two magnificent minds put on the shelf by the scientific fashions of their day, and attempts to rescue the brilliant work they did together.
| Other Items You May Enjoy:
Browse Books From These Related Subjects:
Customer Reviews:
• More About Philosophy Than About Physics Or Math 27 February, 2007
A World Without Time is a book about the friendship between Einstein and Godel that occurred toward the end of their lives. The friendship was fruitful in that Godel used Einstein's General Theory of Relativity to prove the existence of what are now called Godel Universes. Godel Universes are universes where time loops back on itself so, if you go sufficiently fast, you would end up back where you started in time. This is interesting but perhaps the most interesting aspect of the book for me was it's philosophical aspect. The author mentions the Vienna Circle and some concepts of philosophy such as positivism and ontology and epistemology which I found very interesting. I found the explanations of Godel's theories hard to follow but got the basic idea. I recommend this book for it's philosophical content. If you want to learn about Godel's Incompleteness theorem I recommend reading Godel, Escher Bach, An Eternal Golden Braid.
- Reviewed by customer ID: AB399AECXCDT8
• A World Without Philosophers . . . 25 December, 2007
... will be the most appropriate legacy of Kurt Goedel.
READ THIS BOOK for an accessible and entertaining summary of Goedel's important contributions to mathematical logic, his troubled life, and the shamefully defensive response of professional philosophy.
DON'T READ IT for insights into Einstein (a very minor part of the story) or the nature of time.
The title of Palle Yourgau's book A World Without Time: The Forgotten Legacy of Godel And Einstein promises new insights into the physics of time. In fact, Goedel and Yourgrau have nothing significant to say about time. Under Einstein's tutelage (and when both were well into their professional dotage) Goedel found a formal cosmological solution of General Relativity in which non-causal loops can occur. This indeed demonstrates that "time" is not an inherent characteristic of Relativity, but that fact had already been widely recognized ever since Minkowski rewrote Special Relativity with a geometrized time coordinate. By the time Goedel met Einstein, other physicists clearly understood that General Relativity was an incomplete physical theory. So the formal characteristics of the Goedel universe have only mathematical interest.
In the last section of the book, Yourgrau laments that Goedel has been disrespected by professional philosophers. This is like complaining that Mark Spitz wasn't invited to the Special Olympics. The author could better have used those pages to describe Goedel's legacy in modern Category Theory and the powerful intuitionist movement in mathematics.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A363VPN546BAID
• A World Without Time 23 January, 2007
Great book about Godel & Einstein. It tells much about their human side & their friendship. Does good job explaining some of their work.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A437HIM3KE17H
• A History Of Thinkers In The Early 20th Century 24 January, 2008
While the book does mostly focus on the lives of Godel and Einstein, it also introduces the ideas and philosophies of many other great early 20th century thinkers. If you don't have a background in logic and the philosophy of science, math, and logics then it will be a difficult read, but well worth it. More people need to learn about Kurt Godel and his amazing insights.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A25MUEH5WX7MWH
• Should We Dispense With Clocks ? 12 February, 2007
The title of the book suggests time does not exist. The justification is a certain solution to Einstein cosmological equation, where the universe is rotating and time travel is possible. A path could reach into the past going around the universe.It is the Godel solution.
Modern cosmology is based on the Robertson Walker metric , or model,where there is a universal time. It fits the obseved universal expansion.The universe was born in a big bang fifteen billions years ago.
Goodel gave too much importance to his solution. After all any equation can allow many mathematical solutions which bear no relation to physical reality or fact.
The book is good reading with old and rare photos.It compelled me to reread "The Godel Solution" in Adler ,Bazin and Schiffer General Relativity.
Early in the century,Kurt Godel had laid a golden egg with his incompleteness theorem, pertaining to pure mathematics, causing some stir among Hilbert and Russell.But his attempt to abolish time, much later in 1949, felt in deaf ears among physicists and cosmologists.This is not about to change any time soon.
Yourgrau does an elegant work in rescuing an old story.It takes us through Europe and the beginnings of the Princeton Advanced Study Institute.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A3NV3F0YB5AOTZ
|
