Author(s): Sean Carroll

Physics | Sale

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
A Science News favorite science book of 2019

As you read these words, copies of you are being created.

Sean Carroll, theoretical physicist and one of this world's most celebrated writers on science, rewrites the history of 20th century physics. Already hailed as a masterpiece, Something Deeply Hidden shows for the first time that facing up to the essential puzzle of quantum mechanics utterly transforms how we think about space and time. His reconciling of quantum mechanics with Einstein's theory of relativity changes, well, everything.

Most physicists haven't even recognized the uncomfortable truth: physics has been in crisis since 1927. Quantum mechanics has always had obvious gaps--which have come to be simply ignored. Science popularizers keep telling us how weird it is, how impossible it is to understand. Academics discourage students from working on the dead end of quantum foundations. Putting his professional reputation on the line with this audacious yet entirely reasonable book, Carroll says that the crisis can now come to an end. We just have to accept that there is more than one of us in the universe. There are many, many Sean Carrolls. Many of every one of us.

Copies of you are generated thousands of times per second. The Many Worlds Theory of quantum behavior says that every time there is a quantum event, a world splits off with everything in it the same, except in that other world the quantum event didn't happen. Step-by-step in Carroll's uniquely lucid way, he tackles the major objections to this otherworldly revelation until his case is inescapably established.

Rarely does a book so fully reorganize how we think about our place in the universe. We are on the threshold of a new understanding--of where we are in the cosmos, and what we are made of.

Review:

'Carroll takes us by the hand and with a benign smile and a chatty style, leads us to a place where...at every instant an almost infinite number of copies of you are splitting off to live alternative lives... a wild conceptual ride.' -- Sunday Times, BOOKS OF THE YEAR

'Tackling huge questions, myths and conundrums about our Universe is no easy task, but Carroll does so elegantly.'-- BBC Science Focus

'An authoritative and beautifully written account of the quest to understand quantum theory and the origin of space and time. Sean Carroll is a rare combination of excellent science writer and excellent research scientist. His writing exhibits a clarity of thought that is only available through a deep understanding of the subject. When the book becomes speculative, as it must because it deals with deep and as yet unsolved questions, we know we are in good hands.' * Brian Cox - Broadcaster and Professor of Particle Physics at the University of Manchester *

'Something Deeply Hidden is Carroll's ambitious and engaging foray into what quantum mechanics really means and what it tells us about physical reality.'-- Science Magazine

'As a smart and intensely readable undergraduate class in the history of quantum theory and the nature of quantum mechanics, Something Deeply Hidden could scarcely be improved.'-- Open Letters Monthly * Steve Donoghue *

'Readers in this universe (and others?) will relish the opportunity to explore the frontiers of science in the company of titans.'-- Booklist

'Fans of popular science authors such as Neil deGrasse Tyson and John Gribbin will find great joy while exploring these groundbreaking concepts.'-- Library Journal

'Solid arguments and engaging historical backdrop will captivate science-minded readers everywhere.'-- Scientific Inquirer

'Carroll argues with a healthy restlessness that makes his book more interesting than so many others in the quantum physics genre.'-- Forbes

'If you want to know why some people take [the Everett] approach seriously and what you can do with it, then Carroll's latest is one of the best popular books on the market.' -- Physics Today

'Be prepared to deal with some equations - and to have your mind blown.'-- Geek Wire

Author Biography: Sean Carroll is a theoretical physicist at the California Institute of Technology. He won the Royal Society Winton Prize for his book on the search for the elusive Higgs boson, The Particle at the End of the Universe, and his most recent book, The Big Picture, was an international bestseller. He lives in Los Angeles. @seanmcarroll preposterousuniverse.com