This was, as advertised, a history of symmetry; I feel that I did not get a good understanding for what exactly symmetry is, in a more advanced sense, however, which is partially what I was after. Being able to perform an operation on an 'object' and not change it... got it. But when he starts talking about Lie groups, it all went a bit fuzzy for me. I know math (and science) books avoid like the plague actually having math in them, but this would have benefited from e.g. 'psuedocode' examples of what the various symmetries are/do, collected together at some point. Maybe crammed into an appendix for the more interested reader, etc. The cryptic notation (SO(2), E4, etc.) is fine, and what else are you going to call the things anyway, but without *something* concrete to hang those names off of it all becomes a hash. For me anyway.

Nonetheless, it was an entertaining read, and fairly quick at that. ( )

Only read 3/4ths of this, the history parts, the math parts are still outside what I can understand ( )

The author messed up. He frets aloud about giving us lay-readers too much math, and still apparently didn't get a layperson to edit it for him. He avoids giving us equations, choosing instead to explain mathematical ideas in words - but the words are jargon. He explains what a square root is, and then just a few pages later expects us to readily agree that the cubic x (to the third power) = 15x 4 has the obvious solution x = 4." It does?? Ok, Stewart, who is your audience? I love mathematical concepts, but I had to give up on this book. I did scan to the end to be sure, and it did get worse." ( )

Um livro fantástico sobre alguns conceitos matemáticos que foram a base da física moderna. Inicialmente inventados por loucos matemáticos que não sabiam para o que isso serviria, ou mesmo se algum dia suas invenções serviriam. Algumas partes românticas com matemáticos envolvidos em guerras e revoluções, disputas de amores e morte em duelos. Outras partes com o suspense de será que vai conseguir resolver? O livro tem alguns momentos muito difíceis onde explica as teorias da física quântica, cordas, supercordas, bósons e outras partículas, como tudo se encaixa nos modelos matemáticos e porque algumas teorias necessitam universos multidimensionais. Um livro que não decepciona os leitores mais exigentes de obras de divulgação científica pois desce até onde daria para quem não tem a base teórica dos que estudam os mesmos temas em custos especializados nas universidades. Minha recomendação é que não tenham medo, pois mesmo com alguns momentos que dão nó nos miolos, no final nos sentimos parte do seleto grupo que sabe mesmo que apenas um pouco sobre um tema que a maioria nada sabe. ( )

Only read 3/4ths of this, the history parts, the math parts are still outside what I can understand ( )