For the Love of Physics: From the End of the Rainbow to the Edge of Time—A Journey Through the Wonders of Physics

Walter Lewin · Warren Goldstein

maio de 2011 · Simon and Schuster

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“A delightful scientific memoir combined with a memorable introduction to physics” from the legendary MIT lecturer and surprise YouTube celebrity (Kirkus Reviews).

For more than thirty years as a renowned professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Walter Lewin’s lectures made physics not only accessible but fun, whether putting his head in the path of a wrecking ball, supercharging himself with three hundred thousand volts of electricity, or demonstrating why the sky is blue and clouds are white. In For the Love of Physics, Lewin takes readers on a marvelous journey, opening our eyes as never before to the wonders of physics and its amazing ability to reveal the beauty and power embedded in our world.

Whether showing us that a flea is strong enough to pull a heavy book across a table, or describing the coolest, weirdest facts about the tiniest bits of matter, Lewin always entertains as he edifies. “For me,” Lewin writes, “physics is a way of seeing—the spectacular and the mundane, the immense and the minute—as a beautiful, thrillingly interwoven whole.”

“For the Love of Physics captures Walter Lewin’s extraordinary intellect, passion for physics, and brilliance as a teacher” —Bill Gates.

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Walter Lewin taught the three core classes in physics at MIT for more than thirty years and made major discoveries in the area of X-ray astronomy. His physics lectures have been the subject of great acclaim, including a 60 Minutes feature, stories in the New York Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, Newsweek and US News and World Report. They have also been top draws on YouTube and iTunes University. He was awarded three prizes for excellence in undergraduate teaching. He has published more than 450 scientific articles, and his honors and awards include the NASA Award for Exceptional Scientific Achievement, the Alexander von Humboldt Award, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. He became a corresponding member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences and Fellow of the American Physical Society in 1993. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.