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No-Nonsense Quantum Field Theory: A Student-Friendly Introduction
Learning quantum field theory doesn’t have to be hard What if there were a book that allowed you to see the whole picture and not just tiny parts of it? Thoughts like this are the reason that No-Nonsense Quantum Field Theory now exists. What will you learn from this book? No-Nonsense Quantum Field Theory is one the most student-friendly book on quantum field theory ever written. Here’s why. The primary focus on the readers’ needs is also visible in dozens of small features that you won’t find in any other textbook
642 pages, Paperback
Published February 25, 2020
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143 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
August 22, 2020
Best book ever. It's as nice to read as a good novel, and goes right to the point
December 23, 2021
The perfect place to set your foot in the seemingly scary realm of Quantum Field Theory. Recommended if you want to get an idea of what QFT is about without fussing over a lot of detail and technicalities. Very clear presentation of the topics and everything is demystified and easily explained. Almost no prerequisites are assumed, everything you need from calculus, linear algebra and quantum mechanics is mentioned whenever needed.
Renormalization group & spontaneous symmetry breaking are poorly explained though (it's fine the book is meant to give you a very brief idea).
I loved it and I think I'm going to read all of Jakob's textbooks!
Renormalization group & spontaneous symmetry breaking are poorly explained though (it's fine the book is meant to give you a very brief idea).
I loved it and I think I'm going to read all of Jakob's textbooks!
April 29, 2024
It seems that this book was written specifically to address all of my previous concerns. Jakob Schwichtenberg has done a remarkable job of connecting the overarching ideas with many of the nitty-gritty details. Finally, someone wrote an overview of how most of the ideas from QFT fit together. You know where each chapter fits into the whole book. While you read this book, you will know why you are doing what you are doing. The author lets you know what is important. You will know why group theory is so important in QFT and how it fits in with the rest of the topics in the book.
This book is a bridge between the gee-whiz popular science accounts that lack equations and the relatively difficult textbooks that are full of equations and have far too few words. While there are relatively few requirements to reading this book (calculus and complex numbers are a must.), you are taken through legitimate Physics calculations by the end. This is not a comprehensive introduction to all of the topics in QFT. While the idea of spontaneously broken symmetries was covered, Electro-Weak Theory as a whole and Quantum Chromodynamics were not covered. (It does seem like more of these topics are touched on by some of the other No-Nonsense books by this author). You will not learn how to compute QED cross-sections in this book. But this book is the best place you can start if you truly want to feel like you grasp the main ideas and how they are related in QFT.
It was truly exciting to work through this book and find an overall understanding of QFT.
This book is a bridge between the gee-whiz popular science accounts that lack equations and the relatively difficult textbooks that are full of equations and have far too few words. While there are relatively few requirements to reading this book (calculus and complex numbers are a must.), you are taken through legitimate Physics calculations by the end. This is not a comprehensive introduction to all of the topics in QFT. While the idea of spontaneously broken symmetries was covered, Electro-Weak Theory as a whole and Quantum Chromodynamics were not covered. (It does seem like more of these topics are touched on by some of the other No-Nonsense books by this author). You will not learn how to compute QED cross-sections in this book. But this book is the best place you can start if you truly want to feel like you grasp the main ideas and how they are related in QFT.
It was truly exciting to work through this book and find an overall understanding of QFT.
November 6, 2021
Despite the (nonsensical) plaudits you may hear from string theorists, the most advanced physical theory of nature we have right now is quantum field theory (QFT). Accordingly, if you desire to learn about nature's inner workings, your time is better spent learning quantum field theory rather than string theory. My own formal exposure to QFT was the derivation of phonons as the quanta of wave oscillations as taught in my graduate solid state physics classes. That was ancillary to my academic major, but years later I became interested in QFT per se. And for a beginner, there's no better place to start than this textbook. After over a year of on and off studying of this 600 page book, I've finally finished the whole thing. It's impressed me enough that I wanted to write a review.
Just about all current texts on QFT presume a knowledge of Lagrangian mechanics, special relativity, and quantum mechanics. That certainly smooths one's path to learning QFT for the experienced physicist. Schwichtenberg, however, adopts what he calls "just in time" teaching. That is, he introduces only enough of these prerequisites needed to understand QFT. The result is that after this book you won't be calculating scattering cross sections nor postulating new physics beyond the Standard Model. But you will understand things like why every electron is exactly the same as every other electron in the universe, the role of those creation and annihilation operators you learn about in standard quantum mechanics, what spontaneous symmetry breaking is all about (you hear about this in theories of the early universe), and how cutoff energies in the Lagrangian dictate effective field theories. In other words, you'll know enough about QFT to speak about it intelligently with another physicist.
You also may feel emboldened enough to take on Srednicki or Zee even. I've read significant portions of these latter two. (They're also both professors at UC Santa Barbara, coincidentally.) Although each implicitly claims an undergraduate physics background as a prerequisite, in reality a smattering of graduate work in other topics such as functional analysis and group theory is essential if you don't want to be steamrolled by the mathematics. These two texts are excellent but not for the faint of heart. In contrast, Schwichtenberg takes you by the hand and guides you through many of the intricacies of QFT. One particular light bulb moment for me was Schwichtenberg's explanation of the QFT tactic of setting the Planck constant and the speed of light equal to 1. Those "natural units," in the parlance of QFT. Setting this equivalence creates units for energy and time different from what we normally use. Now I know why that's done, but I never came across that in the other QFT texts I've read.
The drawback to such a basic treatment of QFT as proffered by Schwichtenberg is you miss out on much advanced stuff. That's perfectly fine, because, as I mentioned, you can take on the standard QFT fare, even Weinberg if you're feeling particularly adventurous, as your next port of call. Schwichtenberg's only purpose is to show the rank beginner what QFT and all its equations mean, and he does the best job of that I've ever seen.
Just about all current texts on QFT presume a knowledge of Lagrangian mechanics, special relativity, and quantum mechanics. That certainly smooths one's path to learning QFT for the experienced physicist. Schwichtenberg, however, adopts what he calls "just in time" teaching. That is, he introduces only enough of these prerequisites needed to understand QFT. The result is that after this book you won't be calculating scattering cross sections nor postulating new physics beyond the Standard Model. But you will understand things like why every electron is exactly the same as every other electron in the universe, the role of those creation and annihilation operators you learn about in standard quantum mechanics, what spontaneous symmetry breaking is all about (you hear about this in theories of the early universe), and how cutoff energies in the Lagrangian dictate effective field theories. In other words, you'll know enough about QFT to speak about it intelligently with another physicist.
You also may feel emboldened enough to take on Srednicki or Zee even. I've read significant portions of these latter two. (They're also both professors at UC Santa Barbara, coincidentally.) Although each implicitly claims an undergraduate physics background as a prerequisite, in reality a smattering of graduate work in other topics such as functional analysis and group theory is essential if you don't want to be steamrolled by the mathematics. These two texts are excellent but not for the faint of heart. In contrast, Schwichtenberg takes you by the hand and guides you through many of the intricacies of QFT. One particular light bulb moment for me was Schwichtenberg's explanation of the QFT tactic of setting the Planck constant and the speed of light equal to 1. Those "natural units," in the parlance of QFT. Setting this equivalence creates units for energy and time different from what we normally use. Now I know why that's done, but I never came across that in the other QFT texts I've read.
The drawback to such a basic treatment of QFT as proffered by Schwichtenberg is you miss out on much advanced stuff. That's perfectly fine, because, as I mentioned, you can take on the standard QFT fare, even Weinberg if you're feeling particularly adventurous, as your next port of call. Schwichtenberg's only purpose is to show the rank beginner what QFT and all its equations mean, and he does the best job of that I've ever seen.
October 4, 2021
This book is a very good introduction to QFT - really student-friendly (as all other books from Mr. Schwichtenberg).
January 29, 2022
Quantum field theory is a difficult subject. In this book I felt that the author really wanted his readers to understand it, and I am a lot closer to understanding it than I was before reading it.
May 27, 2023
A good introduction, discusses the very basics of the calculations but the presentation of a wide range of concepts of the theory allows even the graduate students which are studying the subject to see what comes forward before the maths frighten them
May 28, 2024
Simply Amazing. Great Introduction to QFT and an incredibly exciting read. Highly recommended!
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews