Our Mathematical Universe: My Quest for the Ultimate Nature of Reality in Science and Inquiry

Oct 30, 2019 Rusty rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: prose, non-fiction, science

You ever read a book, finish it, then sit around for a few days and think, ‘what the f#*k did I just read?’

That happened to me here. And that wasn’t in a bad way either. I’ve lost count of how many pop-science books I’ve read over the years (most of the ones I’ve read were done before I started logging them into Goodreads - way back in the very late nineties and early naughties).

I get them less and less often nowadays, there are only so many ways I can read about the development of modern physi You ever read a book, finish it, then sit around for a few days and think, ‘what the f#*k did I just read?’

That happened to me here. And that wasn’t in a bad way either. I’ve lost count of how many pop-science books I’ve read over the years (most of the ones I’ve read were done before I started logging them into Goodreads - way back in the very late nineties and early naughties).

I get them less and less often nowadays, there are only so many ways I can read about the development of modern physics and it still feel fresh to me. But every few years I’ll pick one up and give it a read. I’m always looking for a deeper understanding of nature, and I think that one day it’ll all click and I’ll have my epiphany and then it’s off to races earning my own Nobel Prize.

Well, I was stunned at how often this book blew my mind. Max Tegmark impressed me so much that this was the ONLY book I brought with me from the states. I mean, I could have finished it up and left it there before I came to Bermuda - but I realized this was the sort of thing I’ll want to hang on to for a while, and maybe reference from time to time so I read the Vision graphic novel I reviewed about a month ago instead of finishing this bad boy up in a cram session the night before flying off.

For the record, this book is slightly more of a deep dive into the esoterica of cosmology than most similar books I’ve read before. He talks a lot about the multiverse and the shape of the cosmos. I dunno, he had a host of concepts and anecdotes that either I’d never heard before, or he pointed out some sliver of an idea that I’d maybe missed when pondering the nature of the universe on previous occasions.

In all, it’s been about four months since I read this, and some of the specifics of what was so mind-bending have faded a bit into that fog of forgetfulness that tends to happen when I’m not neck deep into thinking about and reading about physics in most of my free time.

But time has buzzed right on by. Can’t believe it’s been this long since I’ve read this already. I really need to speed up my reviews. This is ridiculous. I suppose I didn’t bother keeping them coming as I read them because A) I’m busy, like, I tend to have 15-30 minutes a day to myself, if that, and I may not have a keyboard to use during that period. So I make choices. And B), I’ve not really been talking about the books I read in my reviews anyway, so who cares?

But I should have written something down about this one, dammit. I’ll try to re-read at some point (when? I don’t know) and discuss this in a more meaningful way then. In the interim - Cheers! ...more

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Mar 12, 2015 Jose rated it really liked it

What a strange and wonderful book! It's hard to describe exactly what this book is even about... but at its core it is a combination of hard astrophysics and mind blowing speculative metaphysics. I loved it. It all plays out the way you'd expect a night on the town with a physicist might go. At first you talk about respectable things like current physics research into cosmology and dark energy. Then as the night goes on and the drinks get poured it's on to discussing quantum physics and how craz ...more

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