Seven Brief Lessons on Physics

by Carlo Rovelli

FIRST LESSON The Most Beautiful of Theories In his youth Albert Einstein spent a year loafing aimlessly. You don’t get anywhere by not “wasting” time—something, unfortunately, that the parents of teenagers tend frequently to forget.

It is hardly surprising that there are more things in heaven and earth, dear reader, than have been dreamed of in our philosophy—or in our physics. We did not even suspect the existence of radio waves and neutrinos, which fill the universe, until recently.