品牌：
基本信息
·出版社：Bantam Press
·页码：199 页码
·出版日：1994年
·ISBN：0553406639
·条码：9780553406634
·版次：1994-09-08
·装帧：平装
·开本：32开 32开
内容简介
Book Description
Covering subjects ranging from the personal to the wholly scientific, this is a collection of Stephen Hawking's essays and other pieces, revealing him as scientist, man, concerned world citizen and imaginative thinker. He recalls his first experience of nursery school, punctures the arrogance of those who think science can best be understood only by other scientists, explores the origins and the future of the universe, and reflects on the phenomenon of his bestselling book, "A Brief History of Time". Some of the pieces reflect familiar material in fresh ways, while others are entirely new - including the lengthy transcript of Hawking's conversation on "Desert Island Discs".
From the Back Cover
Readers worldwide have come to know the work of Stephen Hawking through his phenomenal bestseller, A Brief History of Time. Now, in his first collection of essays and other pieces - on subjects that range from the warmly personal to the wholly scientific - Stephen Hawking is revealed variously as the scientist, the man, the concerned world citizen, and - as always - the rigorous and imaginative thinker. Whether he is remembering his first experience of nursery school; puncturing the arrogance of those who think science can best be understood only by other scientists and should be left to them; exploring the origins and the future of the universe; or reflecting on the phenomenon of A Brief History of Time, Stephen Hawking's wit, directness of style and absence of pomp are vital characteristics at all times.
From Kirkus Reviews
Superstar physicist Hawking--whose A Brief History of Time (1988) is ensconsed in the Guinness Book of Records for having had the longest bestseller-run in English-language history--returns with 11 essays and one interview, covering matters autobiographical, scientific, and philosophical. The autobiographical pieces share a sketchy, conversational tone and drop a few tasty nuggets: Hawking didn't learn to read until he was eight and proved to be (in the Einstein tradition) a mediocre student; if dropped on a desert island, he would listen to Mozart's Requiem and read Middlemarch. But even so, these pieces keep Hawking's inner life strictly under wraps. Most of the other essays, which tend to repeat themselves, cover the author's major scientific insights: that the universe is ``neither created nor destroyed''; that space/time began 15 billion years ago and is finite but boundless, like the surface of a globe. Hawking cites as his ``most surprising discovery'' the realization that black holes are not self-enclosed but leak particles and radiation: This leads directly to his most recent enthusiasm, ``baby universes,'' generated by black holes, which branch off from our own universe and sometimes return to it. Sometimes the going is thick (``the N=8 theory has twenty-eight spin-1 particles''), but most of Hawking's arguments will be clear to educated laypeople. His weak suit is philosophy, and, indeed, he includes a mild-mannered attack on professional philosophers, many of whom find his discussions of the big questions--what is creation? does God exist?--to be, as he puts it, ``naive and simple-minded.'' No matter: Hawking will be remembered for his physics, not his metaphysics. Not much new, but people feel smarter just by buying a Hawking book. This will sell.
FromLibrary Journal
Hawking is quite probably the most admired and recognizable figure in science today. His A Brief History of Time ( LJ 4/15/88) was a surprise best seller that stimulated a public fascination with this man who, although stricken with a debilitating neurological disease, is widely regarded as the most brilliant theoretical physicist since Einstein. This new collection of essays and lectures will no doubt attract a large readership, but it is somewhat unbalanced. The biographical pieces are digressive and not particularly enlightening. Most pointless is the concluding piece, an interview in which Hawking expounds upon the eight records he would want if he were shipwrecked on a desert island. The scientific essays are much stronger and offer insight into a variety of cutting-edge issues in contemporary physics, though much of what is presented can be found in Brief History. Readers interested in Hawking's life are better advised to read John Gribbin and Michael White's Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science ( LJ 5/1/92). Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 6/15/93.
- Gregg Sapp, Montana State Univ. Libs., Bozeman
About Author
In 1963, Stephen Hawking contracted motor neurone disease and was given two years to live. Yet he went on to Cambridge to become a brilliant researcher and Professorial Fellow at Gonville and Caius College. Since 1979 he has held the post of Lucasian Professor of Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at Cambridge, the chair held by Isaac Newton in 1663. Professor Hawking has over a dozen honorary degrees, was awarded the CBE in 1982. He is a fellow of the Royal Society and a Member of the US National Academy of Science.
Book Dimension:
length: (cm)19.8 width:(cm)12.7
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