Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)Mlodinow ('M' below) writes entertainingly, as most of the other reviews here testify. It's good that the general public get a taste of the excitement of discovery/invention in these fields. He should just correct, in a subsequent edition, the serious distortions that IAS Professor Langlands (Notices of the American Mathematical Society, vol. 49, number 5, p. 554 - referred to as 'L' below) has pointed out; then the book could be a useful, reliable introduction to whet the appetite of people who might want to study the subjects in more depth. Here are a few of Langlands' criticisms:
1. M's portrayals of Proclus, Kant, Kronecker and Gauss' father are unfair caricatures. L provides evidence in their defense.
2. M strives for sensationalism, not fact. E.g., M speculates that Thales traded in leather dildos. Veracity is sacrificed to effect.
3. M missed the main point of Riemann's great 1854 habilitation lecture. L wrote: "I could hardly believe my eyes, but it seems [M] is persuaded that the introduction of elliptic geometry was the principal achievement of the lecture."
Since M acknowledges on p.205 that Einstein's general theory of relativity was based on Riemann's work, M owes the reader much more explanation of Riemann's new ideas, expanding on his p. 207 discussion, not dismissing Riemann by saying his work "wasn't pretty."
4. L criticizes M's account of Einstein's early years, saying: "...to represent Einstein as an academically narrow, misunderstood or mistreated high-school dropout is a cruel disservice to any young reader or to any educator who swallows such falsehoods."
5. L concludes that M's book is "thoroughly dishonest ... simply because the author shrinks from nothing in his desperation to be readable and entertaining."
I didn't dislike the book as much as L did. It would be a significant achievement to make great breakthroughs in mathematics and physics somewhat comprehensible to lay people in an entertaining way and to do so with integrity.
Even L concedes "There would be little point in reviewing the book, were it not that the germ of an excellent monograph is there."
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