dorothy_gale's review against another edition
4.0
Ah, Stephen Hawking (1942-2018). Many regard him as the one of the most brilliant theoretical physicists since Einstein. He has 30 distinct books on Goodreads, and he has averaged a 4.15-star rating between them. This book in particular was/is his most popular, with a 4.17-star average from 254,587 reviewers. Published in 1988, it was only 5 hours and 46 minutes as an audiobook (although I admit I started out with an e-book and crashed and burned).
I'm by no means a physicist or even a scientist, but you know when someone appears on 7 episodes of the Big Bang Theory and 4 episodes of the Simpsons, he's a pretty big deal :)
This was NOT my kind of book, but I listened for the gold anyway. Toward the end, I didn't feel as bad because he said if I had remembered everything in it, I would have recorded over 2 million pieces of information. He did jam a lot in, and he seemed to have a good sense of humor. He mentioned the possibility of black holes not being black, but he really got my attention when he reminded me of the existence of imaginary numbers -- right before introducing imaginary time! VERT DER FERK? haha.
Another favorite piece: "There could be whole antiworlds and antipeople made out of antiparticles. However, if you meet your antiself, don’t shake hands! You would both vanish in a great flash of light."
“I have sold more books on physics than Madonna has on sex.” (The Illustrated Brief History of Time)
I also agree with another reviewer who said "Isn't it amazing that a person can read a book like A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking and come away feeling both smarter and dumber than before he started? What a universe we live in!"
I'm by no means a physicist or even a scientist, but you know when someone appears on 7 episodes of the Big Bang Theory and 4 episodes of the Simpsons, he's a pretty big deal :)
This was NOT my kind of book, but I listened for the gold anyway. Toward the end, I didn't feel as bad because he said if I had remembered everything in it, I would have recorded over 2 million pieces of information. He did jam a lot in, and he seemed to have a good sense of humor. He mentioned the possibility of black holes not being black, but he really got my attention when he reminded me of the existence of imaginary numbers -- right before introducing imaginary time! VERT DER FERK? haha.
Another favorite piece: "There could be whole antiworlds and antipeople made out of antiparticles. However, if you meet your antiself, don’t shake hands! You would both vanish in a great flash of light."
“I have sold more books on physics than Madonna has on sex.” (The Illustrated Brief History of Time)
I also agree with another reviewer who said "Isn't it amazing that a person can read a book like A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking and come away feeling both smarter and dumber than before he started? What a universe we live in!"
1morepaige's review against another edition
4.0
I’m not sure I got everything that was in here, but I’m hoping it’s like when I was learning different languages—sometimes reading something too hard helped me get better at reading in that language. Maybe if I read enough science books, something will get left in my head even if most of it goes right over.
I didn’t expect to laugh out loud while reading A Brief History of Time, but I did! At least twice! That was really nice. This was a good finish for my 2018 reading goal.
I didn’t expect to laugh out loud while reading A Brief History of Time, but I did! At least twice! That was really nice. This was a good finish for my 2018 reading goal.
thayerbowen's review against another edition
3.0
Dense. At times amusing. Written in 1988 astrophysics and physics has professed a lot, even in my amateur understanding.
linguisticali's review against another edition
informative
inspiring
medium-paced
4.5
Fascinating and well written. A lot of it still went over my head but overall a good intro to a range of concepts in physics
nephelila's review against another edition
2.0
Who's the target audience because even though really interesting at times I'm like??? ok
shoggoth_roof's review against another edition
4.0
Un libro de divulgación que da un gran repaso a las teorías de la física hasta su fecha de publicación. Hawking intenta acercar la física a todos, reduciendo la cantidad de ecuaciones a una, explicando con diversos gráficos, incluyendo un glosario e incluso diciendo cuántos ceros tiene una cifra (un detalle que me encantó).
Creo que con la física de la ESO o bachillerato es comprensible.
Creo que con la física de la ESO o bachillerato es comprensible.
branniboob's review against another edition
3.0
I've been meaning to read this book for a while, seeing as I'm doing a degree in physics and all. My understanding was that this was supposed to be the layman's explanation of space-time, but some bits of this even went over my head.
I'd definitely recommend the first chapter to anyone not familiar with physics, because it's quite a nice introduction to why we do a lot of what we do. I learnt a few things (no boundary universe and anthropic principles etc), but overall I thought it was just okay.
I'd definitely recommend the first chapter to anyone not familiar with physics, because it's quite a nice introduction to why we do a lot of what we do. I learnt a few things (no boundary universe and anthropic principles etc), but overall I thought it was just okay.