Brian Greene's The Fabric of the Cosmos with its questions about the limits of space and time and the texture of reality certainly looks a bit daunting to the uninitiated. Cosmic ripples, 11 dimensions to the universe and string theory that is somehow connected to a "Theory of Everything" are all a bit alien if you never really got to grips with Newton, let alone Einstein. It might look very heavyweight, but Greene is an excellent communicator and what he's writing about is perhaps the greatest intellectual challenge we face.

There is no doubt that speculation about the nature of the heavens is very ancient. After centuries of thought "we still can only portray space and time as the most familiar of strangers". But enormous advances in understanding have been made especially over the last few decades. Whether we are high-flying city slickers or impoverished cattle-herders in the third world, speculation about space-time "takes on an almost mystical quality: we're considering the fate of the very things that dominate our sense of reality" according to Greene.

Over the last century we have become much better acquainted with previously hidden features of the Universe, especially thanks to Einstein. Greene summarises these as

"the slowing of time, the relativity of simultaneity, alternative slicings of spacetime, gravity as the warpings and curving of space and time, the probabilistic nature of reality, and long range entanglement were not on the list of things that even the best of the world's nineteenth-century physicists would have expected to find just around the corner."

And yet they are attested to by both experimental results and theoretical explanations. Greene, professor of physics and mathematics at Columbia University, is one of the foremost players in contemporary string theory and authored a bestselling book The Elegant Universe for which he won the Aventis Prize in 2000.

In The Fabric of the Cosmos Green avoids mathematical formulae, which can be an immediate turnoff for most general readers. Clearly he knows that visually we can deal with abstract and/or difficult concepts much better than when they are presented in words. Consequently, he uses a very clever selection of excellent and well designed illustrations to help get his ideas across. There is an excellent index, plenty of notes and suggestions for further reading, which will allow those more in the know to take matters further. And, there is a glossary for us ordinary mortals who need every now and again to check up on our understanding of things such as quarks, Higgs particles, braneworld scenario and M-theory. --Douglas Palmer

Fantastic Guide to Physics for Beginners, 11 Jul 2008
Brian Greene has managed to do the impossible. He has written a guide to physics from Newton to String Theory, that is not only easy to read but is also entertaining. This is what I should have had as my physics textbook in school. Whilst using simple everyday examples and avoiding the dreaded equations, he manages to explain the most complex and even bizzare ideas that physics has so far come up with.

Reading it felt much like opening my eyes to the weird but wonderful universe out there.
A trully excellent book.

Great book - don't be put off, 25 Mar 2008
I'm working my way through this at the moment and I fully agree with other reviewers that it is a life changing book on a par with Blind Watchmaker.

I was a little daunted by the subject material to begin with, but soon lost my inhibitions - it's not half as bad as I expected and I'm actually finding myself second-guessing some of the directions and explanations that author is taking in explaining the wierdness of the relativistic and quantum worlds. Either I'm not as deeply stupid as I thought or Greene's treatment is perfect for the non-expert reader.

It's still a challenging book, and I'll need a re-read at sometime in the near future to fix the concepts in my head, but I'm looking forward to the prospect.

A few minor gripes:

- The illustrations don't seem to have transferred well to the paperback version - they're on the small side and difficult to interpret and return to. Perhaps larger, colour illustrations, gathered in a central section would have been better.
- Some of Greene's analogies grate a little. He makes a lot of use of analogies, which I guess is inevitable and necessary given the esoteric nature of the subject matter. However, one is occasionally left wondering whether these analogies tell the whole story or if there's something important that's been left out for the benefit of the reader's sanity. The early ones on relativity are played out by The Simpsons (obviously Greene is a fan!) which comes across as a little patronising and later ones relate to baseball, which doesn't translate well for the British reader.
- Although the conclusions are mind-boggling (quantum entanglement, string theory) a degree of shell shock is setting in - can the universe get any wierder? I'm only 3/4 of the way through! and it is difficult to lift oneself to the heights of admiration and wonder that Green obviously reaches - Ho hum! More strangeness!

Nevertheless, this is well worth a read and don't be put off by the subject material. You'll never look at the world in the same way again.

Wow. Seriously amazing reading., 04 Jan 2008
It's taken me several attempts to fully absorb and gets heavy going at times (perhaps because it is my first cosmological read) but we live in a very strange and amazing universe.
I want to come back in fifty years to see if the current theorys are anywhere near correct. It has me hooked on the subject.


Excellent, but limited, 30 Dec 2007
It was an excellent book, accesible to readers of all ages and interests. Everything was well explained, such that it leaves the reader feeling proud to have understood such advanced areas of physics! However, the constant references to the simpsons gave a feeling of being talked down to, as if the reader would be too stupid to understand a physical concept if it werent explained by use of cartoons! Said referrences became more and more frequent to the point that one wondered whether the book was about the simpsons or about spacetime. I'll leave it to you to judge though, as i definitely think it a book worth reading.

Physics at it's most accessible, 21 Nov 2007
Let's make no mistake, for the layman some physics concepts can be mind blowing. Briane Greene understands this at the most fundamental level and has successfully produced a book that puts you in the driving seat of discovery. The book makes you quite literally "think again" about what we are and how we fit into the cosmological scheme of things. This is a truly life changing book that through analogy, reduces the etherial world of particle and cosmological physicists into everyday language that will change your worldview forever. This book is exceptionally written and is testimony that the author feels the need to convey the excitement he feels in new discoveries, as well as explain established concepts to a much wider audience. It comes very highly recommended.

Fantastic Guide to Physics for Beginners, 11 Jul 2008
Brian Greene has managed to do the impossible. He has written a guide to physics from Newton to String Theory, that is not only easy to read but is also entertaining. This is what I should have had as my physics textbook in school. Whilst using simple everyday examples and avoiding the dreaded equations, he manages to explain the most complex and even bizzare ideas that physics has so far come up with.

Reading it felt much like opening my eyes to the weird but wonderful universe out there.
A trully excellent book.

Great book - don't be put off, 25 Mar 2008
I'm working my way through this at the moment and I fully agree with other reviewers that it is a life changing book on a par with Blind Watchmaker.

I was a little daunted by the subject material to begin with, but soon lost my inhibitions - it's not half as bad as I expected and I'm actually finding myself second-guessing some of the directions and explanations that author is taking in explaining the wierdness of the relativistic and quantum worlds. Either I'm not as deeply stupid as I thought or Greene's treatment is perfect for the non-expert reader.

It's still a challenging book, and I'll need a re-read at sometime in the near future to fix the concepts in my head, but I'm looking forward to the prospect.

A few minor gripes:

- The illustrations don't seem to have transferred well to the paperback version - they're on the small side and difficult to interpret and return to. Perhaps larger, colour illustrations, gathered in a central section would have been better.
- Some of Greene's analogies grate a little. He makes a lot of use of analogies, which I guess is inevitable and necessary given the esoteric nature of the subject matter. However, one is occasionally left wondering whether these analogies tell the whole story or if there's something important that's been left out for the benefit of the reader's sanity. The early ones on relativity are played out by The Simpsons (obviously Greene is a fan!) which comes across as a little patronising and later ones relate to baseball, which doesn't translate well for the British reader.
- Although the conclusions are mind-boggling (quantum entanglement, string theory) a degree of shell shock is setting in - can the universe get any wierder? I'm only 3/4 of the way through! and it is difficult to lift oneself to the heights of admiration and wonder that Green obviously reaches - Ho hum! More strangeness!

Nevertheless, this is well worth a read and don't be put off by the subject material. You'll never look at the world in the same way again.

Wow. Seriously amazing reading., 04 Jan 2008
It's taken me several attempts to fully absorb and gets heavy going at times (perhaps because it is my first cosmological read) but we live in a very strange and amazing universe.
I want to come back in fifty years to see if the current theorys are anywhere near correct. It has me hooked on the subject.


Excellent, but limited, 30 Dec 2007
It was an excellent book, accesible to readers of all ages and interests. Everything was well explained, such that it leaves the reader feeling proud to have understood such advanced areas of physics! However, the constant references to the simpsons gave a feeling of being talked down to, as if the reader would be too stupid to understand a physical concept if it werent explained by use of cartoons! Said referrences became more and more frequent to the point that one wondered whether the book was about the simpsons or about spacetime. I'll leave it to you to judge though, as i definitely think it a book worth reading.

Physics at it's most accessible, 21 Nov 2007
Let's make no mistake, for the layman some physics concepts can be mind blowing. Briane Greene understands this at the most fundamental level and has successfully produced a book that puts you in the driving seat of discovery. The book makes you quite literally "think again" about what we are and how we fit into the cosmological scheme of things. This is a truly life changing book that through analogy, reduces the etherial world of particle and cosmological physicists into everyday language that will change your worldview forever. This book is exceptionally written and is testimony that the author feels the need to convey the excitement he feels in new discoveries, as well as explain established concepts to a much wider audience. It comes very highly recommended.

Amazing!, 20 Mar 2008
Your brain is a hologram. The cosmos is a hologram. Your body is a hologram. Your mind is a hologram. Dreams are holograms. The world you perceive around you is a hologram. There is an underlying order to everything from which reality is projected. This implicate order is also known as 'the zero point energy field'. It's like a piece of holographic film on which the universe is printed. Each part contains the whole. This book is a must read for anyone trying to do anything parapsychological, whether it's psychokenisis, remote viewing, spiritual healing, or predicting the future, what you are dealing with is a hologram. As an amature music recording artist, the part I found most interesting was the bit about using holography to create 3-D surround sound through a standard pair of earphones! do an internet search for 'cetera holophony algorithm'. This book has something for everyone in it.

LOVE THIS BOOK, 11 Feb 2008
The book not only provides a perspective of looking at the universe as holographic, but also provides an avalanche of very interesting stories.

As a Clinical Hypnotherapist, and a firm believer that there are no limitations to what we can experience and the changes we can create in our bodies and in our lives, even on genetic level, I wanted to share one of the stories from this book:

"Brocq's disease involves a horribly disfiguring hereditary condition. Victims of Brocq's disease develop a thick, horny covering over their skin that resembles the scales of a reptile. The skin can become so hardened and rigid that even the slightest movement will cause it to crack and bleed.

Brocq's disease was incurable until 1951 when a sixteen-year-old boy with an advanced case of the affliction was referred as a last resort to a hypnotherapist named A.A. Mason at the Queen Victoria Hospital in London. Mason discovered that the boy was a good hypnotic subject and could easily be put into a deep state of trance.

While the boy was in trance, Mason told him that his Brocq's disease was healing and would soon be gone. Five days later the scaly layer covering the boy's left arm fell off, revealing soft, healthy flesh beneath. By the end of tend days the arm was completely normal.

Mason and the boy continued to work on different body areas until all of the scaly skin was gone. The boy remained symptom-free for at least five years, at which point Mason lost touch with him.

This is extraordinary because Brocq's disease is a genetic condition, and getting rid of it involves more than just controlling autonomic processes such as blood flow patterns and various cells of the immune system. It means tapping into the masterplan, the DNA programming itself. So, it would appear that when we access the right strata of our beliefs, our minds can override even our genetic makeup.

Reality as Illusion, 09 Jul 2007
I merely scraped a C grade in GCE O Level Physics but I had hoped that this book would be accessible for the layman interested in the radical implications of quantum theory. However I found "The Holographic Universe" to be a difficult read full of weighty philosophical and scientific theorising and a lot of it didn't make sense to me. The author starts off by proposing the existence of a holographic universe , apparently based on the fact that subatomic particles are actually insubstantial waveforms until they are observed at which stage only then do they become particles. Therefore our consciousness must in some way create what appears to be a solid reality out of nothing. I can accept that argument but I must admit that I found it hard to get my head around the fact that the universe is some kind of interactive 3D photographic projection.Most of "The Holographic Universe" uses this theory to explain away a wide variety of paranormal phenomena from stigmatism to telekinesis , from synchronicities to out of body and near death experiences. The author puts forward an impressive body of evidence to support the existence of these fascinating phenomena but I must admit that I didn't understand how this proved his theory of the holographic nature of the universe. This book would be of interest to those with a broad knowledge of physics and those with a deep knowledge of mystical ,esoteric philosophies, however I found it all to be a bit too obscure and deep to fully comprehend and enjoy. Perhaps someone might get round to writing a dumbed down version of this book to help us all to get enlightened !

Well documented book, fascinating stuff, 25 May 2007
Great read, keep an open mind. Very well known book in the quantum physics world, but don't be put off, the book is understandable, its up to you to look in these theories further.

Fantastic!, 09 Apr 2007
This book is probably the easiest to read on the planet when it comes to explaining quantum physics and how our universe and everything in it is basically the same as a hologram. It's a book that everybody interested in the nature of our reality should definitely read, whatever angle they are coming from!

Fantastic Guide to Physics for Beginners, 11 Jul 2008
Brian Greene has managed to do the impossible. He has written a guide to physics from Newton to String Theory, that is not only easy to read but is also entertaining. This is what I should have had as my physics textbook in school. Whilst using simple everyday examples and avoiding the dreaded equations, he manages to explain the most complex and even bizzare ideas that physics has so far come up with.

Reading it felt much like opening my eyes to the weird but wonderful universe out there.
A trully excellent book.

Great book - don't be put off, 25 Mar 2008
I'm working my way through this at the moment and I fully agree with other reviewers that it is a life changing book on a par with Blind Watchmaker.

I was a little daunted by the subject material to begin with, but soon lost my inhibitions - it's not half as bad as I expected and I'm actually finding myself second-guessing some of the directions and explanations that author is taking in explaining the wierdness of the relativistic and quantum worlds. Either I'm not as deeply stupid as I thought or Greene's treatment is perfect for the non-expert reader.

It's still a challenging book, and I'll need a re-read at sometime in the near future to fix the concepts in my head, but I'm looking forward to the prospect.

A few minor gripes:

- The illustrations don't seem to have transferred well to the paperback version - they're on the small side and difficult to interpret and return to. Perhaps larger, colour illustrations, gathered in a central section would have been better.
- Some of Greene's analogies grate a little. He makes a lot of use of analogies, which I guess is inevitable and necessary given the esoteric nature of the subject matter. However, one is occasionally left wondering whether these analogies tell the whole story or if there's something important that's been left out for the benefit of the reader's sanity. The early ones on relativity are played out by The Simpsons (obviously Greene is a fan!) which comes across as a little patronising and later ones relate to baseball, which doesn't translate well for the British reader.
- Although the conclusions are mind-boggling (quantum entanglement, string theory) a degree of shell shock is setting in - can the universe get any wierder? I'm only 3/4 of the way through! and it is difficult to lift oneself to the heights of admiration and wonder that Green obviously reaches - Ho hum! More strangeness!

Nevertheless, this is well worth a read and don't be put off by the subject material. You'll never look at the world in the same way again.

Wow. Seriously amazing reading., 04 Jan 2008
It's taken me several attempts to fully absorb and gets heavy going at times (perhaps because it is my first cosmological read) but we live in a very strange and amazing universe.
I want to come back in fifty years to see if the current theorys are anywhere near correct. It has me hooked on the subject.


Excellent, but limited, 30 Dec 2007
It was an excellent book, accesible to readers of all ages and interests. Everything was well explained, such that it leaves the reader feeling proud to have understood such advanced areas of physics! However, the constant references to the simpsons gave a feeling of being talked down to, as if the reader would be too stupid to understand a physical concept if it werent explained by use of cartoons! Said referrences became more and more frequent to the point that one wondered whether the book was about the simpsons or about spacetime. I'll leave it to you to judge though, as i definitely think it a book worth reading.

Physics at it's most accessible, 21 Nov 2007
Let's make no mistake, for the layman some physics concepts can be mind blowing. Briane Greene understands this at the most fundamental level and has successfully produced a book that puts you in the driving seat of discovery. The book makes you quite literally "think again" about what we are and how we fit into the cosmological scheme of things. This is a truly life changing book that through analogy, reduces the etherial world of particle and cosmological physicists into everyday language that will change your worldview forever. This book is exceptionally written and is testimony that the author feels the need to convey the excitement he feels in new discoveries, as well as explain established concepts to a much wider audience. It comes very highly recommended.

Amazing!, 20 Mar 2008
Your brain is a hologram. The cosmos is a hologram. Your body is a hologram. Your mind is a hologram. Dreams are holograms. The world you perceive around you is a hologram. There is an underlying order to everything from which reality is projected. This implicate order is also known as 'the zero point energy field'. It's like a piece of holographic film on which the universe is printed. Each part contains the whole. This book is a must read for anyone trying to do anything parapsychological, whether it's psychokenisis, remote viewing, spiritual healing, or predicting the future, what you are dealing with is a hologram. As an amature music recording artist, the part I found most interesting was the bit about using holography to create 3-D surround sound through a standard pair of earphones! do an internet search for 'cetera holophony algorithm'. This book has something for everyone in it.

LOVE THIS BOOK, 11 Feb 2008
The book not only provides a perspective of looking at the universe as holographic, but also provides an avalanche of very interesting stories.

As a Clinical Hypnotherapist, and a firm believer that there are no limitations to what we can experience and the changes we can create in our bodies and in our lives, even on genetic level, I wanted to share one of the stories from this book:

"Brocq's disease involves a horribly disfiguring hereditary condition. Victims of Brocq's disease develop a thick, horny covering over their skin that resembles the scales of a reptile. The skin can become so hardened and rigid that even the slightest movement will cause it to crack and bleed.

Brocq's disease was incurable until 1951 when a sixteen-year-old boy with an advanced case of the affliction was referred as a last resort to a hypnotherapist named A.A. Mason at the Queen Victoria Hospital in London. Mason discovered that the boy was a good hypnotic subject and could easily be put into a deep state of trance.

While the boy was in trance, Mason told him that his Brocq's disease was healing and would soon be gone. Five days later the scaly layer covering the boy's left arm fell off, revealing soft, healthy flesh beneath. By the end of tend days the arm was completely normal.

Mason and the boy continued to work on different body areas until all of the scaly skin was gone. The boy remained symptom-free for at least five years, at which point Mason lost touch with him.

This is extraordinary because Brocq's disease is a genetic condition, and getting rid of it involves more than just controlling autonomic processes such as blood flow patterns and various cells of the immune system. It means tapping into the masterplan, the DNA programming itself. So, it would appear that when we access the right strata of our beliefs, our minds can override even our genetic makeup.

Reality as Illusion, 09 Jul 2007
I merely scraped a C grade in GCE O Level Physics but I had hoped that this book would be accessible for the layman interested in the radical implications of quantum theory. However I found "The Holographic Universe" to be a difficult read full of weighty philosophical and scientific theorising and a lot of it didn't make sense to me. The author starts off by proposing the existence of a holographic universe , apparently based on the fact that subatomic particles are actually insubstantial waveforms until they are observed at which stage only then do they become particles. Therefore our consciousness must in some way create what appears to be a solid reality out of nothing. I can accept that argument but I must admit that I found it hard to get my head around the fact that the universe is some kind of interactive 3D photographic projection.Most of "The Holographic Universe" uses this theory to explain away a wide variety of paranormal phenomena from stigmatism to telekinesis , from synchronicities to out of body and near death experiences. The author puts forward an impressive body of evidence to support the existence of these fascinating phenomena but I must admit that I didn't understand how this proved his theory of the holographic nature of the universe. This book would be of interest to those with a broad knowledge of physics and those with a deep knowledge of mystical ,esoteric philosophies, however I found it all to be a bit too obscure and deep to fully comprehend and enjoy. Perhaps someone might get round to writing a dumbed down version of this book to help us all to get enlightened !

Well documented book, fascinating stuff, 25 May 2007
Great read, keep an open mind. Very well known book in the quantum physics world, but don't be put off, the book is understandable, its up to you to look in these theories further.

Fantastic!, 09 Apr 2007
This book is probably the easiest to read on the planet when it comes to explaining quantum physics and how our universe and everything in it is basically the same as a hologram. It's a book that everybody interested in the nature of our reality should definitely read, whatever angle they are coming from!

Perfect for Amateur Astronomers, 22 Jun 2008
The Planisphere is the perfect tool for any amateur astronomer.
It comes with full instructions on its use, so you can have a quick look at it and be out inspecting the night sky in only a few minutes.

It also explains how to find the major planets (Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn), sunrise and sunset as well as the positions of the constellations, season by season. Luckily, many of these instructions can be found on the back of the Planisphere itself (along with a Key to map symbols) so that you can always flip it over if you get stuck.

The Planisphere itself is sturdy, flexible and laminated so it won't be affected by wet surfaces - which is useful if you find yourself outside and there's a change in the weather. This makes it superior to any cardboard version.

I recieved my first Planisphere at the age of ten, and I still buy updated versions every few years, simply because they are useful for locating the major planets (it covers their positions, month by month for ten years). Those who have just started stargazing will find the Planisphere a useful tool.


Great tool for the occassional astronomer, 29 Dec 2007
Every now and then in the winter when Orion is visible in the skies I dig this out and use it to work out what else I can find in the night (or early morning) sky.

It is very easy to use and can also be explained to kids. I have used it in the West of Ireland and Southern England to remind myself of the night sky I was so fascinated by as a teenager.

Straightforward, useful and accurate, 03 Dec 2006
I got the Planisphere a while back and found it to be a fabulous astronomical companion. The larger format makes it easy to see outside in the dark and it's plastic construction means it won't be affected by night dew. On the back is a handy planet finder which is accurate and I quickly found Saturn in the area it computed.
I prefer the Planisphere to the laptop version as it doesn't run out of batteries, crash or damage easily. I wouldn't be without it.

Fantastic Guide to Physics for Beginners, 11 Jul 2008
Brian Greene has managed to do the impossible. He has written a guide to physics from Newton to String Theory, that is not only easy to read but is also entertaining. This is what I should have had as my physics textbook in school. Whilst using simple everyday examples and avoiding the dreaded equations, he manages to explain the most complex and even bizzare ideas that physics has so far come up with.

Reading it felt much like opening my eyes to the weird but wonderful universe out there.
A trully excellent book.

Great book - don't be put off, 25 Mar 2008
I'm working my way through this at the moment and I fully agree with other reviewers that it is a life changing book on a par with Blind Watchmaker.

I was a little daunted by the subject material to begin with, but soon lost my inhibitions - it's not half as bad as I expected and I'm actually finding myself second-guessing some of the directions and explanations that author is taking in explaining the wierdness of the relativistic and quantum worlds. Either I'm not as deeply stupid as I thought or Greene's treatment is perfect for the non-expert reader.

It's still a challenging book, and I'll need a re-read at sometime in the near future to fix the concepts in my head, but I'm looking forward to the prospect.

A few minor gripes:

- The illustrations don't seem to have transferred well to the paperback version - they're on the small side and difficult to interpret and return to. Perhaps larger, colour illustrations, gathered in a central section would have been better.
- Some of Greene's analogies grate a little. He makes a lot of use of analogies, which I guess is inevitable and necessary given the esoteric nature of the subject matter. However, one is occasionally left wondering whether these analogies tell the whole story or if there's something important that's been left out for the benefit of the reader's sanity. The early ones on relativity are played out by The Simpsons (obviously Greene is a fan!) which comes across as a little patronising and later ones relate to baseball, which doesn't translate well for the British reader.
- Although the conclusions are mind-boggling (quantum entanglement, string theory) a degree of shell shock is setting in - can the universe get any wierder? I'm only 3/4 of the way through! and it is difficult to lift oneself to the heights of admiration and wonder that Green obviously reaches - Ho hum! More strangeness!

Nevertheless, this is well worth a read and don't be put off by the subject material. You'll never look at the world in the same way again.

Wow. Seriously amazing reading., 04 Jan 2008
It's taken me several attempts to fully absorb and gets heavy going at times (perhaps because it is my first cosmological read) but we live in a very strange and amazing universe.
I want to come back in fifty years to see if the current theorys are anywhere near correct. It has me hooked on the subject.


Excellent, but limited, 30 Dec 2007
It was an excellent book, accesible to readers of all ages and interests. Everything was well explained, such that it leaves the reader feeling proud to have understood such advanced areas of physics! However, the constant references to the simpsons gave a feeling of being talked down to, as if the reader would be too stupid to understand a physical concept if it werent explained by use of cartoons! Said referrences became more and more frequent to the point that one wondered whether the book was about the simpsons or about spacetime. I'll leave it to you to judge though, as i definitely think it a book worth reading.

Physics at it's most accessible, 21 Nov 2007
Let's make no mistake, for the layman some physics concepts can be mind blowing. Briane Greene understands this at the most fundamental level and has successfully produced a book that puts you in the driving seat of discovery. The book makes you quite literally "think again" about what we are and how we fit into the cosmological scheme of things. This is a truly life changing book that through analogy, reduces the etherial world of particle and cosmological physicists into everyday language that will change your worldview forever. This book is exceptionally written and is testimony that the author feels the need to convey the excitement he feels in new discoveries, as well as explain established concepts to a much wider audience. It comes very highly recommended.

Amazing!, 20 Mar 2008
Your brain is a hologram. The cosmos is a hologram. Your body is a hologram. Your mind is a hologram. Dreams are holograms. The world you perceive around you is a hologram. There is an underlying order to everything from which reality is projected. This implicate order is also known as 'the zero point energy field'. It's like a piece of holographic film on which the universe is printed. Each part contains the whole. This book is a must read for anyone trying to do anything parapsychological, whether it's psychokenisis, remote viewing, spiritual healing, or predicting the future, what you are dealing with is a hologram. As an amature music recording artist, the part I found most interesting was the bit about using holography to create 3-D surround sound through a standard pair of earphones! do an internet search for 'cetera holophony algorithm'. This book has something for everyone in it.

LOVE THIS BOOK, 11 Feb 2008
The book not only provides a perspective of looking at the universe as holographic, but also provides an avalanche of very interesting stories.

As a Clinical Hypnotherapist, and a firm believer that there are no limitations to what we can experience and the changes we can create in our bodies and in our lives, even on genetic level, I wanted to share one of the stories from this book:

"Brocq's disease involves a horribly disfiguring hereditary condition. Victims of Brocq's disease develop a thick, horny covering over their skin that resembles the scales of a reptile. The skin can become so hardened and rigid that even the slightest movement will cause it to crack and bleed.

Brocq's disease was incurable until 1951 when a sixteen-year-old boy with an advanced case of the affliction was referred as a last resort to a hypnotherapist named A.A. Mason at the Queen Victoria Hospital in London. Mason discovered that the boy was a good hypnotic subject and could easily be put into a deep state of trance.

While the boy was in trance, Mason told him that his Brocq's disease was healing and would soon be gone. Five days later the scaly layer covering the boy's left arm fell off, revealing soft, healthy flesh beneath. By the end of tend days the arm was completely normal.

Mason and the boy continued to work on different body areas until all of the scaly skin was gone. The boy remained symptom-free for at least five years, at which point Mason lost touch with him.

This is extraordinary because Brocq's disease is a genetic condition, and getting rid of it involves more than just controlling autonomic processes such as blood flow patterns and various cells of the immune system. It means tapping into the masterplan, the DNA programming itself. So, it would appear that when we access the right strata of our beliefs, our minds can override even our genetic makeup.

Reality as Illusion, 09 Jul 2007
I merely scraped a C grade in GCE O Level Physics but I had hoped that this book would be accessible for the layman interested in the radical implications of quantum theory. However I found "The Holographic Universe" to be a difficult read full of weighty philosophical and scientific theorising and a lot of it didn't make sense to me. The author starts off by proposing the existence of a holographic universe , apparently based on the fact that subatomic particles are actually insubstantial waveforms until they are observed at which stage only then do they become particles. Therefore our consciousness must in some way create what appears to be a solid reality out of nothing. I can accept that argument but I must admit that I found it hard to get my head around the fact that the universe is some kind of interactive 3D photographic projection.Most of "The Holographic Universe" uses this theory to explain away a wide variety of paranormal phenomena from stigmatism to telekinesis , from synchronicities to out of body and near death experiences. The author puts forward an impressive body of evidence to support the existence of these fascinating phenomena but I must admit that I didn't understand how this proved his theory of the holographic nature of the universe. This book would be of interest to those with a broad knowledge of physics and those with a deep knowledge of mystical ,esoteric philosophies, however I found it all to be a bit too obscure and deep to fully comprehend and enjoy. Perhaps someone might get round to writing a dumbed down version of this book to help us all to get enlightened !

Well documented book, fascinating stuff, 25 May 2007
Great read, keep an open mind. Very well known book in the quantum physics world, but don't be put off, the book is understandable, its up to you to look in these theories further.

Fantastic!, 09 Apr 2007
This book is probably the easiest to read on the planet when it comes to explaining quantum physics and how our universe and everything in it is basically the same as a hologram. It's a book that everybody interested in the nature of our reality should definitely read, whatever angle they are coming from!

Perfect for Amateur Astronomers, 22 Jun 2008
The Planisphere is the perfect tool for any amateur astronomer.
It comes with full instructions on its use, so you can have a quick look at it and be out inspecting the night sky in only a few minutes.

It also explains how to find the major planets (Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn), sunrise and sunset as well as the positions of the constellations, season by season. Luckily, many of these instructions can be found on the back of the Planisphere itself (along with a Key to map symbols) so that you can always flip it over if you get stuck.

The Planisphere itself is sturdy, flexible and laminated so it won't be affected by wet surfaces - which is useful if you find yourself outside and there's a change in the weather. This makes it superior to any cardboard version.

I recieved my first Planisphere at the age of ten, and I still buy updated versions every few years, simply because they are useful for locating the major planets (it covers their positions, month by month for ten years). Those who have just started stargazing will find the Planisphere a useful tool.


Great tool for the occassional astronomer, 29 Dec 2007
Every now and then in the winter when Orion is visible in the skies I dig this out and use it to work out what else I can find in the night (or early morning) sky.

It is very easy to use and can also be explained to kids. I have used it in the West of Ireland and Southern England to remind myself of the night sky I was so fascinated by as a teenager.

Straightforward, useful and accurate, 03 Dec 2006
I got the Planisphere a while back and found it to be a fabulous astronomical companion. The larger format makes it easy to see outside in the dark and it's plastic construction means it won't be affected by night dew. On the back is a handy planet finder which is accurate and I quickly found Saturn in the area it computed.
I prefer the Planisphere to the laptop version as it doesn't run out of batteries, crash or damage easily. I wouldn't be without it.

Life, the universe and everything, 14 Jul 2008
I love documentaries that start talking about the quantum world. Of course there is part of your mind that is shouting "this makes no sense" but instead I listen to the bit that says "I must know more". If you are turned off by phrases like M-theory or cosmological constant then this is obviously not the book for you.

If, like me, you love popular science and want to push things a little further without getting bogged down in mathematical formulae which mean NOTHING to me then this is the book for you. Kaku is a great guide through the physics of the very big like red dwarfs and black holes to the subatomic world of gluons and string theory. Whenever there's a danger of losing the reader he uses a simple analogy to help the information make sense. His style is light but serious and his ability to pack so much in without losing a layman like me is impressive.

This is a fabulous book about science for the casual adult reader which will get you to look at the world in a very different way. Enjoy the ride.


Beyond Worlds, 06 Jul 2008
Parallel Worlds is a highly readable account of some of the most advanced and exciting aspects of cosmology and its related disciplines today. Covering everything from Einsteinian relativity, through quantum mechanics and on to the most-favoured current "theories of everything" - string theory and its new variant M-theory - Kaku guides his readers through a potted history of the universe, from its fiery beginning to its cold dark end ... and possibly beyond.

The journey is an exciting one, full of sound and fury - from the pattering of quasars and cosmic background radiation to the roar of supernovae - signifying plenty.

There are one or two editing mishaps - "googol" becomes "google", Jodrell Bank becomes "Jordell Bank", "Brownian motion" becomes "Browning motion" (leading me to wonder what would have happened if Terrence Rattigan had written "The Brownian Version" - in which a retired schoolteacher must confront his failure as a continuous-time stochastic process relating to the movement of a particle in a gas or liquid) - and someone needs to explain to the prof that "enormity" is not the same as "enormousness" but, these very petty cavils aside, this is an entertaining and informative guide to the nature of our universe and the universes that may exist alongside it.

accessible, 10 Jan 2008
a GENUINELY accessible book, written in layman's (or layperson's as it must be these days) terms. the logic of the format flows easily and the topics covered are fascinating, highly speculative but also logically probable. a book to come back to again.

The Humanity's Exit Strategy, 04 Jun 2007
Michio Kaku's "Parallel Worlds" is the best popular science non-fiction ever written. Its breakthrough theories reach out to the most naive reader with such a strength that whatever you've known about the Big Bang or religious essays on the beginning and the end of our world, suddenly becomes a tiny moment caught in the universe yet ever-evolving.

It has very logical structure on complex issues such as the essence of non-material dark energy that apparently consists the 73 percent of the energy in our universe, the bubble theories of the existence of parallel universes where the humanity can move to as our planet comes to an end due to the unavoidable universal freeze. Thus, he masterfully presents the idea of multiverses that co-exist in a string, subject to ongoing Big Bangs here and there. As he narrates "...entire universes continually sprout or "bud" off other universes. If true, it would unify two of the great religious mythologies, Genesis and Nirvana. Genesis would take place continually within the fabric of timeless Nirvana".

(One has another appreciation for Michio Kaku for his bringing up in a Buddhist family who nevertheless sent him off to a Catholic Sunday School had made him one of the most read scientists.)

Decoding Einstein's and Darwin's at their time distant theories on reading "the God's Mind" and the "end of humanity", Michio Kaku unveils the latest developments in the scientific world on the humanity's beginning and future, claiming that even a string of Big Bangs and multiverses would still need an ultimate creator/composer...

This book is a definite buy on the most indefinite questions we have.

Wow!, 19 Apr 2007
This book is mind blowing. Written on a level that makes it accessible to pretty much everybody it covers all aspects of cosmology and their implications regarding time travel, parallel worlds, string theory and black holes. It even covers some of the history behind the major scientists involved (Einstein, Gamow, Schrodinger, Hoyle etc) and includes anecdotes telling of the debates they had with each other concerning some of the major questions. It doesn't matter if you don't fully understand some of the ideas (Quantum theory, for example, is probably fully understood by nobody), there are plenty of other things to keep you interested and its all so well written that it really is close to being impossible to put down.

Fantastic Guide to Physics for Beginners, 11 Jul 2008
Brian Greene has managed to do the impossible. He has written a guide to physics from Newton to String Theory, that is not only easy to read but is also entertaining. This is what I should have had as my physics textbook in school. Whilst using simple everyday examples and avoiding the dreaded equations, he manages to explain the most complex and even bizzare ideas that physics has so far come up with.

Reading it felt much like opening my eyes to the weird but wonderful universe out there.
A trully excellent book.

Great book - don't be put off, 25 Mar 2008
I'm working my way through this at the moment and I fully agree with other reviewers that it is a life changing book on a par with Blind Watchmaker.

I was a little daunted by the subject material to begin with, but soon lost my inhibitions - it's not half as bad as I expected and I'm actually finding myself second-guessing some of the directions and explanations that author is taking in explaining the wierdness of the relativistic and quantum worlds. Either I'm not as deeply stupid as I thought or Greene's treatment is perfect for the non-expert reader.

It's still a challenging book, and I'll need a re-read at sometime in the near future to fix the concepts in my head, but I'm looking forward to the prospect.

A few minor gripes:

- The illustrations don't seem to have transferred well to the paperback version - they're on the small side and difficult to interpret and return to. Perhaps larger, colour illustrations, gathered in a central section would have been better.
- Some of Greene's analogies grate a little. He makes a lot of use of analogies, which I guess is inevitable and necessary given the esoteric nature of the subject matter. However, one is occasionally left wondering whether these analogies tell the whole story or if there's something important that's been left out for the benefit of the reader's sanity. The early ones on relativity are played out by The Simpsons (obviously Greene is a fan!) which comes across as a little patronising and later ones relate to baseball, which doesn't translate well for the British reader.
- Although the conclusions are mind-boggling (quantum entanglement, string theory) a degree of shell shock is setting in - can the universe get any wierder? I'm only 3/4 of the way through! and it is difficult to lift oneself to the heights of admiration and wonder that Green obviously reaches - Ho hum! More strangeness!

Nevertheless, this is well worth a read and don't be put off by the subject material. You'll never look at the world in the same way again.

Wow. Seriously amazing reading., 04 Jan 2008
It's taken me several attempts to fully absorb and gets heavy going at times (perhaps because it is my first cosmological read) but we live in a very strange and amazing universe.
I want to come back in fifty years to see if the current theorys are anywhere near correct. It has me hooked on the subject.


Excellent, but limited, 30 Dec 2007
It was an excellent book, accesible to readers of all ages and interests. Everything was well explained, such that it leaves the reader feeling proud to have understood such advanced areas of physics! However, the constant references to the simpsons gave a feeling of being talked down to, as if the reader would be too stupid to understand a physical concept if it werent explained by use of cartoons! Said referrences became more and more frequent to the point that one wondered whether the book was about the simpsons or about spacetime. I'll leave it to you to judge though, as i definitely think it a book worth reading.

Physics at it's most accessible, 21 Nov 2007
Let's make no mistake, for the layman some physics concepts can be mind blowing. Briane Greene understands this at the most fundamental level and has successfully produced a book that puts you in the driving seat of discovery. The book makes you quite literally "think again" about what we are and how we fit into the cosmological scheme of things. This is a truly life changing book that through analogy, reduces the etherial world of particle and cosmological physicists into everyday language that will change your worldview forever. This book is exceptionally written and is testimony that the author feels the need to convey the excitement he feels in new discoveries, as well as explain established concepts to a much wider audience. It comes very highly recommended.

Amazing!, 20 Mar 2008
Your brain is a hologram. The cosmos is a hologram. Your body is a hologram. Your mind is a hologram. Dreams are holograms. The world you perceive around you is a hologram. There is an underlying order to everything from which reality is projected. This implicate order is also known as 'the zero point energy field'. It's like a piece of holographic film on which the universe is printed. Each part contains the whole. This book is a must read for anyone trying to do anything parapsychological, whether it's psychokenisis, remote viewing, spiritual healing, or predicting the future, what you are dealing with is a hologram. As an amature music recording artist, the part I found most interesting was the bit about using holography to create 3-D surround sound through a standard pair of earphones! do an internet search for 'cetera holophony algorithm'. This book has something for everyone in it.

LOVE THIS BOOK, 11 Feb 2008
The book not only provides a perspective of looking at the universe as holographic, but also provides an avalanche of very interesting stories.

As a Clinical Hypnotherapist, and a firm believer that there are no limitations to what we can experience and the changes we can create in our bodies and in our lives, even on genetic level, I wanted to share one of the stories from this book:

"Brocq's disease involves a horribly disfiguring hereditary condition. Victims of Brocq's disease develop a thick, horny covering over their skin that resembles the scales of a reptile. The skin can become so hardened and rigid that even the slightest movement will cause it to crack and bleed.

Brocq's disease was incurable until 1951 when a sixteen-year-old boy with an advanced case of the affliction was referred as a last resort to a hypnotherapist named A.A. Mason at the Queen Victoria Hospital in London. Mason discovered that the boy was a good hypnotic subject and could easily be put into a deep state of trance.

While the boy was in trance, Mason told him that his Brocq's disease was healing and would soon be gone. Five days later the scaly layer covering the boy's left arm fell off, revealing soft, healthy flesh beneath. By the end of tend days the arm was completely normal.

Mason and the boy continued to work on different body areas until all of the scaly skin was gone. The boy remained symptom-free for at least five years, at which point Mason lost touch with him.

This is extraordinary because Brocq's disease is a genetic condition, and getting rid of it involves more than just controlling autonomic processes such as blood flow patterns and various cells of the immune system. It means tapping into the masterplan, the DNA programming itself. So, it would appear that when we access the right strata of our beliefs, our minds can override even our genetic makeup.

Reality as Illusion, 09 Jul 2007
I merely scraped a C grade in GCE O Level Physics but I had hoped that this book would be accessible for the layman interested in the radical implications of quantum theory. However I found "The Holographic Universe" to be a difficult read full of weighty philosophical and scientific theorising and a lot of it didn't make sense to me. The author starts off by proposing the existence of a holographic universe , apparently based on the fact that subatomic particles are actually insubstantial waveforms until they are observed at which stage only then do they become particles. Therefore our consciousness must in some way create what appears to be a solid reality out of nothing. I can accept that argument but I must admit that I found it hard to get my head around the fact that the universe is some kind of interactive 3D photographic projection.Most of "The Holographic Universe" uses this theory to explain away a wide variety of paranormal phenomena from stigmatism to telekinesis , from synchronicities to out of body and near death experiences. The author puts forward an impressive body of evidence to support the existence of these fascinating phenomena but I must admit that I didn't understand how this proved his theory of the holographic nature of the universe. This book would be of interest to those with a broad knowledge of physics and those with a deep knowledge of mystical ,esoteric philosophies, however I found it all to be a bit too obscure and deep to fully comprehend and enjoy. Perhaps someone might get round to writing a dumbed down version of this book to help us all to get enlightened !

Well documented book, fascinating stuff, 25 May 2007
Great read, keep an open mind. Very well known book in the quantum physics world, but don't be put off, the book is understandable, its up to you to look in these theories further.

Fantastic!, 09 Apr 2007
This book is probably the easiest to read on the planet when it comes to explaining quantum physics and how our universe and everything in it is basically the same as a hologram. It's a book that everybody interested in the nature of our reality should definitely read, whatever angle they are coming from!

Perfect for Amateur Astronomers, 22 Jun 2008
The Planisphere is the perfect tool for any amateur astronomer.
It comes with full instructions on its use, so you can have a quick look at it and be out inspecting the night sky in only a few minutes.

It also explains how to find the major planets (Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn), sunrise and sunset as well as the positions of the constellations, season by season. Luckily, many of these instructions can be found on the back of the Planisphere itself (along with a Key to map symbols) so that you can always flip it over if you get stuck.

The Planisphere itself is sturdy, flexible and laminated so it won't be affected by wet surfaces - which is useful if you find yourself outside and there's a change in the weather. This makes it superior to any cardboard version.

I recieved my first Planisphere at the age of ten, and I still buy updated versions every few years, simply because they are useful for locating the major planets (it covers their positions, month by month for ten years). Those who have just started stargazing will find the Planisphere a useful tool.


Great tool for the occassional astronomer, 29 Dec 2007
Every now and then in the winter when Orion is visible in the skies I dig this out and use it to work out what else I can find in the night (or early morning) sky.

It is very easy to use and can also be explained to kids. I have used it in the West of Ireland and Southern England to remind myself of the night sky I was so fascinated by as a teenager.

Straightforward, useful and accurate, 03 Dec 2006
I got the Planisphere a while back and found it to be a fabulous astronomical companion. The larger format makes it easy to see outside in the dark and it's plastic construction means it won't be affected by night dew. On the back is a handy planet finder which is accurate and I quickly found Saturn in the area it computed.
I prefer the Planisphere to the laptop version as it doesn't run out of batteries, crash or damage easily. I wouldn't be without it.

Life, the universe and everything, 14 Jul 2008
I love documentaries that start talking about the quantum world. Of course there is part of your mind that is shouting "this makes no sense" but instead I listen to the bit that says "I must know more". If you are turned off by phrases like M-theory or cosmological constant then this is obviously not the book for you.

If, like me, you love popular science and want to push things a little further without getting bogged down in mathematical formulae which mean NOTHING to me then this is the book for you. Kaku is a great guide through the physics of the very big like red dwarfs and black holes to the subatomic world of gluons and string theory. Whenever there's a danger of losing the reader he uses a simple analogy to help the information make sense. His style is light but serious and his ability to pack so much in without losing a layman like me is impressive.

This is a fabulous book about science for the casual adult reader which will get you to look at the world in a very different way. Enjoy the ride.


Beyond Worlds, 06 Jul 2008
Parallel Worlds is a highly readable account of some of the most advanced and exciting aspects of cosmology and its related disciplines today. Covering everything from Einsteinian relativity, through quantum mechanics and on to the most-favoured current "theories of everything" - string theory and its new variant M-theory - Kaku guides his readers through a potted history of the universe, from its fiery beginning to its cold dark end ... and possibly beyond.

The journey is an exciting one, full of sound and fury - from the pattering of quasars and cosmic background radiation to the roar of supernovae - signifying plenty.

There are one or two editing mishaps - "googol" becomes "google", Jodrell Bank becomes "Jordell Bank", "Brownian motion" becomes "Browning motion" (leading me to wonder what would have happened if Terrence Rattigan had written "The Brownian Version" - in which a retired schoolteacher must confront his failure as a continuous-time stochastic process relating to the movement of a particle in a gas or liquid) - and someone needs to explain to the prof that "enormity" is not the same as "enormousness" but, these very petty cavils aside, this is an entertaining and informative guide to the nature of our universe and the universes that may exist alongside it.

accessible, 10 Jan 2008
a GENUINELY accessible book, written in layman's (or layperson's as it must be these days) terms. the logic of the format flows easily and the topics covered are fascinating, highly speculative but also logically probable. a book to come back to again.

The Humanity's Exit Strategy, 04 Jun 2007
Michio Kaku's "Parallel Worlds" is the best popular science non-fiction ever written. Its breakthrough theories reach out to the most naive reader with such a strength that whatever you've known about the Big Bang or religious essays on the beginning and the end of our world, suddenly becomes a tiny moment caught in the universe yet ever-evolving.

It has very logical structure on complex issues such as the essence of non-material dark energy that apparently consists the 73 percent of the energy in our universe, the bubble theories of the existence of parallel universes where the humanity can move to as our planet comes to an end due to the unavoidable universal freeze. Thus, he masterfully presents the idea of multiverses that co-exist in a string, subject to ongoing Big Bangs here and there. As he narrates "...entire universes continually sprout or "bud" off other universes. If true, it would unify two of the great religious mythologies, Genesis and Nirvana. Genesis would take place continually within the fabric of timeless Nirvana".

(One has another appreciation for Michio Kaku for his bringing up in a Buddhist family who nevertheless sent him off to a Catholic Sunday School had made him one of the most read scientists.)

Decoding Einstein's and Darwin's at their time distant theories on reading "the God's Mind" and the "end of humanity", Michio Kaku unveils the latest developments in the scientific world on the humanity's beginning and future, claiming that even a string of Big Bangs and multiverses would still need an ultimate creator/composer...

This book is a definite buy on the most indefinite questions we have.

Wow!, 19 Apr 2007
This book is mind blowing. Written on a level that makes it accessible to pretty much everybody it covers all aspects of cosmology and their implications regarding time travel, parallel worlds, string theory and black holes. It even covers some of the history behind the major scientists involved (Einstein, Gamow, Schrodinger, Hoyle etc) and includes anecdotes telling of the debates they had with each other concerning some of the major questions. It doesn't matter if you don't fully understand some of the ideas (Quantum theory, for example, is probably fully understood by nobody), there are plenty of other things to keep you interested and its all so well written that it really is close to being impossible to put down.

get someone to buy it for you, 28 Apr 2008
if you are interested in imaging, forget it. there is no info on what the variouse targets can look like when photographed, only how to find them. a companion book on how too image and what to use is recomended.

The Novice Stargazer's Bible, 06 Mar 2008
Ask any amateur astronomer what the first book they would recommend to a novice, and the majority will tell you this very book.

Written in a style that is user friendly yet not patronising, it carefully details the highlights of the night sky (by season), giving ratings for each target. All the information on how to find that elusive nebula or galaxy etc is here, along with realistic sketched views through the scope (and finderscope) from a 'normal' viewing site.

Rather than showing each target as a HST or large observatory scope photograph, leading to frustration from the novice, this book is refreshingly honest at what the back garden stargazer will see.

Along with the catalogue of targets (with excellent descriptions of what you are looking at), there is plenty of information on how to set up scopes, what equipment to use and other general advice needed for the novice/amateur astronomer.

I've yet to see a book that covers amateur observations so well.



All that the novice needs, 22 Nov 2006
Put simply, if a novice astronomer with ANY size of telescope buys only one book to assist them, then this should be it (or at least the most recent version of it should be). I'm actually a fairly experienced amateur astronomer with an appalling inability to navigate my way round the skies - at least I did have until I had this book bought for me. Broken down into seasonal sections with indications of the right conditions to go looking for particular objects, I can't think of anything that could make the task easier (short of someone actually finding the objects for you!). It is such a good book I can forgive it a few typos and some lapses of English grammar.

My advice - buy this book!

Every bit as good as they all say !!, 24 Jul 2006
.
.

Well, what else is there to say about this book ?

In a nutshell, it transformed me from clueless beginner to starhopper & DSO finder in 2 hours flat. I have a 200mm Newtonian and I find the book perfect for this scope even though it is aimed primarily at users of small scopes. For a novice it beats a straightforward atlas hands down, giving clear step by step hops to each object. There's much more to this book than mere instructions as well. There's very good info on every single object too, so you find something, then read about it at the time you're observing it. Also, having found a number of the "summer" objects at the 1st attempt I'm very happy that I've failed to find some of the objects listed as these will become targets when I'm more practiced, so the book will remain useful for a long time, and probably forever, as the quickest way to re visit favourite objects.

An utter gem., 10 Jun 2006
This book is perfect. It take the reader and builds his interest in observing just at the point where without it the new scope would end up in the cupboard under the stairs and never be seen again until cleared out by the wife several years later and given away to a distant nephew.

The frission of finding the objects in the book never palls.

Fantastic Guide to Physics for Beginners, 11 Jul 2008
Brian Greene has managed to do the impossible. He has written a guide to physics from Newton to String Theory, that is not only easy to read but is also entertaining. This is what I should have had as my physics textbook in school. Whilst using simple everyday examples and avoiding the dreaded equations, he manages to explain the most complex and even bizzare ideas that physics has so far come up with.

Reading it felt much like opening my eyes to the weird but wonderful universe out there.
A trully excellent book.

Great book - don't be put off, 25 Mar 2008
I'm working my way through this at the moment and I fully agree with other reviewers that it is a life changing book on a par with Blind Watchmaker.

I was a little daunted by the subject material to begin with, but soon lost my inhibitions - it's not half as bad as I expected and I'm actually finding myself second-guessing some of the directions and explanations that author is taking in explaining the wierdness of the relativistic and quantum worlds. Either I'm not as deeply stupid as I thought or Greene's treatment is perfect for the non-expert reader.

It's still a challenging book, and I'll need a re-read at sometime in the near future to fix the concepts in my head, but I'm looking forward to the prospect.

A few minor gripes:

- The illustrations don't seem to have transferred well to the paperback version - they're on the small side and difficult to interpret and return to. Perhaps larger, colour illustrations, gathered in a central section would have been better.
- Some of Greene's analogies grate a little. He makes a lot of use of analogies, which I guess is inevitable and necessary given the esoteric nature of the subject matter. However, one is occasionally left wondering whether these analogies tell the whole story or if there's something important that's been left out for the benefit of the reader's sanity. The early ones on relativity are played out by The Simpsons (obviously Greene is a fan!) which comes across as a little patronising and later ones relate to baseball, which doesn't translate well for the British reader.
- Although the conclusions are mind-boggling (quantum entanglement, string theory) a degree of shell shock is setting in - can the universe get any wierder? I'm only 3/4 of the way through! and it is difficult to lift oneself to the heights of admiration and wonder that Green obviously reaches - Ho hum! More strangeness!

Nevertheless, this is well worth a read and don't be put off by the subject material. You'll never look at the world in the same way again.

Wow. Seriously amazing reading., 04 Jan 2008
It's taken me several attempts to fully absorb and gets heavy going at times (perhaps because it is my first cosmological read) but we live in a very strange and amazing universe.
I want to come back in fifty years to see if the current theorys are anywhere near correct. It has me hooked on the subject.


Excellent, but limited, 30 Dec 2007
It was an excellent book, accesible to readers of all ages and interests. Everything was well explained, such that it leaves the reader feeling proud to have understood such advanced areas of physics! However, the constant references to the simpsons gave a feeling of being talked down to, as if the reader would be too stupid to understand a physical concept if it werent explained by use of cartoons! Said referrences became more and more frequent to the point that one wondered whether the book was about the simpsons or about spacetime. I'll leave it to you to judge though, as i definitely think it a book worth reading.

Physics at it's most accessible, 21 Nov 2007
Let's make no mistake, for the layman some physics concepts can be mind blowing. Briane Greene understands this at the most fundamental level and has successfully produced a book that puts you in the driving seat of discovery. The book makes you quite literally "think again" about what we are and how we fit into the cosmological scheme of things. This is a truly life changing book that through analogy, reduces the etherial world of particle and cosmological physicists into everyday language that will change your worldview forever. This book is exceptionally written and is testimony that the author feels the need to convey the excitement he feels in new discoveries, as well as explain established concepts to a much wider audience. It comes very highly recommended.

Amazing!, 20 Mar 2008
Your brain is a hologram. The cosmos is a hologram. Your body is a hologram. Your mind is a hologram. Dreams are holograms. The world you perceive around you is a hologram. There is an underlying order to everything from which reality is projected. This implicate order is also known as 'the zero point energy field'. It's like a piece of holographic film on which the universe is printed. Each part contains the whole. This book is a must read for anyone trying to do anything parapsychological, whether it's psychokenisis, remote viewing, spiritual healing, or predicting the future, what you are dealing with is a hologram. As an amature music recording artist, the part I found most interesting was the bit about using holography to create 3-D surround sound through a standard pair of earphones! do an internet search for 'cetera holophony algorithm'. This book has something for everyone in it.

LOVE THIS BOOK, 11 Feb 2008
The book not only provides a perspective of looking at the universe as holographic, but also provides an avalanche of very interesting stories.

As a Clinical Hypnotherapist, and a firm believer that there are no limitations to what we can experience and the changes we can create in our bodies and in our lives, even on genetic level, I wanted to share one of the stories from this book:

"Brocq's disease involves a horribly disfiguring hereditary condition. Victims of Brocq's disease develop a thick, horny covering over their skin that resembles the scales of a reptile. The skin can become so hardened and rigid that even the slightest movement will cause it to crack and bleed.

Brocq's disease was incurable until 1951 when a sixteen-year-old boy with an advanced case of the affliction was referred as a last resort to a hypnotherapist named A.A. Mason at the Queen Victoria Hospital in London. Mason discovered that the boy was a good hypnotic subject and could easily be put into a deep state of trance.

While the boy was in trance, Mason told him that his Brocq's disease was healing and would soon be gone. Five days later the scaly layer covering the boy's left arm fell off, revealing soft, healthy flesh beneath. By the end of tend days the arm was completely normal.

Mason and the boy continued to work on different body areas until all of the scaly skin was gone. The boy remained symptom-free for at least five years, at which point Mason lost touch with him.

This is extraordinary because Brocq's disease is a genetic condition, and getting rid of it involves more than just controlling autonomic processes such as blood flow patterns and various cells of the immune system. It means tapping into the masterplan, the DNA programming itself. So, it would appear that when we access the right strata of our beliefs, our minds can override even our genetic makeup.

Reality as Illusion, 09 Jul 2007
I merely scraped a C grade in GCE O Level Physics but I had hoped that this book would be accessible for the layman interested in the radical implications of quantum theory. However I found "The Holographic Universe" to be a difficult read full of weighty philosophical and scientific theorising and a lot of it didn't make sense to me. The author starts off by proposing the existence of a holographic universe , apparently based on the fact that subatomic particles are actually insubstantial waveforms until they are observed at which stage only then do they become particles. Therefore our consciousness must in some way create what appears to be a solid reality out of nothing. I can accept that argument but I must admit that I found it hard to get my head around the fact that the universe is some kind of interactive 3D photographic projection.Most of "The Holographic Universe" uses this theory to explain away a wide variety of paranormal phenomena from stigmatism to telekinesis , from synchronicities to out of body and near death experiences. The author puts forward an impressive body of evidence to support the existence of these fascinating phenomena but I must admit that I didn't understand how this proved his theory of the holographic nature of the universe. This book would be of interest to those with a broad knowledge of physics and those with a deep knowledge of mystical ,esoteric philosophies, however I found it all to be a bit too obscure and deep to fully comprehend and enjoy. Perhaps someone might get round to writing a dumbed down version of this book to help us all to get enlightened !

Well documented book, fascinating stuff, 25 May 2007
Great read, keep an open mind. Very well known book in the quantum physics world, but don't be put off, the book is understandable, its up to you to look in these theories further.

Fantastic!, 09 Apr 2007
This book is probably the easiest to read on the planet when it comes to explaining quantum physics and how our universe and everything in it is basically the same as a hologram. It's a book that everybody interested in the nature of our reality should definitely read, whatever angle they are coming from!

Perfect for Amateur Astronomers, 22 Jun 2008
The Planisphere is the perfect tool for any amateur astronomer.
It comes with full instructions on its use, so you can have a quick look at it and be out inspecting the night sky in only a few minutes.

It also explains how to find the major planets (Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn), sunrise and sunset as well as the positions of the constellations, season by season. Luckily, many of these instructions can be found on the back of the Planisphere itself (along with a Key to map symbols) so that you can always flip it over if you get stuck.

The Planisphere itself is sturdy, flexible and laminated so it won't be affected by wet surfaces - which is useful if you find yourself outside and there's a change in the weather. This makes it superior to any cardboard version.

I recieved my first Planisphere at the age of ten, and I still buy updated versions every few years, simply because they are useful for locating the major planets (it covers their positions, month by month for ten years). Those who have just started stargazing will find the Planisphere a useful tool.


Great tool for the occassional astronomer, 29 Dec 2007
Every now and then in the winter when Orion is visible in the skies I dig this out and use it to work out what else I can find in the night (or early morning) sky.

It is very easy to use and can also be explained to kids. I have used it in the West of Ireland and Southern England to remind myself of the night sky I was so fascinated by as a teenager.

Straightforward, useful and accurate, 03 Dec 2006
I got the Planisphere a while back and found it to be a fabulous astronomical companion. The larger format makes it easy to see outside in the dark and it's plastic construction means it won't be affected by night dew. On the back is a handy planet finder which is accurate and I quickly found Saturn in the area it computed.
I prefer the Planisphere to the laptop version as it doesn't run out of batteries, crash or damage easily. I wouldn't be without it.

Life, the universe and everything, 14 Jul 2008
I love documentaries that start talking about the quantum world. Of course there is part of your mind that is shouting "this makes no sense" but instead I listen to the bit that says "I must know more". If you are turned off by phrases like M-theory or cosmological constant then this is obviously not the book for you.

If, like me, you love popular science and want to push things a little further without getting bogged down in mathematical formulae which mean NOTHING to me then this is the book for you. Kaku is a great guide through the physics of the very big like red dwarfs and black holes to the subatomic world of gluons and string theory. Whenever there's a danger of losing the reader he uses a simple analogy to help the information make sense. His style is light but serious and his ability to pack so much in without losing a layman like me is impressive.

This is a fabulous book about science for the casual adult reader which will get you to look at the world in a very different way. Enjoy the ride.


Beyond Worlds, 06 Jul 2008
Parallel Worlds is a highly readable account of some of the most advanced and exciting aspects of cosmology and its related disciplines today. Covering everything from Einsteinian relativity, through quantum mechanics and on to the most-favoured current "theories of everything" - string theory and its new variant M-theory - Kaku guides his readers through a potted history of the universe, from its fiery beginning to its cold dark end ... and possibly beyond.

The journey is an exciting one, full of sound and fury - from the pattering of quasars and cosmic background radiation to the roar of supernovae - signifying plenty.

There are one or two editing mishaps - "googol" becomes "google", Jodrell Bank becomes "Jordell Bank", "Brownian motion" becomes "Browning motion" (leading me to wonder what would have happened if Terrence Rattigan had written "The Brownian Version" - in which a retired schoolteacher must confront his failure as a continuous-time stochastic process relating to the movement of a particle in a gas or liquid) - and someone needs to explain to the prof that "enormity" is not the same as "enormousness" but, these very petty cavils aside, this is an entertaining and informative guide to the nature of our universe and the universes that may exist alongside it.

accessible, 10 Jan 2008
a GENUINELY accessible book, written in layman's (or layperson's as it must be these days) terms. the logic of the format flows easily and the topics covered are fascinating, highly speculative but also logically probable. a book to come back to again.

The Humanity's Exit Strategy, 04 Jun 2007
Michio Kaku's "Parallel Worlds" is the best popular science non-fiction ever written. Its breakthrough theories reach out to the most naive reader with such a strength that whatever you've known about the Big Bang or religious essays on the beginning and the end of our world, suddenly becomes a tiny moment caught in the universe yet ever-evolving.

It has very logical structure on complex issues such as the essence of non-material dark energy that apparently consists the 73 percent of the energy in our universe, the bubble theories of the existence of parallel universes where the humanity can move to as our planet comes to an end due to the unavoidable universal freeze. Thus, he masterfully presents the idea of multiverses that co-exist in a string, subject to ongoing Big Bangs here and there. As he narrates "...entire universes continually sprout or "bud" off other universes. If true, it would unify two of the great religious mythologies, Genesis and Nirvana. Genesis would take place continually within the fabric of timeless Nirvana".

(One has another appreciation for Michio Kaku for his bringing up in a Buddhist family who nevertheless sent him off to a Catholic Sunday School had made him one of the most read scientists.)

Decoding Einstein's and Darwin's at their time distant theories on reading "the God's Mind" and the "end of humanity", Michio Kaku unveils the latest developments in the scientific world on the humanity's beginning and future, claiming that even a string of Big Bangs and multiverses would still need an ultimate creator/composer...

This book is a definite buy on the most indefinite questions we have.

Wow!, 19 Apr 2007
This book is mind blowing. Written on a level that makes it accessible to pretty much everybody it covers all aspects of cosmology and their implications regarding time travel, parallel worlds, string theory and black holes. It even covers some of the history behind the major scientists involved (Einstein, Gamow, Schrodinger, Hoyle etc) and includes anecdotes telling of the debates they had with each other concerning some of the major questions. It doesn't matter if you don't fully understand some of the ideas (Quantum theory, for example, is probably fully understood by nobody), there are plenty of other things to keep you interested and its all so well written that it really is close to being impossible to put down.

get someone to buy it for you, 28 Apr 2008
if you are interested in imaging, forget it. there is no info on what the variouse targets can look like when photographed, only how to find them. a companion book on how too image and what to use is recomended.

The Novice Stargazer's Bible, 06 Mar 2008
Ask any amateur astronomer what the first book they would recommend to a novice, and the majority will tell you this very book.

Written in a style that is user friendly yet not patronising, it carefully details the highlights of the night sky (by season), giving ratings for each target. All the information on how to find that elusive nebula or galaxy etc is here, along with realistic sketched views through the scope (and finderscope) from a 'normal' viewing site.

Rather than showing each target as a HST or large observatory scope photograph, leading to frustration from the novice, this book is refreshingly honest at what the back garden stargazer will see.

Along with the catalogue of targets (with excellent descriptions of what you are looking at), there is plenty of information on how to set up scopes, what equipment to use and other general advice needed for the novice/amateur astronomer.

I've yet to see a book that covers amateur observations so well.



All that the novice needs, 22 Nov 2006
Put simply, if a novice astronomer with ANY size of telescope buys only one book to assist them, then this should be it (or at least the most recent version of it should be). I'm actually a fairly experienced amateur astronomer with an appalling inability to navigate my way round the skies - at least I did have until I had this book bought for me. Broken down into seasonal sections with indications of the right conditions to go looking for particular objects, I can't think of anything that could make the task easier (short of someone actually finding the objects for you!). It is such a good book I can forgive it a few typos and some lapses of English grammar.

My advice - buy this book!

Every bit as good as they all say !!, 24 Jul 2006
.
.

Well, what else is there to say about this book ?

In a nutshell, it transformed me from clueless beginner to starhopper & DSO finder in 2 hours flat. I have a 200mm Newtonian and I find the book perfect for this scope even though it is aimed primarily at users of small scopes. For a novice it beats a straightforward atlas hands down, giving clear step by step hops to each object. There's much more to this book than mere instructions as well. There's very good info on every single object too, so you find something, then read about it at the time you're observing it. Also, having found a number of the "summer" objects at the 1st attempt I'm very happy that I've failed to find some of the objects listed as these will become targets when I'm more practiced, so the book will remain useful for a long time, and probably forever, as the quickest way to re visit favourite objects.

An utter gem., 10 Jun 2006
This book is perfect. It take the reader and builds his interest in observing just at the point where without it the new scope would end up in the cupboard under the stairs and never be seen again until cleared out by the wife several years later and given away to a distant nephew.

The frission of finding the objects in the book never palls.

Inconvenient for the absolute layman, useless to the others, 13 Oct 2008
I purchased this book some time ago, but didn't read it until yesterday.

1) IMhO, the book is an overwarmed collection of essays written at different times, roughly stitched together and rushed to printing and publishing. The seams show.

2) Now, this Chown should know what he's writing about. If he really is a former astronomer (but of what kind?), and the New Scientist's
"cosmological consultant", he must -or should I say 'should'?- be competent. He cites a couple of papers that, if he was able to read and understand, as I think he did, put him in the class of lesser scientists, or at the very least, serious amateurs.

3) This said, the book doesn't show it. I repeat a question I sometimes ask myself: for whom is the book written? For the layman genuinely interested in science? Or for people interested in showing off with friends (but who, outside a very restricted community, talks seriously about these matters?) their 'knowledge' about some 'sexy' topics?
To the former, avoid like the plague (strange how customs change: were I to have written "HIV" instead of "plague" I'm sure I'd have been labeled an insensitive Neanderthal). To the latter: pick up the concepts you're interested in from better books, of which, with the cut and paste (rendered now so ridiculously easy by the current IT) epidemic raging in our midst, there must be hundreds. Any 'popular' book by Thorne, Penrose, Whittaker, Ghirardi, Chaitin, Feynmann, Gell-Mann, Davies (except the last, "Goldilocks"), Gribbin, Rees, Kauffmann, Pagels, Rees, Tipler, Lindley, Greene, Kaku, Deutsch, Smolin, Prigogine, Guth, Linde, Gross, even Susskind, etc. etc. etc.) will give you a better, sounder idea of the topics this one rushes throug so breezily and incorrectly (not by ignorance but by distorted and contradictory dumbing down to a level where brane attraction through the fifth dimension -of a Calaby-Yau manifold, presumably?- is as easy and familiar as fish 'n chips). Of course, every book treats some themes in preference to others, so youll' nowhere find a balance similar to the one chosen by Chown; to achieve that, you'd have to read five or six of the above-mentioned authors. But you'd have a much sounder knowledge of topics that the book mangles (for example, the explanation of Heisenberg's uncertainty principle in page 178 of the PB edition: "The HUP actually states that for any microscopic event, there is a minimum value of particular quantity - the duration of the event multiplied by the energy of the event. An oscillation has a characteristic time associated with it -the duration of a single oscillation- so the HUP dictates it must also have a certain minimum energy associated with it" [everything sic, except for the acronims]. If I hadn't known what decoherence is and supposedly manages to accomplish I wouldn't have understood a word of Chown's explanation his in Chapter 4 "Keeping it Real". The strange thing is, Chown in the Glossary at the end of the book (page 273) gives a clearer and far more conventional definition of the HUP. That reinforces my impression that the book is acollective, badly harmonized effort.

4) Closely linked to the preceding point is the question of the book's quality, which I frankly found wanting.
Besides careless writing (or editing; as one of many examples consider a possible message left by the Creator in the CMB, page 210 on the PBE: "This is how up I built the Universe"), Chown apparently can't bring himself to think coherently. For example he repeatedly presents the Big Bang as the moment everything started, and was concentrated in a singularity, once he even cautions us against likening it to an explosion that happened in space and time; at other times he states that it happened all at once in all of (I suppose infinite) space; most of the time he refers to it as caused by inflation's leftover energy that had nowhere to go except to power the creation of mass-energy and so cause the BB. Since for all we wnow almost anything might be true, one couldn't fault him for presenting ONE idea as true, but this is nowhere done: he writes as if he weren't even aware of his inconsistent statements. (Well, perhaps the book WAS after all put together by helpers and he hurriedly stitched the parts together: have you noticed how often he publishes - and presumably this mustn't be his main occupation-? And the huge number of footnotes and sentences of the type "as we already saw in Chapter ... ", or "for a more thorough treatment refert to Chapter ... ")?.
He also jumps from one argument to another without rhyme or reason: rather in the middle of the book, he defines several times for the presumably least-lower-bound-average reader what are frecuency, amplitude, etc. Yet before that, in pages 57 ff., he presents the brane collision scenario, in a chapter where he "discusses" incredibly advanced conceps (without saying that some of them are more akin to hard science fiction than to science), and even employs exponential notation!
He fails even to mention how physicists categorize leptons, gluons, hadrons, bosons, etc., which he mentions freely but without once explaining how they fit into the general picture, and what the terms mean.

5) The only, for me, good point of the book: his discussion on the origin of mass, in a language more sober and reflective than usual for him, and his thinly veiled but, one feels, rather heartfelt opposition to the Higgs mechanism (let's hope that CERN'S LHC doesn't find the boson too soon!).


So, abstain if you're a complete layman.
In general, avoid unless you're the type that can't resist the chance of finding about a new glamorous field that you hadn't heard about and interests you. In that case, skim through cursorily in one/two days maximum and buy and read toughtfully the bibliography, or surf the articles.
As for me, this is the last (it was the first) book I buy from this author.

Great, 17 Sep 2008
Very well written with some brillant ideas. Excellant read it you like this sort of stuff!

Never ending chapters of speculation, 26 Aug 2008
If you enjoy reading the more far-fetched New Scientist cosmology articles then I am sure you will find this book entertaining. However, if you like your science at all Popperian you will probably, like me, find it increasingly irritating as you progress. There is very little criticism of the ideas presented in the book, some of which are at best controversial and at worst probably nonsense. Furthermore it would also be very easy to go away with a distorted view about the relative importance of various thinkers; for example, Chaitin is virtually put on a par with Godel and Wolfram with Turing. Having said that there was something addictive about this book and I suspect I'll end up buying more of Chown's work.

So what?, 27 Jun 2008
Is the complexity of the universe the result of a four line computer program?

Will we be resurrected within a computer simulation contrived by an advanced civilisation utilising the energy made available to them as the universe approaches it's ultimate demise?

Are we already living within such a simulation?

Has a message been left for us by the creator in the background radiation of the universe?

These and other completely unverifiable musings are addressed in this book and that, for me, is one of the problems with it - all of the ideas are so out there that after a while I found myself thinking "Here's another off the wall idea that can't be verified one way or another, so what?".

Having said that, it's well written and the author is very capable when it comes to explaining some pretty complex ideas.

If you want to keep up too speed with the current ideas doing the rounds in cosmology then this book will probably interest you. If, on the other hand, you're one of these people who think cosmologists have far too much time on their hands and should get out more, then this book will probably confirm those suspicions!

Thanks for inspiring me again, 10 Jun 2008
I am a part-time physics student and last week finished doing my exams. So, you can imagine, I was sick to death of physics. But a friend urged me to read this book and, against my better judgment, I did. And I'm so glad I did. I couldn't put it down. It's all the fun stuff that wasn't in my course. It's reminded me of why I did physics in the first place. Thanks Mr. Chown for inspiring me again!