The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory

Read about third - trilling experience for new cosmologist and fresh insight on old things.

I will admit that I was intimidated when I first opened this book. There was so much that I didn't understand! But I stuck with it and now I have a good handle on the basics of string theory (or TOE as some would call it). This book is not one that you can quickly get through. It took me more than three months to cover the material Greene presents. Take your time with it. Read a chapter, digest it, and then go back to it a few days later. Read it again and again if you have to. When you are finally able to wrap your head around some of these most difficult concepts, I swear that you will feel your brain grow inside your head.

I could feel myself getting smarter as I read this book. I don't really have a strong background in physics, although it has always intrigued me. I remember having discussions about atoms and alternate universes when I was ten years old with my friends. The Elegant Universe is not light reading. It requires at least a vague familiarity with some concepts such as special relativity, quantum mechanics, etc. Some of the chapters in this book were filled with dense (but essential) material. I'm sure I will need to re-read this again sometime to get a fuller grasp of some of the more complicated concepts. Other chapters were filled with evocative scenarios that had me thinking about them for days. I would strongly recommend this book to anyone who's at all interested in physics (or science in general for that matter.) I do wish Greene would have expounded a little more on the implications of string/M theory. I know it would be great to understand the basic composition of the universe, but what would that mean in laypersons terms? I have my own ideas, but feel he should have touched on that a little more.

This book has to be taken little bit with relation to the time of publishing. First of all, the physics and theories change every year. Aprove/disaprove of them is on Yearly basis. So the Bryan put all actual information and founding and some future prediction into this book.
For me it was clear and acceptable way how the author introduce himself, introduce some basic facts, some basic and advanced physics.
After this he kick you to the sea of the new stuff.
This part is prety exiting. All those, who read the S.Hawkings books it will be just repeating of it, but different way, so it is up to reader if he like Hawking's or Greene's style.
Some chapters or parts of the chapters are dificult to be clear after several re-reads. I spent day or two only to get some overview what he si writting about. But finally my brain survive it.
So yours can survive it too.

This book is a very interesting discussion of time, space, gravity and other aspects of the universe in which we live and which we are part of. As a non-scientist, I find this book fascinating.