The Atom: A Visual Tour (Mit Press) by Jack Challoner

The Atom: A Visual Tour (Mit Press) Reviews

• 
  Reet

  Very basic book. I got bored and completed the book in two days as everything was already known to me. No, I am not too smart, writer wrote for layman.
• 
  Sean

  Deceiving book. Looks like a colorful kid-oriented glossy book. I'm not a big fan of the DK series of books that goes for FAR too many splashy pictures that obscures the text. This books covers some VERY serious topics. There is not really a Table of Contents. The Introduction describes what each chapter is about. Short, but to the point. I found the text very readable, and the topics very deep. Schrodinger's wave equation, brownian motion, binding energy, quantum tunneling, quarks, electron orbits (energy levels, 3-d color drawings), wave/particle duality, fusion, fission, mass spectrometer, spectroscopy, supernovae making elements, all the various bonds, semiconductors, transistors, magnetism, electron spin, radioactivity, and more. Impressive! And kids will like the MANY color pictures.
• 
  Daniel Lișinschi

  Jack wrote quite a captivating book. I must say an enourmous THANK YOU. This scientific work demonstrated once again that I’m not really into quantum mechanics. On the other side, despite some easy to read parts made for some art graduates, this book gives a comprehensive look into atoms and everything related to them, sometimes making u dazzled. The way of writing is good, all the ideas are presented in a logically structured way with no water. I personally did write down a lot of interesting facts that I hadn’t known or missed in school.
• 
  Kimberly Alberta

  The most gorgeous book!! It was a perfect basic chemistry refresher - the atom, the periodic table of elements, types of bonds, etc. For topics that were new to me, like nuclear fission & quantum field theory, I found it very accessible. The pictures and illustrations work very well with the text. I know I will reference this book often as my children move through their high school science classes.
• 
  Vijay Marolia

  This book did wonders for my understanding of particle physics and quantum mechanics. Also, the graphics are incredible and stunning! For a book about science, this one keeps you engaged.
• 
  Pam Shelton-Anderson

  I wanted this book for the basic principles of atomic and quantum physics as well as the pictorial aids. It was very basic, especially for me but I very much enjoyed the drawings (which were very well done). I bought this book in the hope that my non-physics family and friends might take a peek and get something out of it and it achieved that marvelously.
• 
  Patrick B. G.

  Approachable yet detailed (though non-rigorous) guide to many different physics and chemistry topics. It's not a textbook, obviously ("Visual Tour" is literally in the title), and I really enjoy it for what it is.
• 
  Krish

  A very good coffee table/picture book that introduces the atom from its origins. Would definitely gift this book!
• 
  Two Readers in Love

  Written with great clarity with engaging photography and illustrations.
• 
  Joseph Hirsch

  We got the idea of the atom from the ancient Greek philosophers, but we shouldn’t let that stop us from viewing it, from the outset, as a scientific concept. “Natural philosophy,” after all, was just what they called science far back enough in the past, when humans were mostly guessing at the nature of the universe.
  Turns out, however, that we’re still guessing. It seems, in fact, that every scientific advance yields another mystery which required further investigation. I’m not much for intelligent design, but sometimes it does seem like someone is playing a trick on us. Maybe, then Euclid and the Wachowskis are right, and that the only reality is numbers, and we’re stuck in a very weird simulation. After keeping us “brains in vats” occupied with atoms and electrons, someone decided to add fermions and gluons to the program.
  Jack Challoner in his book The Atom makes all of this confounding truth not just intelligible, but beautiful. This well-illustrated and handsomely bound hardback takes us from the very beginning of Attic antiquity up until the most cutting edge experiments being conducted inside tokamaks and superconductors.
  A lot of the images we see in the book are “false-color” or even modeled representations of actual processes and subatomic structures, but that hardly matters. In this book, the reader can see the very smallest constituents of matter that make up our universe. Or at least, the smallest constituents that we know of, thus far.
  It’s quite possible that infinite regress is a reality, and that ancient Philosopher (I forget his name) who said it “was turtles all the way down” might have been right. Regardless, though, of how much more divisible these quarks and specks get, this is a worthy and colorful addition to any lay scientist’s collection. This is to say nothing of the kind of perusal it’s bound to get even from the least scientifically inclined guest who happens to find it waiting for them on the coffee table.
  It is found art in the most literal sense, some kind of fractal distillation of matter’s truth, whether it exists as particles or waves, reality or mere potentiality.
  Highest recommendation.
  
• 
  Mike

  I'll go ahead and give it 4 stars. This is simply a book for the Layman, it is a good introduction with no math. It is still a science book so you will have to read it several times to understand it.
• 
  Tracy

  I needed the pictures!