Portland Public Library

The order of time, Carlo Rovelli ; translated by Erica Segre and Simon Carnell ; read by Benedict Cumberbatch

eng

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other

The order of time

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1030237983

Carlo Rovelli ; translated by Erica Segre and Simon Carnell ; read by Benedict Cumberbatch

Time tends to be considered uniform and universal, but it may be much more complicated than that. In fact, the more scientists learn about it, the more mysterious it becomes. In lyric, accessible prose, Rovelli invites us to consider questions about the nature of time that continue to puzzle the best minds"Why do we remember the past and not the future? What does it mean for time to "flow"? Do we exist in time or does time exist in us? In lyric, accessible prose, Carlo Rovelli invites us to consider questions about the nature of time that continue to puzzle physicists and philosophers alike. For most readers this is unfamiliar terrain. We all experience time, but the more scientists learn about it, the more mysterious it remains. We think of it as uniform and universal, moving steadily from past to future, measured by clocks. Rovelli tears down these assumptions one by one, revealing a strange universe where at the most fundamental level time disappears. He explains how the theory of quantum gravity attempts to understand and give meaning to the resulting extreme landscape of this timeless world. Weaving together ideas from philosophy, science and literature, he suggests that our perception of the flow of time depends on our perspective, better understood starting from the structure of our brain and emotions than from the physical universe. Already a bestseller in Italy, and written with the poetic vitality that made Seven Brief Lessons on Physics so appealing, The Order of Time offers a profoundly intelligent, culturally rich, novel appreciation of the mysteries of time."--Publisher's description

Preface : perhaps time is the greatest remaining mystery -- The crumbling of time -- Loss of unity -- Loss of direction -- The end of the present -- Loss of independence -- Quanta of time -- The world without time -- The world is made of events, not things -- The inadequacy of grammar -- Dynamics as relation -- The sources of time -- Time is ignorance -- Perspective -- What emerges from a particularity -- The scent of the madeleine -- The source of time

adult

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