Reddit reviews Thinking Physics: Understandable Practical Reality
We found 14 Reddit comments about Thinking Physics: Understandable Practical Reality. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.
Insight Press Inc
I wrote a quick script to search the full text of HPMOR and return everything italicized and in title case, which I think got most of the books mentioned in the text:
Book title|Author|Mentioned in chapter(s)|Links|Notes
:---|:---|:---|:---|:---
Encyclopaedia Britannica| |7|Wikipedia|Encyclopaedia
Financial Times| |7|Wikipedia|Newspaper
The Feynman Lectures on Physics|Richard P. Feynman|8|Wikipedia|Full text is available online here
Judgment Under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases|Amos Tversky|8|Amazon|
Language in Thought and Action|S.I. Hayakawa|8|Amazon Wikipedia |
Influence: Science and Practice|Robert B. Cialdini|8|Wikipedia|Textbook. See also Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion
Rational Choice in an Uncertain World: The Psychology of Judgment and Decision Making|Reid Hastie and Robyn Dawes|8|Amazon |Textbook
Godel, Escher, Bach|Douglas Hofstadter|8, 22|Amazon Wikipedia|
A Step Farther Out|Jerry Pournelle|8|Amazon|
The Lord of the Rings|J.R.R. Tolkien|17|Wikipedia|
Atlas Shrugged|Ayn Rand|20, 98|Wikipedia|
Chimpanzee Politics|Frans de Waal|24|Amazon|
Thinking Physics: Understandable Practical Reality|Lewis Carroll Epstein|35, 102|Amazon|
Second Foundation|Isaac Asimov|86|Wikipedia|Third novel in the Foundation Series
Childcraft: A Guide For Parents| |91|Amazon|Not useful if your child has a mysterious dark side
Also, this probably isn't technically what the OP was asking, but since the script returned fictional titles along with real ones, I went ahead and included them too:
Book title|Mentioned in chapter(s)
:---|:---
The Quibbler|6, 27, 38, 63, 72, 86
Hogwarts: A History|8, 73, 79
Modern Magical History|8
Magical Theory|16
Intermediate Potion Making|17
Occlumency: The Hidden Arte|21
Daily Prophet|22, 25, 26, 27, 35, 38, 53, 69, 77, 84, 86, 108
Magical Mnemonics|29
The Skeptical Wizard|29
Vegetable Cunning|48
Beauxbatons: A History|63
Moste Potente Potions|78
Toronto Magical Tribune|86
New Zealand Spellcrafter's Diurnal Notice|86
American Mage|86
As others mentioned, TVTropes has a virtually-exhaustive list of allusions to other works, which includes books that aren't explicitly named in the text, like Ender's Game
Ok... this is a weird one but I am going to throw it out there anyway. When I was 8 (many years ago) my grandfather gave me this book: Thinking Physics by Lewis Carroll Epstein. It is basically a picture book of simple physics puzzles meant to help high schoolers or undergraduates develop an intuition for the subject. It asks questions and then provides answers on the next page with solid, simple descriptions.
I. Was. Hooked. I couldn't get enough. This book taught me that we could examine the world around us and understand how it works. My 8 year old brain boggled at the possibilities! WE CAN LEARN ABOUT ANYTHING IF WE TRY! Fucking magnets... I figured out how they work! Or, at least I got an idea. This book made me curious and excited to explore the world around me.
From an excited, curious kid, I moved up on, always eager to explore. This book lead to an undergraduate education in Physics and my current pursuit of a PhD in biophysics. This book played a massive role in developing my critical assessment of the world around me.
Hiya! I'm a recent physics/computer science graduate and although I can't think of any super cool handmade options off the top of my head, there are some physics books that I find interesting that your boyfriend may enjoy. One solid idea would be just about anything written by Richard Feynman. Reading through the Feynman Lectures is pretty standard for all physicists, though there are free versions online as well. There are a few others, such as The Pleasure of Finding things Out and Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman. There's also a cool graphic novel that recounts the events of his life called Feynman by Ottaviani. If you're not familiar with who this guy is, he is a colorful and concise orator who won a nobel prize in physics. His biggest contributions were in nuclear physics and quantum computation, and his quirks make his explanations of these topics very interesting. The Feynman Lectures are more formal, while his personal books are a mixture of personal experience and explanation.
 
Something else that I typically gift all of my friends who are problem solvers interested in physics is the book Thinking Physics. This book is great for developing some high level intuition in every field of physics (mechanics, optics, thermodynamics, electricity and magnetism, quantum mechanics, etc.). This book is great because it's broken into small digestible sections that build your knowledge as you solve more of the questions (solutions are given).
 
Good luck!
Learning physics is learning to think. Start here, don't cheat, you will thank me when your done.
https://www.amazon.com/Thinking-Physics-Understandable-Practical-Reality/dp/0935218084/
Yes, Bryson's is a good one. I'd also recommend some classic books: 1. The Universe and Dr. Einstein. 2. About any book written by George Gamow, like One Two Three . . . Infinity. 3. Thinking Physics. I think all these books are quite motivating.
Here is my copy and paste list:
Books
TIPERS
TIPERs are a fantastic resource for including conceptual thinking assignments. Answer keys are generally available if you talk to your school's Pearson Rep. IMO, the E/M book is the weakest, in part because it ignores that circuits are a thing. I would start with the first as it is a general overview, and go from there.
General Physics Education
Websites
Youtube
Let me know if you have questions about any of these, or about particular types of physics courses.
Get Epstein's book Thinking Physics. Every physicist loves it, it requires no mathematical knowledge whatsoever, and I have seen more than one professor struggle with finding answers. This doesn't teach you the underlying mathematical structure, leaves out most of what you need to pass exams, but once you're through, you've built up a thorough understanding of the world around you.
http://www.amazon.com/Thinking-Physics-Understandable-Practical-Reality/dp/0935218084/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1302401025&sr=8-1
Warning: just because it's in cartoon format, don't assume it's easy. Actually a very potent book on physics, IMHO.
Look for another one called Blood in the Face. I found it at my house in Redneckistan southeast of New Orleans sometime while my older sister dated this Nazi rich-boy asshole back in high school. Being a bookworm, I read it cover to cover multiple times. I didn't read the copy of Mein Kampf he left behind, however. I think my being gay may have had something to do with these books appearing, because it wasn't long after I came out that they showed up.
My sister dumped the hate politics when she dumped him, so we're okay with each other. I still live in Cajun Redneckistan, just not that particular bumfuck town anymore. I much prefer to read books like [Thinking Physics](http://www.amazon.com/Thinking-Physics-Understandable-Practical-Reality/dp/0935218084/ref=sr_1_19?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1313345888&sr=1-19) anyway.
And nobody fucks with me for being gay.
>I'm a 17 year old senior in HS looking to major in physics or engineering next year when I go off to college. I'm subscribed to this subreddt because I find it very interesting. That being said, I don't have an extensive background on physics and was very curious about the Higgs-Boson.
Good for you! We need more people going into the hard sciences. Take the following with a grain of salt, just wanted to share some hindsight. When it comes to physics, start early. I highly recommend a book called Thinking Physics. I didn't find out about it until college when a TA recommended it in an intro course; wish someone told me about it in High School. It would be right up your alley. :) Also, don't be discouraged if the math roughs you up a bit when you get to linear algebra.
Try to find entry points that interest you personally, and from there the next steps will be natural. Most books that get into the nitty-gritty assume you're in school for it and not directly motivated, at least up to early university level, so this is harder than it should be. But a few suggestions aimed at the self-motivated: Lockhart Measurement, Gelfand Algebra, 3blue1brown's videos, Calculus Made Easy, Courant & Robbins What Is Mathematics?. (I guess the last one's a bit tougher to get into.)
For physics, Thinking Physics seems great, based on the first quarter or so (as far as I've read).
Best science teacher I ever had the pleasure of being taught by introduced me to this book. This book and his class changed my world.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0935218084
A little about joe for anyone who's interested.
http://nutrias.org/culotta/ltio.htm
Epstein, Thinking Physics (http://www.amazon.com/Thinking-Physics-Understandable-Practical-Reality/dp/0935218084)
This book is wonderful. It is almost a bathroom reader, but it has amazing depth and great lessons that range across all of physics.
It's not particularly small, but Relativity Visualized by Lewis Carroll Epstein is mostly pictures and is an awesome book.
Edit: by the description of the cover, maybe it's Thinking Physics, also by Epstein?