More than other scientific fields, notes the author, physics asks profound questions about the meaning of everything, including life and death, the origin of the universe, and the nature of reality. In her second book, she turns her gimlet eye on popular beliefs. In her 2018 book, Lost in Math: How Beauty Leads Physics Astray, Hossenfelder, research fellow at the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies, excoriated her colleagues for falling in love with theories that bear little relation to reality. Her book offers a no-nonsense yet entertaining take on some of the toughest riddles in existence, and will give the reader a solid grasp on what we know-and what we don’t know.A German physicist digs into a host of existential quandaries.

In this lively, thought-provoking book, Hossenfelder takes on the biggest questions in physics: Does the past still exist? Do particles think? Was the universe made for us? Has physics ruled out free will? Will we ever have a theory of everything? She lays out how far physicists are on the way to answering these questions, where the current limits are, and what questions might well remain unanswerable forever. Not always, though, have they stayed on the scientific side of the debate. Over the last century, physicists have learned a lot about which spiritual ideas are still compatible with the laws of nature. Science and religion have the same roots, and they still tackle some of the same questions: Where do we come from? Where do we go to? How much can we know? The area of science that is closest to answering these questions is physics. On the other hand, the idea that the universe itself is conscious is difficult to rule out entirely.Īccording to Sabine Hossenfelder, it is not a coincidence that quantum entanglement and vacuum energy have become the go-to explanations of alternative healers, or that people believe their deceased grandmother is still alive because of quantum mechanics. The notion that there are universes within particles, or that particles are conscious, is ascientific, as is the hypothesis that our universe is a computer simulation. Not only can we not currently explain the origin of the universe, it is questionable we will ever be able to explain it. encourage readers to push past well-trod assumptions and have fun doing so.” - Science Magazineįrom renowned physicist and creator of the YouTube series “Science without the Gobbledygook,” a book that takes a no-nonsense approach to life’s biggest questions, and wrestles with what physics really says about the human condition “An informed and entertaining guide to what science can and cannot tell us.” - The Wall Street Journal

Book existential physics