Teach Yourself Physics: a travel companion

This is a great book. I repeat, this is a GREAT BOOK! I wish I had encountered this book or one like it 30 years ago. I had always thought that self-learning was deficient when compared to classroom instruction; however, the author makes the point that there are some definite advantages to self-learning. So the first great thing about this book is its inspirational quality, instilling in the reader the idea that the reader is smart enough to do this, and that with the proper approach, self learning can take place at an impressive speed. The second great thing is his his idea that it's best to start with an overview book, and then progress to more specific and technical books once you have an idea about what's really going on in this subject. The author breaks physics down in to several sub-areas. For each area, he recommends one or more general overview books, and also lists some books that go more deeply into that area. I was happy to see that I already owned many of these books; I just haven't taken the right approach in the past to using those books for self-learning. He also has an interesting discussion explaining the difference between a widely taught textbook, and a book that is effective for self-learning. That brings me to the third great thing. The book contains some strategies and tactics for effective self-learning. I don't have a catchy name for his recommended approach, but it reminds me of water flowing downhill. If you put an obstacle in the way of flowing water, the water doesn't just stop in front of the obstacle. It flows around the obstacle; it finds another path. In this way, there's no need to be frustrated if you can't understand something you read in a book. It may be that you just need it explained in a different way, so switch to another book that until you find the explanation that makes sense to you. Based on this book, I'm going to restart my quest for deeper understanding of physics.

In my view, the premise of the book is “The era of the autodidact hast just begun as a result of the limitless possibilities of the internet.” (Section 3.2) Which I cannot agree more. I think the book is suitable for those who want to go beyond the level of “The Theoretical Minimum” series by Susskind and the “No Nonsense” series by the author and feel confident enough to to tackle undergraduate/graduate textbooks, whether on self-study or at school. The advice offered in the book is sound to me from my experience as a former Ph.D. student in Economics: 1. Build core knowledge with student friendly books (the author provides very detailed recommendations of books and journal articles); 2. Get a firm grasp on the first principles with flow charts or other learning aids; 3. Get the big picture from the historical and philosophical perspective (but need to be wary of cognitive biases); 4. Learn how to learn (the “Ultra-Learning” method). Other pluses: a. Chapter-end questions which readers can use to check their own understanding of the subjects; b. The author’s own learning journey from frustration to the completion of the Ph.D. degree. There are some things which I hope the book would include: 1. Some good summary books of the undergraduate curriculum which could save one’s study time substantially, such as _ Physics: A Student Companion_ and _ Review of Undergraduate Physics_; 2. Although I agree with the author that Math should be learned on need basis, I think one could still benefit from studying some of the Math books tailored for undergraduate Physics majors by the top universities which provide a systematic treatment of Math; 3. Tip on how to keep abreast with the current development of a field as much as possible as a passionate layman. In conclusion, this book is a valuable companion for anyone who is ready to embark on the pursuit of knowledge for the joy of it.

Give my story here, might be quite irrelevant. I'm working as a graduate research assistant in the material science department for more than 3 years now. I started to read physics textbooks/research because of my own research. Oftentimes I found physics book confusing, and I can hardly learn any physical theory effectively. As a guy who needs to publish at least one paper a year, my frustrating self-learning process creates tensions, sometimes friction between me and my advisor. Politely speaking, I know the physical details in my paper is not as clear as it should be, but I literally don't have effective way to use my limited time to learn physical theories. My advisor doesn't understand my concerns and asked me why am I not on board. But all I did for the last three years is trying to get on board and embark on more meaningful research, rather than get all the seemingly correct results and argue with reviewers of my papers. The day before I bought this book I was talking to a recently-graduated Ph.D. friend about quitting my program. The central piece of advice my friend gave me was: just say you're sorry and stick to what your advisor told you to do. Does that mean I have to follow the lead from a faculty member whose Ph.D. training is centered around a topic totally irrelevant to what I am doing? He doesn't even have the patience of letting me finish my research ideas these days. I feel hopeless after that talk. Got the book yesterday and finish it today, just wanna give myself another thrust to get motivated (i.e. trying to find the meaning of my life). And Jakob did a great job of explaining how a layman could study physical theory more effectively by using a top-bottom method along with good sources. Some of the advice he gives is already my daily practice which means I am not as hopeless as I thought I was. I'm a big fan of his no-nonsense series, and now this book will definitely secure a permanent position on my bookshelf. I don't give 5-star because it lacks book recommendations on stat mech, which is most relevant to my research. And I probably should start writing blogs for things I newly learned too... Anyway, thank Jakob for reviving a walking-dead Ph.D. candidate.

If you search for "teach yourself physics" guides, you'll mostly come across long lists of dry, dense textbooks accompanied by such encouragements as "you must know all of *this* before you can know any of *that*". One gets the impression that physics is some kind of trial by exhaustion. Yet, as Schwichtenberg points out, physicists such as Einstein and Feynman have always strived for simple and approachable explanations. Why then, are these guides so dauntingly monolithic? My impression is that Schwichtenberg believes this is (partially) a downstream effect of expediency within the university system (aren't so many things?) and my own experiences resonate with this. So what does Schwichtenberg offer instead? What he gives you is an incredibly rich tapestry of resources, tools, advice, guidance, and - most importantly - a map and broad overview. Crucially, the overview provides a large number of launching points for deep exploration. This book will undoubtably make a great travel companion and I hope to return to it for many years. PS: On a side note, I think books like this are going to become more common. When so much is being written, knowing what is actually *worth reading* becomes more and more important. And I'm not convinced that AI algorithms recommendation algorithms are particularly great at this.

Es buen libro, especialmente para autodidactas. Pero creo que no es un libro para leer de corrido, terminarlo y ya, sino que es más una guía para estar revisando constantemente, especialmente cuando se empiece a estudiar cada uno de los temas de física que se tratan en el libro. Esos temas son cortos, pero tienen los puntos claves, que uno puede leer al iniciar el tema, y también durante el estudio, para no perderse. Recomienda buenos libros, incluyendo los de él, especialmente los de la serie No-nonsense, pero es honesto al hablar del tema, y es lo primero que menciona y advierte, que este libro no es para promocionar sus otros libros. Creo que lo dice al inicio como disclaimer y luego lo menciona otras veces, aunque admite pues que tiene el derecho y son opciones. Creo que un buen orden para leerlo es primero el inicio hasta la parte 2, y luego la parte 4 en adelante, ya que son temas más generales y transversales. Y finalmente leer los demás temas relacionados con física. Aunque como dije, es un libro como para estar mirando constantemente, a medida que se va estudiando; como dice el libro: "a travel companion". Pero pues esto es un gusto personal. Se puede leer como sea.

I am a life long learner of science, philiosophy and language and Jakob has articulated what works for me. I’ve always been interested in theoretical physics but the bottom up approch doesn’t work for me. The top down approach is what works for me in every subject and thank you Jakob for providing a roadmap for how to do that in physics. The reviewer that gave this book one star apparently didn’t read the description of the book very well. He is mostly criticizing the book for not teaching him physics when this book is clearly primarily about how to teach yourself physics with only a “bird’s eye view” of physics itself. I agree that Jakob could have been more concise in places and could have benefited from better proof reading but he has delivered on the substance of his objective. Jakob has other books on the physics itself, which I have sampled and I think they are very good as well in implementing the roadmap he lays out in this book.

I've heard good things about his other books, but on a safe felt like this could just be a blog post

A book that leads me to many other good books is a valuable book to me, partially because it is a source of inspiration and partially because it saves me time. This book really does have a travel guide feel, which I don’t think I’ve encountered much with books about subjects like science. I read this book pretty quickly and felt like I had traveled all over the place and have plans to return to a lot of interesting places. It is a good place for starting (or continuing) a physics journey. I like the honestly of the author. I like people who write candidly about subjects and their own knowledge of them. The author is very relatable, and it is easy to feel his passion about physics and for it to be contagious. Most discussions about physics are either too impersonal and not approachable, or they are flashy and shallow. This book is actually different from what I expected, and the sections are pretty short, but I think it works. I’ll come back to this book periodically through my physics journey to see what I missed on the first read. I didn’t understand most of the questions suggested for each subject, so I think I’ll get more out of it once I’ve read some other things.

This book presents the most important tools and ideas available to anyone who wants to truly understand phsyics and shows why it's necessary to explore physics in your own way instead of simply following religeously a single physics course, there is a ton of ressources that you can use. It also describes quickly the main topics of physics such as classical mechanics, quantum mechanics, etc and the options available to go about learning them. I am certainly going to use a lot a the advices of this book and I think every physics student can benefit from it.

Il miglior libro letto sull'argomento. Se volete studiare fisica dovete leggerlo....dovete.

Such a great book!, And in a very real sense I think most undergrad students would find this book so useful, because of the books recommended in it, but also for the attitude and mindset filled through the whole book.

理論物理出身の技術者です。 prefaceのファインマン の本に影響を受け物理が好きになったという話を読んで、自分の経験と重なるものを感じ購入を決めた。 天才ではない人向けに物理の独学方法が詳述されている。物理学(理論系、特に素粒子理論)を学びたいすべての人にお勧めできるし、後半部分は工学系や情報科学系の人にも役立つものだと思われる。 いくつかスペルミスを見つけたが、自明なので気にならないレベル。著者の他の書籍についても言えるのだが、フォーマットはprint replicaで、電子書籍でも問題ない。 英語は平易なので、物理が好きな高校生でも読むことができるでしょう。 才能がないとか、高校、大学指定の教科書がつまらない、何のために大学にいるんだと思うなら一度読んでみるべきと個人的に思う。もし著者の主張に納得できなくても得られるものがあるだろう。(本書で何度か強調されている) ここまで詳しく物理学の独学法について書かれた本は知らない。本の選び方からから読み方、知識の定着、考え方、active learning、active practice、習得時間など幅広い項目が扱われている。お勧めの教科書やブログ、勉強法の参考文献が豊富で、なるほとど思わせる多数の引用と著者独特の見解が掲載されていて、読んでいてめちゃくちゃ面白い。 stack over flowやphysics forumを利用して自分の理解を試すのはなるほどと思わされた。 著者は素粒子理論でPh.Dをとったばかりの物理学者、Masterの頃に物理本でbest sellerになったphysics from symmeetryを出版している。 その他、古典力学、電磁気学、量子力学、加えて最近場の理論の本を出版しており、さらに本書を読めばわかるが恐ろしく博識。一体いつ研究に着手したの？と思わずにはいられない。 個人的に面白いと思ったのは以下のようなもの。 数式の説明が少ないのは著者が批判されるのを恐れているから。（日本人は間違うことを恐れるとよく言われるが、少なくともドイツの物理学科でも同じらしい） つまり、数式だけで埋め尽くせば批判される余地が少なくなるということ 理解するのが難しい本は読者向けに書かれているのではなく、著者のエゴに基づいて書かれている 理解できないのは自分の頭が悪いのではなく著者が悪いから、気にしない。自分のinspilationとマッチする本を選択すればいい。 悪い本に一時間費やすと、偉大な本に一時間費やす時間がなくなる。（これは仕事とか人間関係にも当てはまると個人的に思う） 逆に難解な本は自分のエゴにも影響を与えることに注意。難解な数式を導けた、自分はスマートだ、みたいな。 you will get your best idea from writing. 自分の言葉で理解する重要性を説いており、writingの重要性を強調している。 書きためたノートなどをwebで公開するか、出版する（著者がやっていること）。これはモチベーションに繋げるため。 効率的な勉強法や知識の定着方法に場の理論や量子力学の勉強法を例などためになる。 私も大学院の頃、peskinが合わなくてshwartz本が自分に合い、周りから（教官も含め）なぜpeskinか久後本を使わないの、という稀有な目で見られながら場の理論を勉強したことを思い出した。知識の吸収効率がpeskinとshwartz本では明らかに違っていた。 Highly recommended!!

I’ve read many physics books as someone who studied physics 20+ years ago, but I have struggled to get back into the right groove to self-study general relativity (my long term goal for many years). This book, which I devoured in less than 2 hours, had given me everything I needed to know to reboot my thinking and embark on the journey to achieving my goal. It’s a wealth of knowledge and also a great reference to a number of other books and online sources. It’s exactly what I needed and I can’t recommend it enough.