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For thousands of years mankind has tried
to understand nature. Exploring the world on all scales
with instruments of ever more ingenuity, we have been able
to unravel some of the great mysteries that surround us.
While collecting an overwhelming multitude of observational
facts, we discovered fundamental laws that govern the structure
and evolution of physical reality. We know that nature speaks
to us in the language of mathematics. In this language most
of our basic understanding of the physical world can be
expressed in an unambiguous and concise way. The most artificial
language turns of to be the most natural of all.
The laws of nature correspond to equations.
These equations are the icons of knowledge that mark crucial
turning points in our thinking about the world we happen
to live in. They form the symbolic representation of most
of what we know, and as such constitute an important and
robust part of our culture.
Author Sander Bais is a leading theoretical
physicist at the University of Amsterdam. His research focuses
on problems in particle physics, from quantum field theory
to string theory, but he enjoys making excursions to many
adjacent fields. His special talent lies in making physics
accessible to a larger audience. His ability to transform
the complex into the comprehensible has allowed him to convey
the essential message of science to many. In this book he
takes the reader on a journey, unveiling the beauty and
meaning of seventeen equations that constitute the basis
of our knowledge of the physical world.
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