Third Thoughts Explained

Third Thoughts
Author:	Steven Weinberg
Country:	USA
Language:	English
Publisher:	Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
Release Date:	2018
Pages:	240
Isbn:	978-0-674-97532-3
Oclc:	1019833836

Third Thoughts is a 2018 book of 25 essays written by Steven Weinberg, mostly in the decade preceding 2018. Most of the essays were previously published in The New York Review of Books, newspapers, and other periodicals. Essays numbered 20, 23, 24, and 25 are published for the first time in the book.^[1] Essay number 6 is the foreword to the 2014 book Time in Powers of Ten.^[2] There are 8 essays in the section on science history, 6 essays in the section on physics and cosmology, 6 essays in the section on public matters, and 5 essays in the section on personal matters.^[3]

Essays

I. SCIENCE HISTORY

• 1 The Uses of Astronomy (pp. 3-14); 2009
• 2 The Art of Discovery (pp. 15-21)
• 3 From Rutherford to the LHC (pp. 22-35); 2011
• 4 Educators and Academics, Underground in Texas (pp. 36-38)
• 5 The Rise of the Standard Models (pp. 39-51); 2013
• 6 Long Times and Short Times (pp. 52-54)
• 7 Keeping an Eye on the Present—Whig History of Science (pp. 55-66); 2015
• 8 The Whig History of Science: An Exchange (pp. 67-70); 2016

II. PHYSICS AND COSMOLOGY

• 9 What Is an Elementary Particle? (pp. 73-82); 1996
• 10 The Universe We Still Don’t Know (pp. 83-95); 2011
• 11 Varieties of Symmetry (pp. 96-111); 2011
• 12 The Higgs, and Beyond (pp. 112-118); 2011
• 13 Why the Higgs? (pp. 119-123); 2012
• 14 The Trouble with Quantum Mechanics (pp. 124-142); 2017

III. PUBLIC MATTERS

• 15 Obama Gets Space Funding Right (pp. 145-148)
• 16 The Crisis of Big Science (pp. 149-163); 2012
• 17 Liberal Disappointment (pp. 164-166); 2012
• 18 Keep Loopholes Open (pp. 167-170)
• 19 Against Manned Space Flight (pp. 171-175)
• 20 Skeptics and Scientists (pp. 176-182)

IV. PERSONAL MATTERS

• 21 Change Course (pp. 183-184)
• 22 Writing about Science (pp. 185-191)
• 23 On Being Wrong (pp. 192-193)
• 24 The Craft of Science, and the Craft of Art (pp. 194-210)
• 25 New York to Austin, and Return (pp. 211-214)

Reception

According to Robert P. Crease:

According to Mario Livio:

References

1. Book: Third Thoughts. 9780674989726. Weinberg. Steven. 2018-08-06. Harvard University Press .
2. Book: Gerard 't Hooft. Stefan Vandoren. Time in Powers of Ten: Natural Phenomena and Their Timescales. 2014. World Scientific. 978-981-4494-92-2.
3. Book: j.ctvckq5b7. Third Thoughts. Weinberg. Steven. 2018. 9780674975323. Harvard University Press. 10.2307/j.ctvckq5b7 .

   Table of contents, with leading paragraphs

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