QED (book)
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QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter (Alix G. Mautner Memorial Lectures) is a book by Richard Feynman consisting of a written adaptation of four lectures. These lectures aim to describe, for the general reader, quantum electrodynamics. QED was designed to be a popular science book written in a witty style, even though there is some use of quantum-mechanical mathematics. It is aimed at teaching its audience to understand what's going on behind the calculations, not at teaching them to do calculations. It was first published in 1985 by Princeton University Press.
The lectures were first given in 1979 at the University of Auckland, New Zealand, and were known as the Sir Douglas Robb lectures. Videotapes of these lectures were made publicly available on a not-for-profit basis in 1996 and, more recently, have been placed online by the Vega Science Trust educational charity (see www.vega.org.uk). A discussion of the major differences between the original Auckland lectures and the published version of QED was given in the American Journal of Physics in 1996.
The goal of this book is to explain the purpose of QED, a part of physics which is well known; Feynman states in the book:
| β | People are always asking for the latest developments in the unification of this theory with that theory, and they don't give us a chance to tell them anything about what we know pretty well. They always want to know the things we don't know. | β |
Much of Feynman's discussion springs from an everyday phenomenon: the way any sheet of glass partly reflects any light shining on it. Feynman also pays homage to Isaac Newton's struggles to come to terms with the nature of light.
In the first lecture, entitled "Introduction", Feynman describes the basic properties of photons and thus acts as a gentle lead into the subject (as he colloquially stated before that a science lecture is boring if either it's not using layman terms or saying something upside down). Feyman discusses how to measure the probability that a photon will reflect or transmit through a partially reflective piece of glass.
The second lecture, "Photons - Particles of Light", Feynman looks at the different paths a photon could take travelling from one point to another, and how this affects phenomena like reflection and diffraction.
The third lecture, "Electrons and their interactions", describes Quantum phenomena such as the famous double-slit experiment and Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, thus describing the transmission and reflection of photons. It also introduces his famous "Feynman diagrams" and the interaction of subatomic particle, which is initially Quantum electrodynamics.
The fourth lecture, "Loose Ends", Feynman discusses the meaning of Quantum electrodynamics and some of its problems. He then describes "the rest of physics", giving a brief look at Quantum chromodynamics, the weak interaction and gravity, and how they relate to Quantum electrodynamics.
[edit] References
Dudley, J.M.; A.M. Kwan (June 1996). "Richard Feynman's popular lectures on quantum electrodynamics: The 1979 Robb Lectures at Auckland University". American Journal of Physics 64: 694-698.
Feynman, Richard (1985). QED: the strange theory of light and matter. Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-08388-6.
The Vega Science Trust - Richard Feynman The videos are only available as .rm format. The Vega Science Trust
[edit] External links
- Recordings of QED held in New Zealand (streaming video)
- Recordings of QED held in New Zealand (DVD)
