Roy Tang

A Briefer History of Time by Stephen Hawking
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I’ve restarted reading this book (and the original) a few times since I was still in school. In fact, when I opened my iBooks copy that I’ve left alone over the past few years, it was at around halfway through. I started over again and managed to finish it this time.

Not sure why I had trouble finishing it before, it’s a fairly short book and the subject matter is interesting to anyone who has even a passing interest in science. The book covers the fundamental development of the physical sciences through the years, from early ruminations about the nature of the universe through Galileo and Newton and Einstein up to modern discussions on wormholes, time travel and string theory. The discussion is simplified to make it more palatable to laymen but still technical enough to be interesting to the science-oriented reader. It’s actually quite fascinating how each chapter of the book and each era of science builds upon the foundations of the previous chapter/era to get where we are today.

With recent developments in physics, I wonder how soon it will be until a new, updated edition is called for (hopefully Stephen Hawking sticks around for it!)

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