Black holes and time warps
Black Holes & Time Warps: Einstein's Outrageous Legacy is a 1994 popular science book by physicist Kip Thorne. It provides an illustrated overview of the history and development of black hole theory, from its roots in Newtonian mechanics until the early 1990s.
Stats for nerds
16recommend
21mentions
18people
2008–2024years
86% recommend14% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- The simulation framing tends to draw deterministic connotations. I think when people think of a simulation or perhaps physical interpretations, they imagine life as happening to them, rather than through them. I think it’s easy to perceive it one way or the other, and what you seek you will find.
But something like ‘lazy evaluation’ could provide a bridge between the two views. A choice is made AND a physically compatible path is observed as if it were always so from the past to the present.
Personally, I think of the universe is alive with choice and we do get to participate.
PS. I kept a copy of Kip Thorne’s Black Holes and Time Warps on my nightstand as a kid - it filled me with fascination. Thanks Kip!
- "Best" is always too hard - here are a handful that I love.
Pride & Prejudice - Jane Austen
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell - Susannah Clarke
The Crow Road - Iain Banks
Equal Rites - Terry Pratchett
Three Men in a Boat - Jerome K. Jerome
A Short History of Nearly Everything - Bill Bryson
Black Holes & Time Warps - Kip Thorne
The Inventions of Daedalus - David E H Jones
The Cuckoo's Egg - Cliff Stoll
I hope one or two of those float your boat!
- If anyone is interested in the history and an accessible, but deep understanding of black holes I highly recommend Kip Thorne’s book “Black Holes and Time Warps” (1994). The first half of this article follows a summary of that book closely.
- This book is fantastic. I’d also recommend Black Holes and Time Warps by Kip Thorne to learn more about Oppenheimer’s scientific accomplishments.
- You mention point mass. Yes, the volume also matters. If your second black box contains the same mass but over a bigger volume, then the spacetime curvature it will cause will be less extreme than the black hole in the first box. The book I most like on this topic is Kip Thorne's Black Holes and Time Warps. IMO Thorne is a better explainer than Hawking.
- Perhaps "Black Holes and Time Warps" by Kip Thorne.
Related
Deep time
7 recommend · 11
A Brief History of Time
76 recommend · 181
The Science of Interstellar
6 recommend · 11
2019–2025
Modern Classical Physics
4 recommend · 7
The Black Hole War
6 recommend · 8
Spacetime and geometry
8 recommend · 12
Spacetime physics
8 recommend · 14
