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QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter

Richard P. Feynman, A. Zee · 3 HN comments
HN Books has aggregated all Hacker News stories and comments that mention "QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter" by Richard P. Feynman, A. Zee.
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Amazon Summary
Celebrated for his brilliantly quirky insights into the physical world, Nobel laureate Richard Feynman also possessed an extraordinary talent for explaining difficult concepts to the general public. Here Feynman provides a classic and definitive introduction to QED (namely, quantum electrodynamics), that part of quantum field theory describing the interactions of light with charged particles. Using everyday language, spatial concepts, visualizations, and his renowned "Feynman diagrams" instead of advanced mathematics, Feynman clearly and humorously communicates both the substance and spirit of QED to the layperson. A. Zee's introduction places Feynman’s book and his seminal contribution to QED in historical context and further highlights Feynman’s uniquely appealing and illuminating style.
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Hacker News Stories and Comments

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By far my favorite piece of writing from Feynman is QED:

http://www.amazon.com/QED-Strange-Princeton-Science-Library/...

Out of all his writings, this is the one that has always stuck with me.

Feynman long held that one does not understand something if one cannot explain it to someone who is not deeply steeped in the subject already. I regard this lecture as probably the culmination of that philosophy for Feynman. Anybody with a deep mathematical background will be stunned on reading this book to realize that, oh, he was actually just talking about complex numbers and the path integral formulation all along.

Taken from one of those reviews, I don't need to say much more than this: "He does close to the impossible by explaining the rudimentary ideas of Quantum Electro Dynamics (QED) in a manner that is reasonably accessible to those with some physics background"

evanb
The videos that were essentially transcribed into that book are legally available to watch online.

http://vega.org.uk/video/subseries/8

tedsanders
I recommend the book over the video lecture because I think the book explains it better.
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