Exploring Gravitation: A Review of Kip Thorne and John Wheeler's Book

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Discussion Overview

The discussion revolves around the book "Gravitation" by Kip Thorne and John Wheeler, focusing on its technicality as a textbook on general relativity (GR) and comparing it to other challenging texts in the field. Participants share their experiences and opinions on various GR textbooks, discussing their difficulty levels and pedagogical approaches.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Technical explanation
  • Debate/contested

Main Points Raised

  • One participant questions the technical nature of "Gravitation" and seeks a difficulty rating on a scale of 1-5.
  • Another participant mentions MTW (Misner, Thorne, and Wheeler) as a challenging graduate-level text and expresses a desire to study it.
  • Several participants agree that "Gravitation" is a monumental textbook and express admiration for its content.
  • Wald's book is described as terse and not very friendly, but it contains unique material not found elsewhere.
  • Carroll's graduate text is noted to be more accessible compared to Wald's, with a specific mention of the value of Chapter 9.
  • Participants reflect on the difficulty of reading MTW, with some humor about its size and complexity.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants express a range of opinions on the difficulty and pedagogical value of various GR textbooks, with no consensus on which is the most challenging or accessible. The discussion remains unresolved regarding the overall ranking of these texts.

Contextual Notes

Some participants reference personal experiences with the textbooks, which may not reflect a universal perspective. The discussion includes subjective assessments of difficulty and pedagogical effectiveness, which depend on individual backgrounds and learning styles.

Who May Find This Useful

Readers interested in general relativity, particularly those seeking recommendations for challenging textbooks or insights into the pedagogical approaches of various authors.

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i wonder, the book by kip thorne and john wheeler called gravitation, is it a technical textbook on gr? and on a scale of 1-5 (1-easy 5 extremely hard) how would you rate this book?
are there any other challenging textbooks on GR?
 
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neutrino, i too hope that someday i would have a spare time to read this monumental textbook. (that with the principia mathematica by russel and whitehead are hardcore texts in their respective fields).
 
Gravitation is the one that I studied, and I highly recommend. I have read Wald's book, and I don't think that it is as pedogagical as is Gravitation (though I have a slight bias).

Or you could look into PAM Dirac's "General Relativity", it's probably the hardest book I've read on General Relativity.
 
Wald's book is a tough nut, very terse and not very friendly, but it still has much material not found in other books.

I recently got Carroll's graduate text, and it's much more friendly than Wald. But I paid $70 for a used copy. :eek:

Can anyone claim to have read all of MTW? What a monster. Still a cool book to dip into now and then.
 
Daverz said:
Wald's book is a tough nut, very terse and not very friendly, but it still has much material not found in other books.

I find amusing what Wald said about the exercises in his book: ' ... and none (exercises) which are, in my opinion, inordinately difficult (i.e., I think I can solve them).'

This, from one of the world's leading experts on relativity!

I recently got Carroll's graduate text, and it's much more friendly than Wald. But I paid $70 for a used copy. :eek:

Chapter 9 is worth the price of admission.

Can anyone claim to have read all of MTW? What a monster.

Not me.

Still a cool book to dip into now and then.

It's sitting open on my desk as I type.
 

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