From Eternity to Here:
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Blurbs
- "For anyone who ever wondered about the nature of time and how it influences our universe, this book is a must read. It is beautifully written, lucid, and deep." -- Kip Thorne
- "Sean Carroll is a sure-footed guide through some of the most perplexing and fascinating insights of modern physics. His delightful From Eternity to Here is an accessible and engaging exploration of the mysteries of time, grappling with issues that will very likely play a critical role in the next major upheaval in our understanding of the cosmos." -- Brian Greene
- "The meaning of time at a fundamental level remains one of the most elusive mysteries physicists encounter today. Sean Carroll presents our current understanding of time and the ways in which physical theories single out time, which continues to march forward. There isn't a single agreed-upon answer to some of the more perplexing questions to which he exposes the reader, but there is an abundance of interesting excursions written in entertaining and engaging language that will keep fascinated those interested in profound questions in modern physics." -- Lisa Randall
- "Sean Carroll's From Eternity to Here provides a wonderfully accessible account of some of the most profound mysteries of modern physics. While you may not agree with all his conclusions, you will find the discussion fascinating, and taken to much deeper levels than is normal in a work of popular science." -- Sir Roger Penrose
Interviews
- LA Times interview.
- New Scientist: your questions about time, answered.
- Coast to Coast AM (Audio, with unrelated video backdrop.)
- Scientific American interview, January 2010.
- Science Friday with Ira Flatow, on NPR. (Audio.)
- Media Bistro Podcast with Jason Boog, talking about time travel and Lost. (Audio.)
- North County Times interview.
- Guardian podcast, with Ian Sample. (Audio.)
- Colin Marshall's Marketplace of Ideas. (Audio.)
- Wired Science asks, "What is Time?"
- Interview with Roger Bingham on The Science Network. (Video.)
- Interview on The Colbert Report. (Video.)
- Podcast with Liz Saint John. (Audio.)
- Bookstore talk at BookWorks, in Del Mar, California. (Video.)
- Scientific American podcast with Steve Mirsky. (Audio.)
- New York Times interview.
Blog Discussions
- Weekly Book Club at Cosmic Variance
- Facebook group, of course.
- The inimitable Michael Bérubé managed to review the book before it even existed. A closed timelike loop?
- A discussion by Robin Hanson at Overcoming Bias, after reading an early draft.
- And Robin Hanson again, after the finished book came out.
- Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution: "a very good summary of the paradoxes of time."
- Heather Demarest at The Philosopher's Eye: "Carroll’s book is intended for a popular audience, and would be a worthwhile investment for any philosopher curious about physics-based approaches to the metaphysics of time."
- Firedoglake Book Salon, moderated by Chad Orzel.
- Alan Boyle at Cosmic Log, msnbc.com: "The last season of Lost might clear up some fictional time-travel mysteries, but the true mysteries of time can be found in a new book titled From Eternity to Here."
- The Geek Philosophers: "If you want a thoughtful, funny crash course on what time might be, how time travel might work, and what scientists currently think about the nature of spacetime and our specific relationship to it, read Sean Carroll's From Eternity to Here."
- Review and discussion at Daily Kos.
- Review by John Walker at Fourmilab: "This book is a tour de force popular exposition of thermodynamics and statistical mechanics, which provides the best intuitive grasp of these concepts of any non-technical book I have yet encountered."
Published Articles
Articles by other people, that is. For my own writings, see extra resources.
- Article in Discover by Adam Frank. (Reprinted in Best American Science and Nature Writing 2009.)
- WIRED magazine, December 2009: "Armchair Einsteins will geek out at [Sean Carroll's] audacious thesis... His writing is accessible and peppered with cultural references... But don't be fooled by his mass-market approach: Carroll isn't afraid to wade into topics that have befuddled even name-brand physicists."
- USA Today: Dan Vergano talks about the book and the book club.
Reviews
- Publisher's Weekly (starred review): "No one is better equipped to take readers on a rollercoaster ride through time, space, and the origins of the universe than Caltech theoretical physicist Carroll... Carroll writes with verve and infectious enthusiasm, reminding readers that “science is a journey in which getting there is, without question, much of the fun.”"
- Library Journal: "Carroll employs an easygoing, colloquial style of explanation to explore challenging issues of cosmology."
- Kirkus Reviews: "A revealing look into the fourth and thorniest dimension... Carroll (Theoretical Physics/Caltech) has read all the literary and scientific writing on the subject but has plenty of his own opinions. In his debut, the author writes in accessible prose, so readers who make the effort will absorb an avalanche of information."
- Scientific American Book Club: "Sean Carroll is a scientist with a deep appreciation of the mystery of time: Why does it appear to “flow” from the past to the future and not vice versa? In From Eternity to Here, he offers an engaging tour of ideas from thermodynamics and cosmology, showing how they suggest a resolution."
- SEED: "In Carroll’s first book intended for popular audiences, the Caltech theoretical physicist delivers a masterful overview of what time is—and what its one-way passage implies about the nature of the universe. Unifying cosmology, thermodynamics, and information science into a refreshingly accessible whole, From Eternity to Here will make you wish time’s arrow could fly in reverse, if only so you could once again read the book for the first time."
- Associated Press: "This book should go down big with people who like discussing modern astronomy's "black holes" that swallow everything nearby, and the Big Bang of more than 13 billion years ago that some experts believe created the universe." (That's about the highlight of the review, I'm afraid.)
- Alexander Waugh, Wall Street Journal: "Outlines, in the simplest possible terms, all that is known about the arrow of time... The best way to grasp the rich mysteries of our universe is by constantly rereading the best and clearest explanations. Mr. Carroll's From Eternity to Here is certainly one of them."
- Craig Callender, New Scientist: "Perhaps the best and most comprehensive discussion of time's arrow that is widely accessible. Carroll explains time's fascinating subtleties in a lucid and entertaining manner."
- Laurence A. Marschall, Natural History Magazine: "One of the most lucid popular overviews of modern theoretical cosmology that I have read in recent years."
- Justin Moyer, Washington Post: "Carroll keeps it real, getting at the complex guts of cutting-edge cosmology in discussions that will challenge fans of Hawking's A Brief History of Time."
- Pedro Ferreira, Nature: "The book is a modern incarnation of the sort of works that twentieth-century physicists such as Arthur Eddington, Erwin Schrödinger and Werner Heisenberg wrote late in their lives — venerable, erudite accounts with a new, possibly esoteric idea to put across."
- Donna Bowman, The Onion's A.V. Club: "With equal parts patience, enthusiasm, and humor, Carroll presents a mini-course on the natural history of cosmology itself: what has been pieced together by evidence, then unraveled by new frames of reference, and the reasons we’re edging closer to answers even though scientific revolutions often seem to take us back to square one. Like all great teachers, he makes his subject irresistible, and makes his students feel smarter."
- D. Wayne Dworsky, San Francisco Book Review: "A world of stunning clarity; a quiescent moment in the universe to ponder our existence. His book invigorates the mind and leaves us in a state of awe. Don’t read another thing until you read this enduring testimony of reality."
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