Product Description

Physics of the Impossible takes us on a journey to the frontiers of science and beyond, giving us an exhilarating insight into what we can really hope to achieve in the future. Everyday we see that what was once declared ‘impossible’ by scientists has become part of our everyday lives: fax machines, glass sky-scrapers, gas-powered automobiles and a worldwide communications network. Here internationally bestselling author Micho Kaku confidently hurdles today’s frontier of science, revealing the actual possibilities of perpetual motion, force fields, invisibility, ray guns, anti-gravity and anti-matter, teleportation, telepathy, psychokinesis, robots and cyborgs, time travel, zero-point energy, even extraterrestrial life. And he shows how few of these ideas actually violate the laws of physics. Where does the realm of science fiction end? What can we really hope to achieve? ‘Anything that is not impossible, is mandatory!’ declares Kaku in this lucid, entertaining and enlightening read.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2025 in Books
• Published on: 2009-05-28
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 352 pages

Review

'A rich compendium of jaw-dropping reality checks'

The Times

Review

'One of the world's most distinguished physicists ... takes the reader on a journey to the frontiers of science and beyond'

Review

'After reading Kaku's boundless enthuasiasm for the future, what you wouldn't give for a real-life time machine'

Customer Reviews

On the boundaries of science and fiction
Michio Kaku takes a pleasant verbal stroll along science fiction classics like force fields, time travel, parallel universes, telepathy, artificial intelligence and the like, while explaining the physics that would be involved in making these come true. Quite a lot more is physically possible than one would think.

Mr Kaku does a fine job of systematically exploring the boundaries of science and fiction. Unfortunately, his prose is rather bland and the anekdotes - the icing on the cake in books like this - lack the liveliness that is needed for a really gripping read. For readers who prefer content over style this should be no deterrent.

An entralling high level snapshot that challenges possibilities
Got this book and finished it the day after it arrived. Captivating stuff ! As a high level introduction to the current state of a variety of scientific areas it's fantastic.
Kaku tends to spend a little more time on the areas close to him, but everthing gets good coverage. As a springboard to understand current progress it allows the reader to go off and find more information on the particular subject areas that interest them.
I read it in the same week as Ray Kurzweil's 'The Singularity is Near' and it's interesting to see both the overlap, and how things have moved on in 5 years.
All in all a great book for the layman and those with a scientific background. Oh, and a great price for a hardback book right now :)

Great premise, reasonable execution
The premise of this book is fabulous. Take all the things which we've read about and seen in science fiction books, TV shows and films, and examine how possible, or impossible they are.

So we have phasers, death stars, time travel, warp engines, telepathy and many many more. Yes, it's a geek heaven, but hopefully the book is accessible enough to attrect a wider audience. It certainly deserves it.

Kaku's approach is to look at the fictional invention, explain why it is impossible as it stands, but then go on to see how real physics could create something similar in the future. He classes inventions into type 1,2 and 3 impossibilities, possible in some form within the next century, possible in the distant future, and impossible given the laws of physics as they are currently understood. This is a framework which gives the author the opportunity to potter around on some of the more exciting playing fields of modern physics.

The most surprising thing about the book is the number of things he tags as type 1 impossibilities (starships, forcefields and teleportation amongst them) and the very small number of type three (perpetual motion, precognition).

The strength of the book is simply its source material. The whacky world of theoretical physics is one that should have interest to many beyond a purely scientific audience, especially when described in the largely layperson's terms used here.

My one slight niggle is that while Kaku is relatively easy to read, he isn't the most inspiring author in the world. His material is the inspiring part, and he puts it across well, but in the end I found the structure of the book rather repetitive.

Minor quibble though. Rcommended.