Six Impossible Things: The ‘Quanta of Solace’ and the Mysteries of the Subatomic World

"This is a riveting and mind-bending book that explains the various ways in which scientists have sought to make sense of the quantum world. John Gribbin is one of the UK’s foremost science writers, an astrophysicist and Visiting Fellow at the University of Sussex. He has written a series of books on a wide range of topics, but quantum physics is one he keeps revisiting, and here he does so brilliantly. Making sense of quantum physics flies in the face of ordinary assumptions about how the world works. It tells us that a particle can be in two places at once. That a particle is also a wave, and everything in the quantum world can be described entirely in terms of waves, or entirely in terms of particles. It demonstrates teleportation of photons and promises the advent of computers the like of which we have never seen before— quantum computers that are fundamentally secure in themselves whilst having the potential to break any form of existing security in classical computers. Support Five Books Five Books interviews are expensive to produce. If you're enjoying this interview, please support us by donating a small amount . Gribbin effortlessly explains the quantum phenomena themselves, the history of their discovery and the challenges they pose. He does this with elegant simplicity whilst pointing out how deeply unsettling these results are for our common sense intuitions of how the world behaves around us. For this he provides a range of ‘solaces’—six ways in which scientists have tried to make sense of the quantum phenomena. Each of these interpretations of quantum physics invites the response ‘But that is impossible’. Whether it is the Many-Worlds interpretation or the original Copenhagen interpretation, John Gribbin describes each with superb clarity. The author himself remains ‘agnostic’ about the merits of the particular solaces. Since all are crazy compared to common sense, he leaves the reader to determine their own preference for a particular interpretation. However, just because an idea is crazy does not mean it is wrong. Gribbin reminds us that we might still be missing something, we may discover a new way to make sense of the all the results he so clearly presents. But for now we are left in a world that is exquisitely characterised and yet deeply mysterious."