FEARFUL SYMMETRY
FEARFUL SYMMETRY The Search for Beauty in Modern Physics
With a new foreword by Roger Penrose
A.Zee
PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS Princeton and Oxford Published by Princeton University Press, 41 William Street, Princeton, New Jersey 08540
The poem “Cosmic Gall” by John Updike (on page 37), Copyright © 1960 by John Updike, is reprinted from Telephone Poles and Other Poems by John Updike, by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. The poem originally appeared in The New Yorker.
The excerpts from Jim Murray’s column in the Los Angeles Times (on page 88) is reprinted with the kind permission of the Los Angeles Times Syndicate. All rights reserved.
The lyrics form, “As Time Goes By” by Herman Hupfeld (on page 278), © 1931 (renewed) Warner Bros., Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Copyright © 1986 by Anthony Zee Preface and Afterword © 1999 Princeton University Press Foreword © 2007 Princeton University Press
All Rights Reserved
First published by Macmillan Publishing Company, 1986 First Princeton edition, for the Princeton Science Library, 1999 Reprinted, with a new foreword, 2007 ISBN-13: 978-0-691-13482-6
The Library of Congress has cataloged the first Princeton edition as follows
Zee, A. Fearful symmetry : the search for beauty in modern physics / A. Zee. p. cm. With a new preface and afterword. Originally published: New York : Macmillan Pub. Co., 1986 Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-691-00946-5 (pb. : alk. paper) 1. Symmetry (Physics) 2. Physics—Philosophy. 3. Renormalization (Physics) I. Title. QC174.17.S9Z4 1999 530.1—dc21 99–44882
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10 9 8 7 6 5 To Gretcften
Tyger! Tyger! burning bright In the forests of the night, What immortal hand or eye Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
- William Blake (From Poems ofWiIliam Blake, edited by W. B. Yeats. London: G. Routledge & Sons. 1905.)