How to Teach Quantum Physics to Your Dog [Paperback]

There is perhaps no area of Physics that has garnered as much fascination as quantum mechanics, save perhaps the theory of relativity. Yet in a sense the weirdness associated with quantum mechanics is even more profound than that associated with relativity. Relativity deals with physics of very fast objects, and even though it challenges our normal way of thinking, it still preserves some of the basic intuitions of what does it mean to be a physical object, how we measure properties of those objects, and what those objects can and cannot do. Quantum mechanics, on the other hand, puts all those basic notion to a test. We are forced to reconsider even our basic understanding of what reality is. There have been many popular accounts of Quantum Mechanics over the years, and this book is yet another attempt of bringing this arcane field to the general readership. So despite what the title may say, this is not a book about Physics in general, but just about quantum mechanics. The dog from the title is author's German shepherd, and she is used as a stand-in for all the naïve, "Newtonian" ways of thinking about the world. Each chapter in the book covers a different aspect of quantum theory, and all the discussions are motivated in a light-hearted way by author's "dialogues" with his dog. These "dialogues" are meant to provide some comic relief from the otherwise technical subject matter. As such they work fine, although I am not the biggest fan of author's attempts at humor. The explanations provided in the book are actually very good - they are very well written, accessible to the general audience, and absolutely conceptually correct. This last point should not be taken for granted, as I have seen many attempts at making Physics accessible to the general audience that don't actually do justice to the actual Physics. One thing that I in particular like about this book is that it mentions several more recent experiments that have shed important light at the foundational aspects of quantum mechanics. In that respect this popular treatment is as up-to-date as they come. As a college Physics professor myself, I appreciate all the effort that the author has put into making this material accessible. As far as introductory, non-technical books on quantum mechanics go, this one clearly hits its targeted audience.

Since the day I rescued copies of the original "Mr Tomkins" books from a school library "discard" pile, I've always been an enthusiastic reader of books which try to explain advanced science and technology concepts in a fun way, and this book (and it's newer counterpart about relativity) caught my eye recently.

The concept is simple: Chad Orzel's dog, Emmy, may be a typical mutt obsessed with walks, squirrels and discarded food, but she's also intelligent enough to have a basic grasp of quantum concepts, and a view to how they might be exploited in her favour, for example by passing simultaneously around both sides of a tree to catch a squirrel. Each chapter starts with Chad explaining why "it's not quite like that", and going on to explain the real physics to her in some detail. This works well, breaking up some quite complex discussions with amusing dialogue between master and hound, and makes the book eminently readable.

The books scores because it's bang up to date, and goes beyond the basic quantum concepts into more complex areas like decoherence, entanglement and quantum teleportation, supplementing explanations of the basic concepts and "thought experiments" with the details and outcomes of relatively recent experimental verification. Similarly "quantum" is the current buzzword beloved of pseudo-scientific charlatans, and the last chapter is a timely effort to debunk those who abuse it for get-rich-quick schemes and medical quackery.

I also particularly liked the way that the author is not afraid to embrace the concepts of measurement errors and accuracy. These are vital tools to understand how well, or badly, something has been established, and I was very pleased to see such an accessible book using them well.

The explanations themselves are a mixed bunch, some being very complicated and taking me a couple of goes to read and absorb. Given that I probably have rather more background that the target demographic (I do have a good Physics degree, albeit a few years old) this may mean that some readers could struggle with the most complex parts. I suspect a few more diagrams in these areas might have helped. However overall the book succeeds, and will probably prompt keen readers to re-read or seek out secondary explanations where they don't understand first time.

In the Kindle edition some of the graphics are a page or two adrift of the relevant text, and the footnotes (which often contain important or amusing asides) are presented in a bunch at the end of each chapter, which is not very reader friendly. I suspect the paper version of the book is better in this respect.

This books is well worth reading, and has certainly helped to refresh and update my understanding of a complex field, while giving me a welcome laugh at the dog's antics. I look forward to reading the relativity volume later this year.

Well, it certainly has a unique selling point.

A quixotic quest, you would think: rendering the world of quantum physics understandable for the layman - approached quixotically: by fabricating a dialogue between the author, a physics professor, and his rabbit-chasing, treat-loving Alsatian dog.

There is something oddly Socratic about Orzal's interlocutions with Emmy the Alsatian. Only in the Dialogues, no-one says "that sounds ridiculous, Socrates". Emmy has no such qualms.

As a conceptual device it works as well as it can be expected to, though at times both Chad and Emmy expect too much of their readers. That is one smart dog.

Over the years I've read plenty of popular science treatments of quantum physics (more than your average bear, I dare say, but of course that's not to say I necessarily understood them), and I still found my eyes glazing over at some of the depth to which Orzal was obliged (or at any rate inclined) to descend in expounding quantum theory. Emmy stays with him throughout, and eggs him on.

I have always harboured suspicions about the scientific inviolability claimed of this sort of physics. Real, falsifiable empirical evidence seems in short supply (often being suspiciously forbidden by the very terms of the theory, or at least buried under many sedimentary layers of mathematical assumption) and quantum effects have a habit of conveniently being unobservable in any dimension meaningful to everyday life. Or vanishing (er, I mean, collapsing the wave function) when you try to measure them.

Which, to this old sceptic, gives them a religious sort of disposition - true by definition; true because smart men learned in arcane lore say so. (I should say I'm not alone in this view: properly credentialised physicists like Peter Woit and Lee Smolin have also expressed it).

That said, Orzal is no (ahem) dogmatist (indeed, trying to de-mystify the scriptures as he does makes him more like a sort of Lutheran reformer), and I think is prepared to admit of some missing links in the overall theory (I couldn't work out whether quantum entanglement, which is "non local", falsifies relativity or not).

Then again, the only practical upshot I could derive of all this colossally brain-contorting discipline is the possibility of "quantum computing" - apparently faster and cheaper than boring old silicon.

Orzal's main objective, finally arrived at in the closing chapter, is to debunk phoney new age baloney which purports to trade on quantum underpinnings - quantum healing, and that kind of thing. This is done effectively, but at some cost: by underlining the singular uselessness of quantum theory in every day volumes, velocities and quantities. Whenever it would come in handy (often, when chasing squirrels, as Emmy astutely observes), by its own theory, quantum effects would be unobservably minuscule.

Which makes this old goat wonder why we bother digging up the Swiss countryside and dropping trillions of dollars of supercooled electromagnets into it just to find another unobservable subatomic particle. Surely we can figure out whether quantum computing works by trying to building a quantum computer?

In the final analysis, and as other reviewers have said, I put this book down having a better general understanding of the gist of a number of really quite difficult concepts - enough to keep my end of the conversation up if sat next to a physicist at dinner - even if the details and implications below that remain entirely murky - and so in that regard, it is a tough job imaginatively and successfully done.

And, now matter how cute the device seems, you can't help but like the irrepressible Emmy, even if she does understand Schrodinger's indeterminacy better than I do.

Olly Buxton

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