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Summary: Beautiful Little Gem of a Book! A Trip to Outer Dreamspace!!
Review: Having read this twice in the past 5 years or so, this gem is a timeless, smooth transport practically into another world,make that worlds. It bends and stretches your views of reality,even if this new world disappears after you close the pages, and view the "real" world. Much like the 100-year old or so little book about geometry, angles,and a trip thru FLATLANDS (the other book's name,though I can't remember that one's author). A fine drug-free head-trip!
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Summary: scattered apart novel
Review: I can't believe it can be publish as a novel,
save you money for other good book
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Summary: Like no other book I've ever read
Review: This book was very thought-provoking. Most of the chapters explore what life and the world would be like if time operated in a certain way. For instance, in one chapter, time moves slower the higher you go. Only the rich were able to live in the highest towers because time was such a precious entity. Sprung from Einstein's theory of relativity, this book is very interesting. If you want a "different" read than what you are used to, or if you really like to think outside the box. I definitely recommend this book.
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Summary: Understanding Reality by Imagining the Alternatives!
Review: This book deserves many more than five stars for its potential to make you a better thinker!!One of the most creative people I know (holder of dozens of patents that have created two new industries) first told me about this book. He said that Einstein's Dreams was better for stimulating new ideas than any other book he had ever read. Naturally, I added the book to my list . . . but didn't get around to it right away. That was a mistake! I found Einstein's Dreams better for stimulating creativity than all other creativity books I have read combined. I wish I had read Einstein's Dreams when it first came out. Einstein, of course, was famous for this "thought experiments" in which he would imagine what would happen if he were placed in different circumstances. For example, what if he were riding on a photon of light? What would happen if he shined a flashlight ahead of him? How would someone riding on a parallel photon of light perceive his flashlight if he flashed it toward the other person? The result of most of these thought experiments was to understand the nature of time, and to create his famous special and general theories of relativity. (If you want to know more about this subject, be sure to check out Professor Stephen Hawking's latest, The Universe in a Nutshell.) Alan Lightman has created a novel built around 30 "dreams" (or scenarios) that make differing assumptions about time, and describe how the lives of ordinary people living in Switzerland in 1905 would be changed. In the process, you will probably have several epiphanies. For example, so much of the way we run our lives depends on the fact that time runs forward in what normally seems like a linear, predictable way . . . but without giving us certainty about what happens next in our lives. If time operated in a fractured way, for example, we would find little incentive to try to create connections to others and to create something better for the future. The other epiphany you will probably have is that you can take everything that you believe to be well understood, and think about that factor as being dozens of different things using these dreams as templates. For example, you can apply the ideas in this book to an academic discipline like linguistics, art history, behavioral psychology, or anything else. In the process of thinking through these "factual" areas in terms of assuming that reality is different, you will immediately see "reality" more clearly and objectively than ever before. Finally, you will realize that the greatest limitation we have in creating new learning is our lack of imagination. Fill in the empty spaces in our minds with new questions, new possibilities, and new problems, and vast new insights immediately emerge without using computers, mathematics, or any sort of technology. All you have to do is dream . . . or day dream, if you prefer. My suggestion for you is that you plan to read this book several times. After the first time, when you have the idea of the book's approach well in hand, take something that you have absolute certainty about and apply the dreams here to your area of certainty. On the next reading, do the same thing with yet another subject. After you have done this a few times, come back and reread the book considering your first topic. Another possibility is to take the 30 dreams and expand on what the author has written about the implications for time. A number of these are on the sketchy side, and you can make them more vivid and valuable to you if you flesh the dreams out. I also suggest reading this book someplace where it is quiet, and you will not be disturbed. You will also probably find it helpful to ponder a little with each dream before moving onto the next one.
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Summary: Excellent Book
Review: I bought and read this book when it first came out and thought it was excellent. It is far from being a "tradtitional" novel and the style fits the theme: dream-like, poetic vignettes that eventually lead the young Einstein to his theory of relativity, itself almost as bizarre yet also believable as any of his other dreams regarding the nature of time. I was also looking forward to listening to the Audio version of this book, which I thought would be very appropriate, but the only version I could find was read by Michael York, whom I dislike as an actor.
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Summary: Boring
Review: Good writing but it doesn't seem to go anywhere. Its one of those kind of books that people think most be real deep because they can't figure out what it is trying to say. What it says to me is... BORING.
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Summary: An intriguing look at the nature of time
Review: In "Einstein's Dreams" Alan Lightman offers up a consideration of what Albert Einstein's dreams might have been like in the weeks leading up to the publication of his Theory of Relativity in 1905. Over the course of thirty vignettes, Einstein dreams of the various courses through which time might flow (or not flow). What I found to be most intriguing was that the author played upon our perceptions of time in each dream. For example, we have all felt like time is moving slower for us than everyone else, but what if this were actually the case? What if you actually could "seize the moment"?
While this a very short book (I read it in less than 2 hours), it really leaves you thinking about how we spend our time. By taking things we all wish we could do, like stopping time in its tracks, and making them physical constants, Lightman sheds a lot of light on to the way we can waste our time, and our lives, "Einstein's Dreams" is a delightful novel that reads almost like poetry. Although cautionary about taking time for granted, it is not judgmental, and makes no claim to the correct use of one's time. If you're looking for a novel in the traditional sense, you'd do well to pass on this book. However, if you're looking for an easy, yet insightful book, this is one for you. Enjoy!
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Summary: Concepts too simple and not developed
Review: The concepts of time and reality in this book are much too simple and Lightman failed to develop any of the multiple scenarios to any interesting level. So much potential existed within the alternate realities, but by only spending 3 pages on each, I could not get interested. Once I understood what a particular chapter's concept was, I knew that once I turned the page it would be over and Lightman would be onto something new. This was distracting to say the least. SO many interesting things could have occured within each chapter, and he failed to explore any of the possibilities.
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Summary: simply beautiful
Review: This is one of the most remarkable books I've ever read. I found it so increadably enjoyable that, during the all-too-brief time that I had it from the library, I read it five times. The stories were beautiful, in their language, their implacations, and in their simplicity. It made me want to share it, and I did; I found myself reading my favorite stories over and over to friends and family in the hopes that they would find them as intruiging as I did. No matter how many times I read this book it never lost its potency. Read it!
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Summary: wholly unimpressed
Review: if it werent for the interlude on page 51, i would have put the book down and stopped there. inspired to read this book by the subject and further influenced by the fantastic reviews. i was expecting a wonderful adventure of the mind. instead, i lost 8.99 that would have been better spent at the movies. while certainly fine if on an airplane, train, or bus, i wouldnt reprioritize to fit this in. over praised and under developed, this book is one that is better left on the shelf.
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