Relativity, Thermodynamics and Cosmology

Rating:
Summary: Historically Intersting
Review: Don't buy this book to learn relativity or cosmology from it.
There are much better books out there in the same price range.
Try Foster and Nighangle for general relativity. And Michel Berry for cosmology.
This book by Tolman will be useful to only those who have a historical interest in the subject matter. You can learn general relativity from it, but it is not the most clearly written book out there. Furthermore, the notation used in this book is ancient and does not place emphasis on the geometrical nature of relativity.

Rating:
Summary: A classic in cosmology
Review: Originally published in 1934, this Dover reprint covers the early development of cosmology in a rigorous mathematical format. You need to know math through tensor equations (as you would for any rigorous treatment of cosmology), and this probably should not be anyone's first foray into cosmology. For that, see Peebles. Having said that, this gives sidelights present nowhere else, and a fine treatment of some by-passed cosmological models.

Rating:
Summary: A valuable classic
Review: This classic book should be on the shelf of every physicist interested in relativity. The exposition is very clear and can be used to fix some ideas. My comments do not include the thermodynamics part, which I'm not competent to review. The cosmological applications are, evidently, severaly outdated, but can be very useful for those interested in the history of the development of observational cosmology.

Rating:
Summary: A valuable classic
Review: To the publisher I would appreciate it if the publisher could produce an audio adaptation of this book. I would love to listen to this while I drive to work and to let my 16 month old son listen to it as a bedtime story. Arnold D Veness