Rating: 
Summary: A good overview, but ...
Review: "Constants of Nature" is an excellent overview of a fascinating topic--the origins and significance of the constants of the universe. It prompted me to spend a great deal of my free time digging around for more information on many of the topics it addresses, which is always a ringing endorsement for a work of non-fiction.However, it's not perfect. The book's subtitle ("From Alpha to Omega") is somewhat deceptive--the "meat" of the book (after the first few chapters) deals almost entirely with the fine structure constant (alpha). Barrow talks a great deal about constants in general, but never devotes much time to any of the others specifically. Furthermore, at times, Barrow seems to become sidetracked--an inexplicable discussion of the value of contemplating "alternative histories" (i.e., speculating what would have happened if Germany had won World War II, and similar endeavors) awkwardly interrupts the flow of one chapter, for instance. Also, the book has several errors that were immediately obvious to me (for instance, it says light from the Sun takes 3 seconds to reach the Earth; the correct value is more than 8 minutes), which makes me suspect that there are probably many more errors that I missed, but which would be obvious to someone with a marginally greater degree of physics sophistication. However, perhaps the biggest disappointment was in the introduction of the values of the Planck length, Planck time, etc., all of which are central to the book. Barrow justifies the signifiance of these values simply by stating that they are the only values of the appropriate dimensions that can be derived by combining certain other physical constants in straightforward ways. However, from there he makes the logical leap that the Planck distance, for instance, is the "natural" measure of length in the universe. This is certainly a fair statement, but it's hardly justifiable to make that statement based simply on the fact that it can be derived from a number of other constants--one could have selected another collection of fundamental constants and come up with a completely different "natural" unit of length. In short, the line of reasoning does not justify the conclusion. In all, this is a thought-provoking work, but it's often short on detail and had a tendency to leave me with more questions than answers. The more technical reader will probably wish for more thorough arguments throughout; however, it's still an enjoyable read and a fine attempt at popularizing a difficult area of physics.
Rating:
Summary: Good to whet your appetite
Review: Barrow picks what is certainly an intriguing topic, and does a decent job of glossing over pretty much all aspects of the fine structure constant. He mentions a couple others, too, like beta, and alpha-s. This shallow look at these few constants probably make up around 40 pages, or so.
That having been said, I found the rest of the book very interesting, too: stories about various contributors of various theories; what it would mean to nudge the constants one way or another; the whole history of the topic. But I bought the book to learn about the constants themselves, and was severely disappointed in that respect.
There are also the glaring errors that the other reviewers have mentioned. I found 4 or 5 that I knew immediately were wrong (others have mentioned the 3 second light trip from the sun), as well as some annoying typographical errors (e.g. "<" instead of ">" for "greater than") and some serious fundamental errors in the notes. Were it not for these, I probably would have given the book 4 stars. They got rather annoying though, and left me with a sneaking suspicion about other things he's written that I *can't* immediately "correct" mentally.
All-in-all, it's worth the read, but only to spark your curiosity on the subject.
Rating: 
Summary: very good
Review: Fascinating discussion on the number that govern the universe. Though certainly not perfect(and somewhat self promoting), barrow is a very entertaining, infromative writer.
Rating: 
Summary: The book should have had a very different title.
Review: How about: three centuries of gossip in the world of theoritical physics and mathematics...it's a lot closer to the content of the book.
Why do most physicists and mathematicians have to write about the human side of those who contributed to their fields instead of discussing the topics germane to their to main ideas.
I really would like to know about the constants, what their importance is and how they were discovered and developed, not about a debate at a conference in some place I've never been in 1879.
I had hoped, and had believed, that this book would discuss each of the constants in detail. But, after weeks of teadous reading, I came to the end with my wish unfulfilled.
Rating:
Summary: Well-written with one typographic flaw
Review: I don't feel qualified to review this book beyond stating my own general enjoyment of it. I find it a well-written example of a math book for the moderately clever, semi-numerate layman. Quite fun. But why use a font for the text that has the exact same glyph for 1 (one) and I ((uppercase I)? Perhaps the hardback version was not marred in this way, but the paperback can be headache inducing for anyone who is used to reading even simple equations. A number like 137 seems clearly to be I37. What was the typesetter thinking. using this font for a book related to numbers?
Rating: 
Summary: Prof., Dr. Victor V. Vasiliev:
Review: I have received this remarkable book of March 4, 2003.
I ask the author to inform me about its edition
in Russian is planned? Yours faithfully, vavivlad-rvc@mtu-net.ru
Rating:
Summary: Innovative and refreshing text
Review: In his previous book "The Book of Nothing", John Barrow presents a vacuum and uses it to show us its new meaning. Now he finds another interesting topic - constants of Nature in science (mostly "fine structure" constant but not exclusively), and uses them to teach us about unknown history and measurements in modern cosmology. I find his cube of theories and colorful description of many forms of multiverses (including the one having different times dimension) very educative.
Extra flavor is added in chapter 9 (about "virtual history"). It brings some humor and relaxes in the middle of not so easy subjects. Especially chapter 11 requires extra effort and figure 11.6 is missing from the hardcover edition. Generally: book represents another great effort in popularizing sophisticated top end of a science. Hopefully I will remember formula: 2(pi)e^2/hc for a long time to come.
Rating:
Summary: A big disappointment
Review: The Author, though capable to give a systematic review of the present knowledge of the fundamental interactions (in terms of the respective constants), such as the strong, electromagnetic, weak, and gravitational ones, as well as the problem of their unification, merely concentrates in giving a purely superficial exposition. The book is full of historical anecdotes and chats around the science, sometimes written with a strange and irresponsible negligence to the real nature of the phenomena under consideration. For example, in p. 78 the solar eclipse is described as "...the Sun's disc was covered by the Earth's shadow..." (?!).
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointed
Review: The Book of Nothing was much better. I am surprised at errors made on simple physical realities. Eclipse of sun is defined as earth's shadow covering sun's disc... Sun's light reaching earth in 3 seconds... As one reviewer already mentioned, letter used for "1" is indistinguishable from "I"... I could not find much detail on "constants", just speculations and what if's... Quotes sprinkled all over are much more fun to read...
Rating:
Summary: Disappointed
Review: The Book of Nothing was much better. I am surprised at errors made on simple physical realities. Eclipse of sun is defined as earth's shadow covering sun's disc... Sun's light reaching earth in 3 seconds... As one reviewer already mentioned, letter used for "1" is indistinguishable from "I"... I could not find much detail on "constants", just speculations and what if's... Quotes sprinkled all over are much more fun to read...
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