Statistical Mechanics: A Set of Lectures (Advanced Book Classics)

Rating:
Summary: Statistics that "moos you along"
Review: A classic by one of the best. I wish I could say I understand
it all, but it rings true in many ways. His famous quote
"I can definitely say that Nobody understands Quantum Mechanics"
is perhaps this biggest "Moo Clue".

Rating:
Summary: Statistics that "moos you along"
Review: A classic by one of the best. I wish I could say I understand
it all, but it rings true in many ways. His famous quote
"I can definitely say that Nobody understands Quantum Mechanics"
is perhaps this biggest "Moo Clue".

Rating:
Summary: Style over substance.
Review: Feynman was one of the most accomplished physicists in the 2nd half of the 20th century. His publications speak for themselves. However, as represented in this set of lecture notes, for example, I do not find him as a pedagogue more enlightening than others. I bought and read this book in grad school, and found it to be a nice quick intro to several topics (spin waves and such). I did not, and still don't find the exposition physically exceptionally profound. One difference though, is the fact that Feynman, with his fame, could afford to be rather informal in his presentation. Any unsatisfactory aspects would be accepted as the mysterious ways of a 'genius'. If you are a student and would like to learn to solve problems on your own, forget this one. What this book gives you is a little 'attitude', aside from a quick intro, which most of us haven't earned the right to put on, of doing physics. Try it. Try to be as unorthodox and informal as he was, and you will mostly end up with nonsense.

Rating:
Summary: extraordinary Masterpiece!
Review: Richard Feynman said:"What I cannot create, I do not understand!". I am really amazed by his unique style of doing physics: he always create anything from scratch, always has his unique point of view, even on an old problem. All I can say about Feynman is Genius!!!
This book is about Feynman's extraordinary viewpoint on statistical mechanics. I can bet that this is an unique S.M book.
but i don't think it's for beginner, I suggest you should finish a standard statistical mechanics course before you read this one.
I can not find suitable words to admire this great book, so I quit here, but in the end, I strongly recommend this book to all physicists, physics-major students!

Rating:
Summary: great book on statistical and condensed matter physics
Review: This is a wonderful book written by one of the greatest teachers of physics on a subject matter often shrouded in mystery. I found it tremendously helpful in understanding many topics in condensed matter physics on a deeper, more conceptual level. The chapters on second quantization, superconductivity and superfluidity are especially illuminating, and the latter is far surperior in clarity than anything I have come across (which is perhaps not surprising considering Feymnman developed much of the theory himself). I highly recommend this book as a supplimentary text for any graduate-level Statistical Mechanics, Quantum Mechanics or Solid State course you may be taking.

Rating:
Summary: a tremendous book
Review: when i was undergrad, i read Prof. Kerson Huang's stat mech. i think that book is good. everything is covered systematically, but everything is explained 'evenly'. if u r a careful reader, u still get the ideas of the essence, like partition function plays the central role of stat mech, etc.

now, i am reading feynman's book. it's totally diff from huang's. it's full of excitement. he put the principle of stat mech which is the relation b/w partition function and probability at the very beginning. all the other aspects in stat mech follow so straight forword and there are endless novel derivations in this book. i feel many of my previous understandings are interconnected by reading this book.

it's simply great, just like the other books written by feynman.