The Unobservable Universe: A Paradox-Free Framework for Understanding the Universe

The Unobservable Universe: A Paradox-Free Framework for Understanding the Universe - Scott M. Tyson, Catherine J. Rourke, Thomas M. Hill "Poorly read and written, but good overall"


I give it a 4 star rating in spite of it's poor writing and reading by the author. The author compensates for his speaking and writing by making the story as if he's having a personal conversation with the listener. The book reads as if it was mostly written in 3 weeks time and it was since he mentions that in the book! Hint to author, if you write most of a book in three weeks and it reads like you did, don't let the reader know.

His main purpose of the book is to talk about his new theory of the universe which he says explains the paradoxes floating around modern day physics, the measurement problem, the double slit experiment and entanglement (spooky action at a distance). He quotes from the Richard Feyman's presentation in "Characteristics of Physical Law" lecture series where he says all the mysteries of physics are contained in the double slit experiment. If you haven't yet watched all seven episodes of the Feynman presentation,or if you haven't heard (or read) multiple sections on the paradoxes floating around in physics from Brian Greene, or Sean Carroll or other good authors multiple times elsewhere this book is definitely not for you since he doesn't really explain them nearly as well as most other authors do.

I give the author Kudos for leading with his chin. He criticizes the current science but gives a consistent frame work for fixing the paradoxes. Anybody can give criticism, but offering a fix is not so easy. The summation of his theory is that instead of Newtons 3rd law we have for every action in the our universe (the observer universe) there's a reaction in the void universe such that their product equals 1. He says this will lead the Theory of Everything. Well, do it and than tell me about it.

Carl Sagan used this quote,
"What is called for is an exquisite balance between two conflicting needs: the most skeptical scrutiny of all hypotheses that are served up to us and at the same time a great openness to new ideas". I give the author credit for his new idea and he knows full well he's leading with his chin. I fault him greatly in his theory for only stating it, but offering no predictions of new phenomena deriving from it. Any body can state things and give consistency, but science requires predictive models.

This book is not for most readers and should only be bought by somebody who can get past the poor reading and poor writing and who is also bothered by the known paradoxes in physics and wants a possible explanation for them. By the way, David Deutsch's well written book "The Beginning of Infinity" offers such a theory inside his book and is much more entertaining.

(review based on Audible version).