The Tao of Physics

The mystics explore it through meditation.  The nuclear physicists explore it through experimentation and hypothesis.  It's the universe as we understand it today, a "cosmic dance" of paradoxical yet unified relationships -- an organic vision brilliantly evoked by a gifted and thoughtful physicist.

"Mystics understand the roots of the Tao but not its branches; scientists understand its branches but not its roots.  Science does not need mysticism and mysticism does not need science; but man needs both." -- Fritjof Capra in The Tao of Physics

This is the first edition of this book from 1975, during the rush to New Age philosophy.  Capra spends the first portion of the book explaining to the layman quantum physics and relativity of modern physics without mathematics.  He then provides an overview of eastern religion/philosophy.  Given these two introductions, Capra moves forward on seek to correlate the two; very poorly I believe.

I was very disappointed in this book.  I should have gotten a philosophy text of eastern philosophy and made the connections myself being a physicist.  Leaving mathematics out of physics is like telling a story without words.  Though one might be able to correlate eastern mystical philosophy to some aspects of modern physics, it does not help the understanding of either nor reveal any new truth.

I felt like I had wasted my time reading this text.  I am very glad that this was given to me by someone who also spent nothing for the book.  If you want to know about modern physics, read any book by Hawking.  If you want to know about eastern philosophy, get an eastern philosophy book.