Overview

Books on Einstein and his theories abound. However, this book is uniquely different. It presents key concepts in Special and General Relativity, in verse form. The aim is to make Einstein's insights more fun to learn. It uses rhyme and rhythm to render reading memorable and thus pleasurable. Moreover, what is pleasurable may foster a better understanding, as well as retention, of ideas. Use of verse apparently worked effectively in ancient times: in the Iliad and Odyssey of Homer among the Greeks; in the Vedas and Upanishads of ancient India; both rhyme, in the form of alliteration, and rhythm in Beowulf among the Anglo-Saxons, etc. The target reader is college-educated, or college student in third year, or anyone willing to puzzle it out, who desires to understand why time slows down and lengths contract when objects are in relative motion; how Science, Einstein's theories in particular, can contribute to answering the perennial question: what it is to be human; how to time travel to the future by staying young ; etc. Relativity has a reputation of being difficult . For example, curvature of spacetime seems so abstruse, so forbidding a concept. But, do not disarm yourself prematurely. Do not be intimidated. As it turns out, curvature of spacetime is tidal gravity, the cause of familiar ocean tides. You may even have a gut feel for it. This book will not teach you how to solve problems in Relativity. Nor will it teach you how to prove The shortest distance takes the longest time . No, we will spend our time grasping Einstein's insights, their implications on Reality and on mind; and amid our quest, on what it means to be human. More fun to learn does not mean that verse form is the lazy road to learning. It does not mean that verse form makes the difficult easy, or, the rough, plain. No, the difficult remains difficult; the rough remains rough. And to grasp it, you have to exert a determined, sustained effort and be willing to stretch your mind to accommodate the wild notions in Relativity. The idea motivating this book is to make the stretching more enjoyable relative to prose by using the rhyme-rhythm features of verse. But, stretch your mind, you have to. There is no royal, poetic road to learning! There is a feature in our history, that stands out in view of our concerns in conveying knowledge-a feature that the ancients aptly used. It is the oral tradition. Since the first humans appeared, oral tradition was the sole means in transmitting knowledge for a very long time, indeed. If we fit the whole time since the first humans lived into a year, then writing started only about the morning of 30th of December. That is a huge time in which oral tradition operated, i.e. about 99.5% of our time as humans. What does this imply? We transmitted information orally; and we received information aurally! This oral-aural conveyance was the way for all information, including that of knowledge. In addition, during the five hundred thousand years or so, oral tradition honed our brains to receive knowledge aurally . To me, this implies that our brains have a natural deep resonance to features of language in the oral tradition. The key language features in the oral tradition are the rhymes and rhythms of verse. I wrote this book in verse, inspired by this thought: to make the most out of the resonant structures in our brains engendered by oral tradition, to convey the deep insights of Einstein on Reality. It is my sincere wish that Einstein's ideas will find recognition in the public understanding and thus inform the public outlook. I invite you, everyone: Hop in with me, a time machine we ride, Intent on chasing space-time concepts wild; To fathom Einstein's insights into Reality, In his Special and General Relativity. Like Wordsworth, a lonely cloud wandering, Through space and time we will be winging, Not to appreciate the daffodils of Nature; But to understand Nature's Architecture

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9781492896098

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Feliciano Bantilan earned his AB Philosophy from St Francis Xavier Major Seminary, Davao City, Philippines. After his MS Physics from University of the Philippines at Diliman, Quezon City, he went to the USA on fellowship to pursue a PhD in Physics. He obtained his PhD in Physics from Duke University in 1983. He returned to his country and taught Physics at the University of the Philippines at Los Banos. Then, a bombshell dropped on his life: Parkinson's disease in 2002. The lowest point in his struggle with Parkinson's occurred in 2006, when his mobility was so impaired, he no longer could raise himself up on bed to sleep. He slept on a mattress spread on the floor. He would have episodes of near panic, due to difficulty breathing. Then, by a stroke of luck, still with severe movement difficulty--only a finger in his left hand could press keys of his laptop--he chanced upon the website of Dr Amy Yasko. A year and three months into her protocol, he began to get back some of his mobility, as well as some of his brain . And something more: all of a sudden, he began to think in verse. He enjoyed reading and reciting poetry since he was young. However, he never composed a poem in his life, until his partial recovery. At age sixty-five, he began writing poetry. The first two poems he composed make up his first book, Einstein in Verse. The rest forms the content of this book, his second, Life in Poetry.

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