Steven Holzner

This book is not for dummies. If it were presented as a supplement to a quantum physics textbook, I'd give it four stars. As a "for Dummies" book, I'm afraid it's a failure. I came into this book just having finished [b:String Theory For Dummies|10399015|String Theory For Dummies|Andrew Zimmerman Jones|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51MeQK9gINL._SL75_.jpg|15302931] by [a:Andrew Zimmerman Jones|2943202|Andrew Zimmerman Jones|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1252952533p2/2943202.jpg], which I highly recommend. String Theory for Dummies is a wonderful introduction to the very strange universe of string theory. In contrast, Quantum Physics for Dummies is an almost indecipherable, math-laden, incomprehensible "introduction" to quantum physics. The introduction states that you need a good background in college calculus including differential equations and at least a year of college physics to understand this book. The introduction does not lie. I have all these qualifications (and I'd add matrices mathematics to the requirements) and I still could not follow a lot of the math. My main problem with the book was that the author did a poor job of connecting all this math to the real world. There was very, very little qualitative discussion of quantum physics, and 90 % of the book was spent solving equations, but failing to tie the resulting equation to any physical object or phenomenon. All that said, it's not a bad book, it's just not appropriate for the "For Dummies" series.… (mer)

Differential Equations for Dummies is another book in the Dummies series and as such is made for the common man or common woman as the case may be. Dr. Steven Holzner explains the subject with panache and skill. Some of the parts can be skipped. For instance, the author discusses how to do Euler’s Method with a short program written in the Java Programming Language.

The author assumes some prior knowledge of Calculus, but this is a sensible thing to expect. If you are rusty with Calculus the author does explain some of its rules and techniques, but he dives in pretty quickly. The book is written in plain English and is sprinkled here and there with humor. It mostly comes in the form of a comic panel, but sometimes he comes up with an imaginary situation where you are the only person who can use Differential Equations, even though you are surrounded by Engineers and Scientists.

I do have some problems with this book but they aren’t that extreme. First and foremost, there are no workable problems. This might be because of the nature of the text, but I am not quite certain. The second is that the book contains links to websites and I don’t know how long they will last. Although, I suppose if you enter ‘Differential Equation Solver’ into your favorite Search Engine you will be pointed to some good resources.… (mer)