史蒂文 :: Release 2.0

I am reading The Road to Reality by Roger Penrose. He spent 8 years writing probably the most important book i have ever read.

It has started to answer so many of the fundamental questions i had in maths and science and in my opinion, the stuff you just don't get told at school. The reason why you are learning certain things. I cannot just learn something - i don't have to know the theoretical derivation, but i have to at leat know the starting point, the assumtions and the end point. I also have to know why bother.

I remember learning Calculus and it took me a long time to really understand why. This book is giving me even more reasons. Wy are complex numbers actually useful? Now i know - or at least I am starting to know. I remember during Physics that these numbers just appeared but i really *hate* memorizing formulas for the sake of it. It's like learning to speak a language by remembering sentences rather than knowing how to *build* a sentence. As soon as something new comes up you have NO idea on how to extend that knowledge.

Read this book. Get your kids to read it. You don't have to understand it all, but when you start looking at its applications you will at least have some idea where it all came from and, more importantly, you can start to form your own ideas and you will have some idea of how various concepts relate and can be extended.

It's hard to put down!