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The Physical Basis of The Direction of Time

  • Book
  • © 2001

Overview

Authors:
  1. H. Dieter Zeh

    1. Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany

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  • By now this book has become a classic frequently cited in the literature
  • The new edition is completely revised and in part now also takes care of the discussions going on in the community of philosophers of science
  • Includes supplementary material: sn.pub/extras

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Table of contents (8 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages I-X
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  2. Introduction

    • H. Dieter Zeh
    Pages 1-8

  3. The Physical Concept of Time

    • H. Dieter Zeh
    Pages 9-14

  4. The Time Arrow of Radiation

    • H. Dieter Zeh
    Pages 15-36

  5. The Thermodynamical Arrow of Time

    • H. Dieter Zeh
    Pages 37-82

  6. The Quantum Mechanical Arrow of Time

    • H. Dieter Zeh
    Pages 83-132

  7. The Time Arrow of Spacetime Geometry

    • H. Dieter Zeh
    Pages 133-168

  8. The Time Arrow in Quantum Cosmology

    • H. Dieter Zeh
    Pages 169-196

  9. Epilog

    • H. Dieter Zeh
    Pages 197-200

  10. Back Matter

    Pages 201-231
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About this book

The fourth edition contains again various revisions and updates throughout the whole book. There are many new comments, formulations and arguments, several new references, and three minor error corrections (regarding page 22, 112 and 146 of the third edition). This time I am grateful to David Atkinson (for a very useful discussion of radiation damping - Sect. 2. 3), to Larry Schulman (for comments on the problem of simultaneous arrows of time - Sect. 3. 1. 2), and to Paul Sheldon (for a discussion of the compatibility of closed time-like curves with quantum theory - Chap. 1). The most efficient help came from John Free, who carefully edited the whole fourth edition (not only for matters of English language). Heidelberg, April 2001 H. D. Zeh Preface to the Third Edition The third (1999) edition of the Direction of Time offered far more revisions and additions than the second one in 1992. During the seven years in between, several fields of research related to the arrow of time had shown remarkable progress. For example, decoherence proved to be the most ubiquitous man­ ifestation of the quantum arrow, while articles on various interpretations of quantum theory (many of them with inbuilt time-asymmetric dynamical aspects) can and do now regularly appear in reputed physics journals. There­ fore, most parts of Chap. 4 were completely rewritten and some new sections added, while the second part of Chap.

Reviews

From the reviews of the fourth edition:

"An unusually clear introduction to the theory of time. It covers philosophy as well as physics, and is most up-to-date, with a thorough discussion of the consistent histories approach. The author covers all areas of physics, beginning with classical physics, relativity, thermodynamics and moving through quantum physics and ending with quantum cosmology. [...] the book is highly recommended." (Mathematical Reviews 2003a)

"This book is a thorough survey of what is known about irreversibility in physics. It investigates this topic in such fields as radiation, thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, gravitation and quantum cosmology. … This book is certainly a concise, technically sophisticated and up-to-date discussion on the subject in various physical fields. It is also complete. … I can recommend this book for physicists interested in the subject … ." (Cl. Semay, Physicalia, Vol. 38 (2), 2002)

"This fourth edition of Zeh’s ‘The physical basis of the direction of time’ represents an almost new book. … 12 years after the first edition, the author not only incorporated further new results but totally rewrote several chapters. … Therefore, libraries should keep the older editions and incorporate this new edition." (Hans-Jürgen Schmidt, Zentralblatt MATH, Vol. 976, 2002)

Authors and Affiliations

  • Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany

    H. Dieter Zeh

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