"Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!": Adventures of a Curious Character

Front Cover
W. W. Norton & Company, Jun 28, 2010 - Biography & Autobiography - 352 pages

A New York Times bestseller—the outrageous exploits of one of this century's greatest scientific minds and a legendary American original.

Richard Feynman, winner of the Nobel Prize in physics, thrived on outrageous adventures. Here he recounts in his inimitable voice his experience trading ideas on atomic physics with Einstein and Bohr and ideas on gambling with Nick the Greek; cracking the uncrackable safes guarding the most deeply held nuclear secrets; accompanying a ballet on his bongo drums; painting a naked female toreador. In short, here is Feynman's life in all its eccentric—a combustible mixture of high intelligence, unlimited curiosity, and raging chutzpah.

 

Contents

He Fixes Radios by Thinking
17
String Beans
25
Latin or Italian? 42 Contents
45
The Chief Research Chemist of
53
THE PRINCETON YEARS 59 Part 2
59
Meeeeeeeeeee
66
Monster Minds
77
A Different Box of Tools
84
You Just Ask Them?
184
Lucky Numbers
192
O Americano Outra Vez
199
Man of a Thousand Tongues
220
An Offer You Must Refuse
232
Percent Solution
247
Thirteen Times
256
Is Electricity Fire?
279

The Amateur Scientist
91
FEYNMAN THE BOMB AND
99
Los Alamos from Below
107
Safecracker Meets Safecracker
137
Uncle Sam Doesnt Need You
156
FROM CORNELL TO CALTECH
165
Any Questions?
175
Judging Books by Their Covers
288
Alfred Nobels Other Mistake
303
Bringing Culture to the Physicists
313
Altered States
330
Cargo Cult Science
338
Index
347
Copyright

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About the author (2010)

Richard P. Feynman (1918–1988) was a professor at Cornell University and CalTech and received the Nobel Prize for physics in 1965. In 1986 he served with distinction on the Rogers Commission investigating the space shuttle Challenger disaster.

Ralph Leighton lives in northern California.

Bibliographic information