Science writer unveils the art of seeing things differently

Rovelli's best-seller has been published in 34 languages and its Chinese edition is expected soon. Provided to China Daily

These received much notice in Italy and have been expanded into the book.

The core idea is often simple after you eliminate extraneous details, he says.

For instance, the work of Copernicus in the 16th century is very technical and complicated, but his discovery can be stated simply: 'The Earth turns on itself and around the sun'," Rovelli says. So he tried to do the same for the discoveries of modern physics.

He starts the first chapter, the proposition of general relativity, from Albert Einstein's "loafing aimlessly", pointing out the value of wasting time for young talents.

"In his youth, Albert Einstein spent a year loafing aimlessly. You don't get anywhere by not 'wasting' time - something, unfortunately, which the parents of teenagers tend frequently to forget."

In explaining the complicated genius theory, Rovelli connects his personal experience as an undergraduate in Calabria, Italy.

Reading a rodent-gnawed textbook, he says, "every so often I would raise my eyes from the book and look at the glittering sea: It seemed to me that I was actually seeing the curvature of space and time imagined by Einstein".

Rovelli compares the uplifting epiphany moment to the appreciation of artistic works: Mozart's Requiem, Homer's Odyssey, the Sistine Chapel and King Lear.

Li Min, astrophysicist and secretary-in-general with Jiangsu Astronomy Association, shares that view. He says that like artists and writers, the most brilliant talent of a scientist lies not in his or her strong logic, but in intuition and imagination.

Science begins with a vision. Scientific thought is fed by the capacity to see things differently than they have previously been seen, Rovelli writes.

Besides beguiling important scientific discoveries, Rovelli also presents the perseverant attempts of the most brilliant minds in the 20th century to cross the ocean of the unknown to see a "simpler, deeper order" of the cosmos, to solve the problem that made Einstein's head hurt.

"This is what we call the spirit of science, which is the most important aspect that popular science readings should advocate," says Li Min.

yangyangs@chinadaily.com.cn