“Six Easy Pieces” by Richard Feynman
Science - 6 Minute Read
Having just completed “A Brief History of Time” by Stephen Hawking, I came into Richard Feynman’s “Six Easy Pieces” expecting a similar type of nonfiction physics-based writing but instead was met by a very different style. Albeit it may be due to my limited history with pure non-fiction books, but I found Feynman’s book to be a varied approach on explaining the fundamental concepts of the universe. Once accustomed to his style of writing, I did enjoy most of the book but not necessarily as much as I would have expected after reading Hawking’s work.
Firstly, this change of style that I refer to in Feynman’s writing is something that I believe can be traced back to his role as a scientist. To elaborate, while Hawking is renowned for his international lectures and collaborations with many other scientists globally, Feynman is famous for his excellency as a teacher. I think that this is very clear in his writing where he utilises real-life analogies, breaks down complex concepts and also frequently questions the ideas that he explains to further dissolve any obscurity. These techniques, particularly the latter, enabled me to not only grasp the ideas that Feynman tries to convey but also enabled me to visualise him teaching in front of me. Especially when compared to Hawking’s writing, who, at least in “A Brief History of Time,” prefers to sustain the grandness and profoundness of the topics that he discusses, Feynman’s approach differs in the sense that he makes the reader’s understanding his main goal which results in him consistently reducing complexities to their simple core. One of my favourite instances of this simplification from Feynman is his explanation of temperature in kinetic theory as the “jiggliness” of molecules.
Having established my take on his way of writing, I think that the book itself is an accurate representation of Feynman’s ability and methodology when it comes to explaining physics. Throughout the book, the reader is constantly entertained by Feynman’s intriguing references, comparisons and analogies to the real world in an attempt to explain scientific concepts that may initially seem larger-than-life to the reader. An example of this is when Feynman describes the pursuit of understanding the universe as an attempt to understand the game of chess. He states, “We do not know what the rules of the game are; all we are allowed to do is watch the playing. Of course, if we watch long enough, we may eventually catch on to a few of the rules. The rules of the game are what we mean by fundamental physics. If we know the rules, we consider that we “understand” the world.” Personally, I believe that this is the most intriguing analogy throughout the book as it offers a fresh and eye-opening viewpoint on the entirety of science and the pursuit of scientists, something that was not frequent in Hawking’s writing.
However, I do think that there are some aspects of Feynman’s writing in this book that I tended to dislike and found difficult to keep up with. In particular, in some parts of the book, I disliked the way Feynman transitioned between topics, purely because in some instances there was no transition. To elaborate, when moving between chapters I found the concepts to be changing very abruptly and lacking a certain fluidity. This might have been because of the fact that this book is a compilation of his lectures that perhaps were not intended to be printed and read consecutively but I thought that certain chapters could have drawn ideas from or referenced back to previous topics more frequently. That being said, once again I am comparing this book to Hawking’s “A Brief History of Time'' which is commonly regarded to be one of the best pieces of nonfiction writing. Hence, the format of “Six Easy Pieces,” which I found to be jagged and abrupt, may be a minor disadvantage to a good piece of science writing.
In conclusion, I enjoyed Richard Feynman’s “Six Easy Pieces” and was definitely intrigued by his prowess as a teacher that was vividly replicated in his writing. From here, I look forward to reading his sequel, “Six Not-So-Easy Pieces” and seeing how he develops his ideas and explores concepts that are much more complex and perhaps can’t be explained by the “jiggliness” of molecules.
