Book recommendation on Quantum Mechanics

Question

I am looking for one or more books on quantum mechanics, but more of a popular type. I was thinking of something similar to R. Feynman's QED, for example, but more specific on the classical quantum formulation. In fact, I already have several books that present the mathematically rigorous formulation, but I would also like to integrate a more general view of the concepts covered, without getting lost in the mathematical formalism directly.

Answer 1

A popular book on quantum mechanics that I can recommend is In Search of Schrödinger's Cat by John Gribbin. Although it is quite old I think it provides a good popular introduction to the quantum mechanics.

Answer 2

Nick Herbert's popular book Quantum Reality struck me as quite good and honest (and readable!) when I read it a very long time ago.

I'm also a fan of David Albert's Quantum Mechanics and Experience, which is pitched slightly higher than Herbert but is still aimed at a reader with no physics background, and is again quite readable and insightful.

And I second the nomination of Susskind's Theoretical Minimum, which is pitched a bit higher than Albert, but again should still be readable with very little background.

All three of these are exceptionally well written and blessedly free of the sort of hype and wild surmise that infests most popularizations of this subject.

And finally: I think that if you want to begin to understand the structure of quantum mechanics starting with relatively little mathematical background, it pays to start with systems that have finite-dimensional state spaces (so that you'll need some linear algebra but can pretty much avoid calculus, differential equations, etc.) You're more likely to find this treatment in textbooks on quantum information theory or quantum computing than in textbooks on quantum mechanics.

Answer 3

Popular books on science are useful in giving the over-arching story. I would have suggested Feynman's QED but it seems you have already read it. There are very few books that try to bridge the gap between popular accounts and the physics literature. One book that tries to attempt this is Susskind's Theoretical Minimum: Quantum Mechanics.

If you want a popular account of current research into quantum gravity then I highly recommend Joseph Conlon's Why String Theory?. It's a spirited defence of string theory against its critics.