Escape From Shadow Physics

Fascinating and rather beautiful … Physicists want their objective, real world back. Adam Forrest Kay shows that there might be one way they can have it – Philip Ball * TLS *Energetically written in short chapters interspersed with digressions into other episodes of scientific wrongturnings, ESCAPE FROM SHADOW PHYSICS is consistently interesting … Mr. Kay rightly highlights the limitations of current physics – Andrew Crumey * Wall Street Journal *Artfully written … Kay’s knowledge of physics history is exquisite … ESCAPE FROM SHADOW PHYSICS offers a splendid history of classical and quantum physics as well as a convincing exposition of hydrodynamic quantum analogues – Paul Halpern * Science *Precise and seductive … I could gladly spend a year - or at least an academic semester - with this book – Rebecca Coffey * Forbes *A singular addition to the popular literature on quantum interpretations – Jim Baggott * Physics World *Whatever you think of Kay’s efforts to overturn the Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum mechanics and to justify Einstein by re-establishing classical norms of causality and determinism, his history of the whole wave/particle debate from ancient Greece onwards is authoritative and encyclopaedic - and intriguingly suggests that the purely scientific arguments were in part outweighed by an element of the straightforwardly human – Michael Frayn * author of Copenhagen *Adam Kay has written a rollicking account of the history of science - and human intellectual folly. Rare in its irreverence towards the hallowed ground of quantum foundations, Escape from Shadow Physics is a must-read for quantum dissidents – John Bush, Professor of Applied Mathematics, MITAdam Forrest Kay has accomplished a real tour de force: he has covered almost the entire history of science to illustrate the failure of instrumentalist or positivist approaches. This leads him to a radical critique of the current dominant view of quantum physics, known as the Copenhagen interpretation. Kay’s critique is based in part on the pilot-wave theory and the hydrodynamic quantum analogues. This book will be a landmark in the history and philosophy of physics – Jean Bricmont * theoretical physicist and author, with Alan Sokal, of Intellectual Impostures *Reads like a novel, in which the biographies of major physical concepts are intertwined with the biographies of the great minds that shaped them. The reader will be surprised by the clarity of Kay’s arguments – Ana Maria Cetto * author of The Emerging Quantum and winner of the 2023 UNESCO Kalinga Prize for the Popularisation of Science *Adam Kay has written a book that lays out with great clarity the central issue in modern physics: are quantum-mechanical probabilities quite different in nature from all the others in physics and life? The reader will enjoy fascinating details from a great sweep of history and Kay’s skill in explaining key technical facts with enviable simplicity – Julian Barbour * author of The Janus Point *In the bouncing groove of an oil droplet, Adam Forrest Kay finds a new way to look at quantum mechanics - one that replaces randomness and mystery with new knowledge. Supported by a brilliantly told history and philosophy of physics, this book will change how you think about the field’s past. And it may just set a new path for its future – Stephon Alexander * author of Fear of a Black Universe *

Adam Forrest Kay has two PhDs, one in literature from the University of Cambridge and the other in mathematics from the University of Oxford. In 2020 he took up a research position at MIT to work with John Bush, the leading scholar in the field of Hydrodynamic Quantum Analogues. Adam’s current research centres around realist models of quantum mechanics.