Product Description
This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words.This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

Classic book in facsimile
As the other reviewers put it, a classic. Well worth the price! My only comment is this facsimile edition is a scan of the original (not reset).Some of the formulae are small and not as clear as I wish-there is extensive use of the Newtonian notation for derivatives. It is usually ok to read, and context helps with meaning as does a reading glass.

Integrability defined
This is where I learned Liouville's integrability theorem for Hamiltonian systems, a key topic ignored by most modern texts on classical mechanics. Arnol'd covers it, but I found Arnol'd's more abstract lattice-based proof difficult to follow. Whittaker's text also contains many problems that are useful for a modern dynamics course. As a basis for understanding modern nonlinear dynamics, or for applications of mechanics, this old text is in many respects far better than the newer 'standard' mechanics texts by Landau-Lifshitz, and by Goldstein.

But take care: in a general discussion of integrability (conserved quantities) for general systems of odes early in the book, Whittaker does not distinguish local from global integrability. But then neither does Eisenhart in his bookContinuous Groups, of the same era.

The most detailed Dynamics BookEver
To put it mildly, this book is a frightening exercise to read. The biggest challenge faced by modern readers is that we seem to have lost certain mathematical skills and intuition compared with people in the very early 1900's. It takes enormous amounts of patience and effort to try and work through any of the proofs or derivations presented in this book.

However, Whittaker has presented just about every concept in classical dynamics that you could possibly want to know in an extremely elegant fashion. Concepts that you simply do not expect to see in a book written first in 1904 make an appearence here. This book is worth reading just to find out how the original mathematicicals that invented concepts view them. For exmaple, Whittakers use of Christoffel Symbols is the classical view that the early geometers like Levi-Civita probably had, without the modern terminology and viewpoint in temrs of connections on a manifold.

All in all this book is well worth the time and effort spent to read it, but be prepared to use up lots of paper in your attempts to convince yourself that a single proof is true.(Brush up your geometry before you even try to read this book)

A complete and scholarly book from one of THE experts
This book is, or rather was , the first modern book on classical mechanics. I think the first edition was published in 1904 and at the time it represented just about all that was known about the subject. A seriousstudent today could rightly ask why he/she should read such a old book ?Well the answer to that question is a not an esay one : however whilst Iwould never say it is an simple book it repays careful study. Anyone takingmore modern courses based on Arnold or Abraham and Marsden would do well tohave a copy of this book by their side.The problems are taken mainly fromCambridge Maths Tripos examinations and they form a useful adjunct to themain body of the text.All the major topics are coverd including the 2 and 3body problem, small oscillations, stability,etc. Well worth a read. ... Read more

Product Description
This book an EXACT reproduction of the original book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words.This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ... Read more

Product Description
Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone! ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

profound, wide-ranging, accessible
This is a profound little book by a profound thinker. Whittaker, a mathematical physicist and convert to Catholicism, engages the insights brought to us by science on space, time and causality, asking how they affect natural theology, and especially what they mean for a contemporary understanding of Thomas Aquinas' Five Ways. He rejects the philosophy according to which metaphysics and theology are simply independent of what science tells us about the world, and also displays an impressive knowledge of history of science. Science has of course made progress since this book was written, but the basics of modern cosmology, such as the expanding universe, relativity, and quantum physics were already known, so that the book is still relevant to the contemporary discourse.
Because of the book's broad scope and accessible style, as well as the author's wide-ranging erudition, this book will be of interest both to the general educated reader as well as to scientists, philosophers and theologians.



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Product Description
This scarce antiquarian book is a selection from Kessinger Publishing's Legacy Reprint Series. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment to protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature. Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone! ... Read more

Product Description
This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words.This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ... Read more

Product Description
This scarce antiquarian book is a selection from Kessinger Publishings Legacy Reprint Series. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment to protecting, preserving, and promoting the worlds literature. Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone! ... Read more

Product Description
This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923.This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process.We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide.We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ... Read more