The Shape of a Life

One Mathematician’s Search for the Universe’s Hidden Geometry

De: Shing-Tung Yau, Steve Nadis

Narrado por: Arthur Morey

A Fields medalist recounts his lifelong transnational effort to uncover the geometric shape - the Calabi-Yau manifold - that may store the hidden dimensions of our universe.

Harvard geometer and Fields medalist Shing-Tung Yau has provided a mathematical foundation for string theory, offered new insights into black holes, and mathematically demonstrated the stability of our universe. In this autobiography, Yau reflects on his improbable journey to becoming one of the world’s most distinguished mathematicians. Beginning with an impoverished childhood in China and Hong Kong, Yau takes listeners through his doctoral studies at Berkeley during the height of the Vietnam War protests, his Fields Medal-winning proof of the Calabi conjecture, his return to China, and his pioneering work in geometric analysis. This new branch of geometry, which Yau built up with his friends and colleagues, has paved the way for solutions to several important and previously intransigent problems. With complicated ideas explained for a broad audience, this book offers listeners not only insights into the life of an eminent mathematician, but also an accessible way to understand advanced and highly abstract concepts in mathematics and theoretical physics.

©2019 Shing-Tung Yau and Steve Nadis (P)2019 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

The Chinese Communist Party would love this book

I love reading biographies. But I am not a fan of political propaganda. This book has way too much Chinese loving content, it gets tiring and makes me wonder if it was really necessary to have so much of it. In the book, it almost feels like fluff. Now, I think China is a country that has a rich history and has contributed so much to humanity. With that said, I think the author loves to cast a blind eye to the human abuses the CCP is getting away with, not to mention the threat they pose to its neighbors including Hong Kong.

One of the best popular math book

I really like the passion of Shing Tung Yau on math and his devotion for training students! He is a great mathematician!

The shape of the author's life

I quickly took the book convinced by the cover and expecting some new perspectives on sacred geometry.

I am an artist and in the art world, we are taught that art matters, not the artist.

If you have time, patience, and wanna listen in detail to someone's life that you have never heard before that's the book.

I wish I can have my credit back.

A book full of complaints

Not enough math. Just a bunch of the author complaining about other people, and sniping at them. Tedious and embarrassing to listen to.