If you give a dog a quantum physics book...

By Benjamin Engle

When Chad Orzel, an associate professor of physics, and his wife adopted Emmy from a local pound, they never knew the German Shepherd mix would become the next 'Queen of Niskayuna.'

According to Orzel's blog, Uncertain Principles, Emmy likes what most dogs enjoy: treats, walks, chasing bunnies, and the food Orzel drops, or doesn't drop, at his computer. But the Queen of Niskayuna differed from most other German Shepherd mixes in that she soon began to take an interest in quantum physics.

Started in 2002, at the end of his first year at Union, Orzel writes in his blog as a way to blow off steam by writing about things he finds interesting or amusing.

"I write about cool new developments in physics, older bits of physics that I think are interesting, life in the lab, life as a college professor, books, movies, and whatever catches my interest," said Orzel. "I'm always a little surprised at how many people are willing to read what I post, but I enjoy it."

Five years later, on May 17, 2007, Orzel decided to write in his blog a conversation he had with Emmy about which universes he dropped steak in and the universes in which she ate those 'imaginary' pieces. However, as he wrote it, he never knew 50,000 people would read it. Of those 50,000 people who came across his blog entry, which was entitled, "Many Worlds, Many Treats," one was an agent who thought that his entry could be expanded into a book. After writing a proposal with his agent, Scribner soon bought it.

"The book happened more or less by accident. I've always carried on elaborate conversations with the dog at home, because it makes my wife laugh," Orzel said. "Inevitably, these ended up including some physics references, because that's what I do."

After many conversations with Emmy and three years of writing, editing, and publishing, Orzel's How to Teach Physics to Your Dog was released in December 2009.

What makes Orzel's book unique is not that he is teaching physics to his dog, but rather that the book is understandable to both those with backgrounds in physics and those without any knowledge of the subject.

"It's aimed at people with no real background in science. I do make reference to a few ideas that people have hopefully heard about-things like momentum and energy-but I try to define everything as it comes up, so even if you've never had a physics class, it should make sense," Orzel added.

Available at major retailers, including Barnes and Noble, Borders, and amazon.com, as well as at the Union College bookstore, Orzel's book has been received positively by readers and reviewers alike.

Orzel's favorite review comment so far, however, has not come from a newspaper reviewer or science critic, but rather from a mother on Amazon who wrote that she bought it for her 11-year-old son.

"The whole ruse of explaining physics to a dog was hilarious to him and really made concrete some of the things that the author was trying to explain," the mother on Amazon wrote. "I had my son explaining to me, laughing, how a dog could walk through a tree if he went slowly enough (with all the physics behind that crazy statement) and then hilariously illustrating what would happen if the dog didn't go quite slow enough. (He'd bonk his head)."

Orzel believes people should read the book for the same reason he wrote it, because "quantum physics is just about the coolest thing ever."

"The things that quantum physics predicts is utterly bizarre-objects in two places at the same time, particles that appear out of nothing and disappear again-but they're absolutely real, and confirmed again and again by experiments," Orzel explained. "The universe that we live in is a much stranger and more amazing place than most people realize."

According to Orzel, one goal in writing the book was to challenge the idea that quantum physics can only be seen with billion-dollar accelerators. In fact, quantum rules have consequences for human's daily lives, including computer and Internet usage.

"And even the sunlight that we're finally getting today is quantum in origin-were it not for the quantum phenomenon called 'tunneling,' it would be impossible for the Sun to fuse hydrogen into helium, and generate the light that makes life on Earth possible," Orzel added.

Writing his book about physics has taught him a lot about the philosophical basis of quantum mechanics and how to become a better teacher.

"They say you never really understand a subject until you teach it to someone else, and that goes double for dogs," Orzel said. "I had a vague idea of how things like the Copenhagen Interpretation and the Many-Worlds Interpretation worked, but getting to understand them enough to be able to explain it to the dog took a lot of work."

Orzel, whose research interests are in the general field of Atomic, Molecular, and Optical (AMO) physics, specifically the laser cooling and trapping of atoms, hopes that readers of his book learn about "some of the cool things about quantum physics."

"I hope that the book helps give people some appreciation of the astonishing things that we learn from modern physics," Orzel added.

Originally published in Union's Concordy on 1/28/10.