Thermodynamics: Four Laws That Move the Universe

By: Jeffrey C. Grossman, The Great Courses

Narrated by: Jeffrey C. Grossman

Nothing has had a more profound impact on the development of modern civilization than thermodynamics. Thermodynamic processes are at the heart of everything that involves heat, energy, and work, making an understanding of the subject indispensable for careers in engineering, physical science, biology, meteorology, and even nutrition and culinary arts. Get an in-depth tour of this vital and fascinating science in 24 enthralling lectures suitable for everyone from science novices to experts who wish to review elementary concepts and formulas.

Professor Jeffrey Grossman of MIT uses the four laws of thermodynamics as a launching point to discuss foundational concepts that are critical pillars of science and engineering - ideas such as entropy, chemical potential, Gibbs free energy, enthalpy, osmotic pressure, heat capacity, eutectic melting, and the Carnot cycle. These and other ideas shed light on many phenomena in the natural world, and they are the analytical tools that engineers use to create new devices and technologies. At the end of these lectures, you'll truly appreciate the elegance and importance of thermodynamic principles. Also, you'll have unlocked the secrets to a fascinating aspect of our universe.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2014 The Great Courses (P)2014 The Teaching Company, LLC

Incredibly interesting still

If thermodynamics peaked your interest while at university, well this course is sure to grow that curiosity further. Professor Grossman makes the concepts easy to process and enjoy. Although his staccato rhythm can be distracting at times, the substance is spot on

Advanced Material

Visualizing mathematical formulas is always challenging in an audio book, and this one has plenty of them. The material is dependent on fairly advanced math -- calculus in many cases -- and a robust understanding of chemistry and physics. There is very little chance of absorbing this material osmotically -- did you catch that pun? In any case, this is one audio book that might require you to break out the supplemental material if you truly want to learn thermodynamics.

Audible is the Wrong Platform for This Series

This series is informative and interesting. However, I struggled to stay focused on it as the material required a chalkboard or a piece of paper and a pen. It is almost impossible to truly appreciate a topic like this without seeing the equations, the charts and the information that the person giving the series lectures is trying to relay.

But it is also true that your average non-science-geek person that knows nothing about thermodynamics would likely benefit from this series if for no other reason than to be exposed to the nomenclature and many of the concepts that drive the conversations related to it.

Link between empirical science, math, philosophy

Buried somewhat in this lengthy course are key connections between lab science, calculus, and clearly defined concepts connected to modern philosophy and the its focus on clear terms. A review of the PDF is necessary for selected chapters to get an understanding of the simple terms and their very complex non intuitive but precise relationships. For me this course is a return to the branch of engineering and science and 'common sense' understandings that propelled the early years of the scientific historical moment. My only complaint for an otherwise excellent intellectual performance is Grossman's diction and elocution, or lack of them really. These are easily corrected defects that several listenings, required for me in any case, corrects nicely.

Not for audio

The course was not made for audio. It was also light on the math. Without the math entropy and gibbs free energy is not easily explained.

Excellent Course; Particularly as Review

I'm a chemical engineer and was probably one of the few people in my class who actually enjoyed our thermodynamics class in college. It's a difficult subject. The content of this course is five stars but I hold back one star overall since it may be too difficult for some people without the video. This course was made for video and included demos and equations. That makes listening to it somewhat challenging. But I'm still delighted to see this course made accessible from The Great Courses through Audible at regular prices.

I'd say the audio-only format is just fine for people who have studied thermodynamics previously and are looking for a review. That way all the equations and processes referred to will be easier to visualize mentally. Also listeners with a background in calculus and physics, even if not in thermodynamics, will probably be fine. For beginners it will be more of a challenge, but nothing wrong with that either. It's just something to be aware of.

Splendid

I'm actually shocked at how much I enjoyed this book / course; like to the point where I wish I paid this subject more attention when choosing college courses a lifetime ago. I'd like to think I'm a relatively smart person, but I never realized how Thermodynamics is really a building-block for everything else. I incorrectly assumed the subject would solely be about expansion of materials for machining or construction, like what a Civil or Mechanical engineer might be interested in; but this course is oh-so-much-more. People complained in their reviews about not being able to see the presentations Prof Grossman was doing, but I was able to visualize most. Now I'm off to read it for the 3rd-time...

Good teacher. but not audio material

The material includes lots of formulas which is not suited to an audio format. I've suffered through most of it and there are some interesting points, but the could have cut all the formulas which didn't add anything.

It's all Gibbs Free Energy

First, my complaints.

This honestly should have been a series of video lectures and is not properly adapted for audio.

There are many visual experiments that we are left to imagine from the narration, and several graphs/charts that are mentioned, but which we cannot see.
(The accompanying PDFs doesn't even show those images either, and that is an ideal way to utilise it. I was quite disappointed to learn that.)

I think the effort to prepare this lecture series as an audiobook was very subpar.

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All the above said, I still greatly enjoyed this read (and reread it quite a few times).

Overall, I found it quite informative and enlightening.

The author's playful style kept my attention, and the material was sufficiently information dense in each chapter.

It is a thoughtful and very educational book.

The subject is presented in a manner that not only makes it easy to remember, it at its end has the quality of causing one to not want the book to end.