A Relatively Painless Guide to Special Relativity : The University of Chicago Press : 9780226821856 : 0226821854 : 20 Jul 2023 : Serious and accessible?finally the special relativity course book that both physics majors and lifelong learners deserve.   Special relativity challenges one's physical intuition of space, time, matter, and energy in a way that few other topics in physics do. Yet the subject is often treated as an extra in undergraduate courses?something to be picked up in a few random lectures and presented as a combination of geometric and logical puzzles (seemingly with the premise of getting the novice student to concede that Einstein was a genius and that the universe is weird). But special relativity is absolutely fundamental to modern physics. It is the canvas on which electromagnetism, particle physics, field theory, and ultimately general relativity are based. For physics students, developing a relativistic intuition isn't just a luxury: it's a requirement.   Physici