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Principles of Quantum Mechanics Softcover reprint of the original 1st ed. 1980 Edition

4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 373 ratings

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Publish and perish-Giordano Bruno Given the number of books that already exist on the subject of quantum mechanics, one would think that the public needs one more as much as it does, say, the latest version of the Table of Integers. But this does not deter me (as it didn't my predecessors) from trying to circulate my own version of how it ought to be taught. The approach to be presented here (to be described in a moment) was first tried on a group of Harvard under­ graduates in the summer of '76, once again in the summer of '77, and more recently at Yale on undergraduates ('77-'78) and graduates ('78-'79) taking a year-long course on the subject. In all cases the results were very satisfactory in the sense that the students seemed to have learned the subject well and to have enjoyed the presentation. It is, in fact, their enthusiastic response and encouragement that convinced me of the soundness of my approach and impelled me to write this book. The basic idea is to develop the subject from its postulates, after ad­ dressing some indispensable preliminaries.

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Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Springer; Softcover reprint of the original 1st ed. 1980 edition (December 6, 2013)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 630 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 146157675X
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1461576754
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.85 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.98 x 1.43 x 9.02 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 373 ratings

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Ramamurti Shankar
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Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
373 global ratings

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Customers say

Customers find this book helpful for learning quantum mechanics. They appreciate the solid foundation it provides and the self-contained style. However, some find the content too dense and wordy, while others consider the exercises easy and well-suited for self learning.

AI-generated from the text of customer reviews

30 customers mention "Introductory value"30 positive0 negative

Customers find the book helpful for learning quantum mechanics. It provides a strong mathematical foundation and prepares them for further study with clear and thorough explanations of concepts. The pedagogy is reasonable and goes beyond typical introductory material. Many consider it a good textbook for their quantum mechanics course and perfect for science investigations in school projects.

"...path integrals early on demystifies them; they are not such foreign concepts as they might seem to be when they are presented near the end of a book..." Read more

"...time formalism, the connections between quantum mechanics, quantum statistical mechanics, and classical statistical mechanics via path integrals,..." Read more

"...This book really prepares you for further study. Sakurai should be very accessible after understanding Shankar...." Read more

"...a strong mathematical foundation as well as a review of the intermediate classical mechanics including Lagrangian and Hamiltonian formulations that..." Read more

9 customers mention "Quality of binding"9 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the book's good condition. They find the pages and cover in perfect condition. The book provides a solid foundation with clear presentation, great material choices, and carefully chosen exercises.

"...mathematics that quantum mechanics is formulated with provides a solid foundation that prepares the reader for the subject...." Read more

"...and it has only gone through light wear, the pages and cover are in perfect condition...." Read more

"Book received in good quality. Recommended for all serious in studying quantum mechanics to read this from cover to cover...." Read more

"...The book was delivered on time and in great condition." Read more

8 customers mention "Knowledge of quantum mechanics"8 positive0 negative

Customers find the book helpful in explaining quantum mechanics concepts. It covers path integrals and symmetries early on, before getting to statistical mechanics and classical statistical mechanics. The book is self-contained, with no previous exposure to quantum mechanics required.

"...What surprised me even more is that the author discusses path integrals and symmetries early one, before even getting to the hydrogen atom and..." Read more

"...mechanics, quantum statistical mechanics, and classical statistical mechanics via path integrals, and ends with discussion of fermionic path..." Read more

"...The prerequisites for this book are really just: a good understanding of quantum physics, as just mentioned, and then parts of mechanics, such as..." Read more

"...more deeply most subjects than Griffiths and has chapters on the path integral formulation as well...." Read more

4 customers mention "Self-contained"4 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the book's self-contained nature. They find the text well-written and the exercises easy to follow, with solutions provided for some.

"...The book is self contained, it has many exercises with solutions for some and as the book is so abundantly used, there are numerous online further..." Read more

"...A "but": despite it's supposedly simple and self-contained, it sometimes lacks deeper explanations of results the author gets to by apparently '..." Read more

"...The text is well written and self-contained, no prior exposure to quantum mechanics is necessary, and it goes beyond the typical introductory..." Read more

"Self Contained and well Explained..." Read more

13 customers mention "Ease of learning"8 positive5 negative

Customers have different views on the book's ease of learning. Some find it simple and self-contained, with easy exercises and hints for difficult ones. The style is well-suited to self-learning, and the book lays everything out brilliantly. However, others feel it seems hard and lacks deeper explanations of results.

"...Lastly, the exercises in this textbook are very carefully chosen...." Read more

"...product states (in addition of angular momentum problems) easy to understand from a mathematical point of view, so you can focus on understanding..." Read more

"...Good for both undergraduate and graduate. But indeed it's harder than Griffiths, you need to read some paragraphs several times to be able to..." Read more

"...The exercies are quite easy and the difficult ones have nice hints on how to approach the problem...." Read more

4 customers mention "Content"0 positive4 negative

Customers find the content too wordy and dense. They also mention that the book lacks a table of contents, search, or marking capabilities for Kindle devices.

"...The downside of this book is that....it spares no expanse of the book (676 pages, about 9 inches by 6 inches in dimension!)...." Read more

"For content and style, great book. No Kindle table of contents, ability to search, or mark up...." Read more

"The content is quite dense, but that is to be expected from a book on such a dense topic...." Read more

"...In short, too wordy, yet not enough content." Read more

Terrible printing and binding quality for such a classic textbook
1 out of 5 stars
Terrible printing and binding quality for such a classic textbook
First off, I would like to be very clear that this review is for the quality of the book sent to me, and not for the contents of the book written by Dr. Shankar. His QM book is famous for a reason - it is outstanding! I have a cherished copy at home, published by Plenum Press in 1994 before they were bought by Springer. But my old copy has seen better days, and I heard that the newer editions had some of the errata corrected, so I thought I might get myself a new copy. Picture 1 is the new copyright page.Well, the printing and binding quality of this latest edition from Springer is abysmal. The paper feels and looks like regular copy paper. It is bright white, which is actually quite annoying and harsh to the eyes. My old Plenum version has a soft white to it which is much nicer. Also, the text block is not at all the right size for the paper! Somehow, they left a much larger top and bottom margin on the new version, so even though the books are the same overall size, the printing on the new version is noticeably smaller! Pictures 2 and 3 show comparisons between the new Springer version and my old Plenum version.Also, when viewed closely, the characters on the new version just appear slightly blurry, and I believe it is because the printing was done cheaply with an ink-jet printer. Pictures 4 and 5 show a close up of the same text, comparing my old Plenum vs the new Springer.The binding is glued perfect binding, which I do not believe is acceptable for a 700 page 7x10 Hardcover book. A book like this really should have sewn signatures. Picture 6 shows the binding.Overall, I am very disappointed with the quality of the book sent to me. Dr Shankar’s excellent text deserves to be treated with respect, and this isn’t it! I have only guesses as to what has happened here, but I suspect that Springer has outsourced printing to a cheap Print-on-Demand supplier. Even this might be reasonable if they advertised it as such and charged a significant discount. But to continue to charge $100 for the book and pretend like you are getting a high quality textbook seems outrageous. I highly recommend that you get yourself a quality used copy instead.
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Top reviews from the United States

  • Reviewed in the United States on December 27, 2017
    I was impressed from how clear and well-motivated everything is in this textbook.
    It contains two big chapters on prerequisites(mathematical methods and classical mechanics) which shows that the author is determined in making you actually understand the subject matter. Next, there is a small chapter to motivate the reader to believe that there's something more than just classical mechanics and effectively builds the way towards Quantum Mechanics. Then, at the start of chapter 4, the author gives the postulates of Quantum Mechanics in the clearest way possible; he gives them in the form of a list and he also compares them with the classical mechanics counterparts. This shows how deeply the author has thought about the presentation of his textbook.
    In the next chapters, the author proceeds on with the same spirit and never disappoints. He's done an exquisite work!

    What surprised me even more is that the author discusses path integrals and symmetries early one, before even getting to the hydrogen atom and approximation methods. Other textbooks leave path integrals and symmetries until later. This way of introducing path integrals and symmetries is much better. Introducing path integrals early on demystifies them; they are not such foreign concepts as they might seem to be when they are presented near the end of a book and after all the fundamentals of QM have been worked out with the canonical formulation. Introducing Symmetries early on helps with always keeping symmetries at the back of our minds, as we should because symmetries are at the heart of physics

    The last point which surprised me was that the author also chooses to present some content that is not presented in typical QM textbooks very often. A brilliant example of this is the inclusion of the Berry phase(at a higher level and more effectively than Griffiths' presentation) which is a beautiful and very modern concept that led to important research(for example the 2016 physics Nobel prize). This also illustrates that the author's background has payed off big time. Shankar's research background is broad: from particle physics to condensed matter physics. And this shows from the choice of the material that's found here.

    Now, here is an example that shows how well-motivated is everything:
    In the introductory chapter(p.46, example 1.8.6), the author gives an example of how to find the normal modes of two coupled oscillators. He showcases how the change of basis to the eigenbasis is essential for solving the problem and understanding the problem. He uses this example to illustrate how the concepts of linear algebra that he explained a few pages back are used in physics. The whole example is written in the Bra-Ket language of Dirac(which is the language of advanced Quantum Mechanics) and thus serves as a very nice motivation of what's to come regarding Quantum Mechanics.
    The textbook is full of such pedagogical examples.
    It also reads very smoothly, although anyone that hopes to find a writing style similar to Griffiths' will be disappointed; this author chooses a formal but clear writing style which helps avoid babbling(although I like the writing style of Griffiths). And everything is explained in the intuitive way that you expect from a good author.
    Lastly, the exercises in this textbook are very carefully chosen. A great example is exercise 7.4.9 on p.213, where the author shows that the association of the momentum operator is not unique and can be something more rather than just the derivative (-id/dx for 1d); we can also add an arbitrary function f(x) and asks the reader to show that this corresponds to a unitary change of basis.
    These kinds of exercises are rarely found in textbooks and are, in my opinion at least, the pinnacle of pedagogy that every textbook must try to achieve.
    22 people found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on June 17, 2009
    As other reviewers have remarked this is an excellent book, and if you are interested in really learning quantum mechanics, this is where I'd recommend you start.

    Here are some of the things I particularly liked about this book, and some of the ways I thought it could have been better.

    The first chapter provides the necessary mathematical background for quantum mechanics. It is a long chapter, but very well done. Regardless, make no mistake, you should not attempt this book at all without a solid background in differential equations and linear algebra. This chapter is very helpful though as a review and for fixing notation. I also approved of its stated goal: to put the math first rather than trying to interleave it with the physics. Physics is hard enough without trying to tackle the math and the physics at the same time.

    Chapter two is a quick review of classical mechanics. Advanced classical mechanics. If you are not already comfortable with the Lagrangian and Hamiltonian formulations of classical mechanics before you attempt this book, well you probably shouldn't attempt this book. But if you are, this chapter is an excellent and concise review done with an eye towards quantum mechanics.

    Chapter four presents quantum mehcanics in a postulatory manner, and builds the subject deductively from there. Of the quantum mechanics books I've read, the ones that proceed in this fashion tend to be clearest, and this one is no exception.

    Chapter five presents a collection of one dimensional problems. This chapter is one of the few that I felt could have been better. I did not think there was enough discussion of tunneling and scattering, which struck me as odd. Certainly I have seen other introductions to quantum mechanics do a better job with these topics.

    Chapter ten is on systems with more degrees of freedom and covers the tricky subject of identical particles in quantum mechanics. It is a very clear treatment.

    Chapters twelve and thirteen extend the treatment to three dimensional systems and the Hydrogen atom in particular. While good, I thought the author could have done a better job building intuition for the special functions that appear in this section of the book, like the spherical harmonics. The author even states that many other books provide graphs and additional information for these very important functions. Ok, so why not this one as well? For a book that is so complete in so many other ways, this omission seemed odd.

    Chapters fourteen and fifteen cover spin and the addition of angular momentum. Challenging topics in quantum mechanics. For the most part the discussion is very lucid, and among the best I've seen.

    Chapters sixteen through eigthteen cover approximation methods. They are superb. Chapter eighteen is a particular standout here. The discussion of the quantization of the electromagnetic field is outstanding, and very unusual in an introductory book.

    Chapter nineteen is on scattering, and is probably the clearest introduction to this (rather tricky) subject I have seen.

    Chapter twenty is on the Dirac equation. Almost never seen in an introductory book, this is again an outstanding feature of this work.

    Finally, as other reviewers have mentioned, this book discusses path integrals in two chapters: eight and twenty-one. These discussions are five star worthy. This topic is also highly unusual in an introductory book, but as the author points out it is of central importance in contemporary physics.

    The last chapter -- twenty-one -- is definitely the most advanced in the book. It disusses the Quantum Hall Effect, the imaginary time formalism, the connections between quantum mechanics, quantum statistical mechanics, and classical statistical mechanics via path integrals, and ends with discussion of fermionic path integrals which are central to quantum field theory. All of these are advanced topics, and the author does an excellent job preparing the reader to tackle them. Kudos!

    There are numerous problems throughout, most of which are rather simple.

    This is an excellent book for anyone looking really to sink their teeth into QM.
    38 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

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  • Kurt Wagner Gray
    1.0 out of 5 stars Versão para Kindle não funciona
    Reviewed in Brazil on February 8, 2024
    O texto não fica legível em nenhuma configuração do Kindle, tem que dar Oom e fica pessima a experiência de leitura.
  • Mazen NEIFER
    5.0 out of 5 stars Super boukin
    Reviewed in France on December 13, 2024
    J'ai bien aimé, même si lire sur un écran est moins confortable que sur un vrais support papier, mais le contenu est bien.
  • Concerned Buyer
    5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Printing and Binding
    Reviewed in India on May 26, 2024
    1. One of the best books to learn QM.

    2. Excellent printing and binding quality. (Printed in the Netherlands)

    3. Authentic hard-cover binding with pages stitched together.

    4. This edition is printed in normal paper unlike the older editions which were printed in glossy paper.

    5. The only issue that still remains from the previous prints is the font-size. Some times, the equations are printed with very small fonts.
    Customer image
    Concerned Buyer
    5.0 out of 5 stars
    Excellent Printing and Binding

    Reviewed in India on May 26, 2024
    1. One of the best books to learn QM.

    2. Excellent printing and binding quality. (Printed in the Netherlands)

    3. Authentic hard-cover binding with pages stitched together.

    4. This edition is printed in normal paper unlike the older editions which were printed in glossy paper.

    5. The only issue that still remains from the previous prints is the font-size. Some times, the equations are printed with very small fonts.
    Images in this review
    Customer imageCustomer imageCustomer imageCustomer imageCustomer imageCustomer image
  • roro
    5.0 out of 5 stars Great book
    Reviewed in Canada on April 19, 2021
    This book advanced my understanding of QM, but drained my bank. Too bad textbooks are so expensive, may just have to skip meals for the next few months, to make up for the expense. Worth it, though.
  • Martin Nava
    5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best QM books!
    Reviewed in Mexico on May 21, 2017
    If you are beggining to study QM, it may be a little hard getting used with concepts and ideas. This book has helped me to clarify my conceptual doubts on the subject, thanks to the well-defined structure of the information (mathematical review and classical mechanics first, in contrast with many other text that mix those ideas with the common problems in QM). The delivering took place 3 days before the expectation date, which was fantastic!