Jim Al-Khalili

Best-selling quantum physicist Jim Al-Khalili tackles one of the great unresolved mysteries of our universe – time. Does it have a beginning, and an end? Why does it only point towards the future and not the past? And crucially – does it even exist?

In On Time, Al-Khalili tackles the enduring problems of time head-on, carefully examining them across the three central pillars of physics – quantum mechanics, general relativity, and thermodynamics. He shows how, in each domain, time can be understood differently: as a coordinate or label, as an inseparable dimension of space-time, or as a direction or “arrow.” He also makes the case that time is not illusory, and the master arrow of time is not a trick of senses but a fundamental truth of the universe. 

Jim Al-Khalili is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Surrey and one of Britain’s leading science communicators. He has written numerous books that have been translated into twenty-six languages, among them The Joy of Science and The World According to Physics (both Princeton). A fellow of the Royal Society, he is a regular presenter of TV science documentaries and is best-known in the UK for his long-running BBC Radio program, The Life Scientific.