★Mirrors are something we are familiar with in our daily lives, but have you ever thought about the mystery behind them? Why why does it reverse right with left but not top with bottom? Do “left” and “right” still exist in extraterrestrial civilizations? Are the natural laws in the world of mirror the same as those in our world? Starting from what we know as mirrors and symmetry, this book takes readers on a deeper exploration of quantum physics, antimatter, time dilation, and other interesting physics problems.
★ Introducing physics with references to literature and movies evokes the reader's interest, makes the content more accessible, and brings us new perspectives to see these literary and cinematic works.

The mirror fascinates us because of its ability to duplicate things, even people, even ourselves. But what exactly does the mirror do, and why does it reverse right with left but not top with bottom? Would it be possible to explain to an extraterrestrial civilization what we mean by left and right? The mirror is also often associated with an ideal of beauty that goes well with what it represents in geometric terms: symmetry. Symmetry conveys a sense of harmony and balance, and which we are accustomed to considering it a cornerstone of nature, but modern physical research has discovered that not all symmetries are universal, and has opened up a new, vast and fascinating meaning of symmetry. What happens if we go from the real world to the mirror world, or if we reverse the arrow of time? Do natural laws continue to hold in both directions, or can they return a counterpart that does not exist in nature? If we then descend to the fundamental level of the world, that of the elementary particles that make up the world and where quantum physics applies, we find that physical phenomena due to weak nuclear interaction inherently distinguish right from left. We also find that, in addition to space and time, even matter has a mirror in which to reflect itself, antimatter. Mirrors upon mirrors, linked together and bringing back millennia-old questions: what is time? Can the speed of light be exceeded? Can one travel through time? Can causality be violated? Giorgio Chinnici tackles this and other questions, unveiling highly suggestive phenomena such as relativity of simultaneity, time dilation or the Twin paradox, also exploiting references to literature and cinema. And showing us that the relationship between symmetry and asymmetry is as complex and fascinating as it is fundamental to the structure and functioning of the world.

Giorgio Chinnici is a physicist and electrical engineer. He has published numerous popular science books, all with Hoepli, including Turing. L’enigma di un genio (2016), Guarda caso. I meccanismi segreti del mondo quantistico (2017), Il labirinto del continuo. Numeri, strutture, infiniti (2019). Il sogno di Democrito. L’atomo dall’antichità alla meccanica quantistica (2020) e Il segreto del nucleo (2023).