Book · 1964
The Feynman Lectures on Physics
by Richard P. Feynman
Feynman's three-volume lecture series, free online, used to teach Caltech freshmen physics from particles to gravity.
What does Reddit think of The Feynman Lectures on Physics?
With only 4 mentions across r/askscience over seven years, The Feynman Lectures doesn't drive Reddit debate the way a popular science bestseller would. That scarcity is itself a signal: people don't argue about whether it's good, they just point to it. All four commenters cite it as a recommendation rather than a complaint. The top-voted thread (↑686) uses Feynman's treatment of quantum indistinguishability to explain particle physics. A separate commenter (↑9) drops it alongside Susskind's The Theoretical Minimum and Penrose's Road to Reality as alternatives to freshman textbooks — praise by placement. Another ↑9 reply uses Feynman's harmonic oscillator framing for tides as an analogy, not a citation, which means the text is embedded enough in r/askscience regulars' thinking that they reach for it mid-explanation. Sentiment is neutral across all four mentions, not because people are lukewarm, but because the comments are expository rather than evaluative.
Community feedback & reader fit
Themes
- · Quantum mechanics and particle indistinguishability
- · Classical mechanics and oscillatory systems
- · Physics pedagogy and alternatives to standard textbooks
- · Free online access and open educational resources
Common praise
- + r/askscience commenters reach for it mid-explanation without citing it, which means the framing has stuck.
- + Gets shelved alongside Susskind and Penrose as the alternatives when someone wants to escape a freshman textbook.
- + The entire three-volume set is available free online, which every recommender mentions as a selling point.
- + Feynman's quantum indistinguishability chapter circulates in particle physics threads as a go-to explanation (↑686).
Common criticism
- − Four mentions in seven years is genuinely thin — Reddit's physicists don't return to it repeatedly the way they do with, say, Griffiths.
- − None of the four commenters evaluates the book itself; they use it instrumentally, which makes it hard to extract what actually works for self-study.
- − No r/Physics or r/learnphysics mentions in the tracked data, so there's no thread on the hard question: can you actually learn from it without a course?
Who it's for
If you're already browsing r/askscience and have hit the wall where pop-science explanations stop making sense, this is the step up. It works best if you have calculus and aren't expecting a problem-set textbook — Feynman teaches the ideas, not the drills. The free online version removes the usual barrier, so the only real cost is time. If you want worked problems and graded difficulty, Griffiths or Kleppner will serve you better; if you want Feynman explaining why the rules are the rules, start here.
Mentions over time
Top subreddits
Which Reddit comments matter for The Feynman Lectures on Physics?
Top-upvoted quotes across the subreddits where this book is mentioned. Click through to read the full thread.
“elementary particle are more than just identical, the universe does not even keep track which is which! This can be shown by the mathematical descriptions of their interaction. So if two electron fly really towards to each other from left and right (bouncing of off eachother), and then flying up an…
“You can find a pdf of the Feynman lectures online for free, which I would strongly recommend for anyone who wants to learn physics over one of those freshman tomes. The Theoretical Minimum by Susskind and the Road to Reality by Penrose are also good. All three are written by some of the greatest phy…
“Absolutely! A great analogy for tides can be found in The Feynman Lectures where you can describe the tide as a harmonic oscillator. In the diffusion free limit the response of a spring is instantaneous to the forcing and so the phase angle between the forcing and response is zero (they are in time)…
“AM: Yes. ET: There are a lot of tutorials that teach the basics of quantum mechanics. SR: MIT Open Courseware. The Feynman Lectures are now available for free online.
Convinced? Pick up The Feynman Lectures on Physics
What else does r/askscience read?
Other books mentioned in the same sub, ranked. Shared-sub overlap with this title breaks ties.
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What If?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions
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Randall Munroe takes absurd physics questions — what if a baseball traveled at 90% the speed of light? — and answers them with actual math.
Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body
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A paleontologist finds a fish fossil in the Arctic and uses it to trace the evolutionary origin of your hands, ears, and hernias.
A Brief History of Time
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Stephen Hawking explains black holes, the Big Bang, and the edge of time to people who never took a physics class.
Immune: A Journey into the Mysterious System That Keeps You Alive
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Philipp Dettmer of Kurzgesagt turns the immune system into a 300-page illustrated war story, written for the person who watched every YouTube video and still wanted more.
The Feynman Lectures on Physics — frequently asked
Is The Feynman Lectures on Physics actually free to read online?+
Yes. Multiple r/askscience commenters point to the free online PDF as a reason to prefer it over standard textbooks. The full three-volume set is available on the Caltech website. Two separate ↑9 comments mention this availability as an active recommendation, so it's not just technically true — it's the main pitch.
What does Reddit actually say about The Feynman Lectures on Physics?+
All 4 mentions tracked over seven years come from r/askscience, and none of them are negative. Commenters use it as a reference mid-explanation rather than discussing it as a book — Feynman's harmonic oscillator framing appears in a tides thread, the quantum indistinguishability chapter anchors a particle physics reply. Sentiment is neutral, meaning descriptive rather than evaluative.
How does The Feynman Lectures on Physics compare to The Theoretical Minimum?+
One r/askscience comment (↑9) names both in the same breath, alongside Penrose's Road to Reality, as alternatives to freshman tomes 'written by some of the greatest physicists.' The framing treats them as a set. Feynman is broader; Susskind's Theoretical Minimum is more explicitly structured for self-study with defined prerequisites.
Can I use The Feynman Lectures on Physics for self-study without a course?+
Depends on your background. The Reddit data doesn't settle this — all 4 mentions come from r/askscience, where commenters already know the physics and use Feynman as a reference. There are no threads from r/learnphysics or r/Physics in the tracked data, which is where the self-study debate would actually live. Calculus is a baseline requirement.