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Review title: Excellent Introduction, despite the notation
Product review: Although I agree with the reviewers from Berkeley that the notation is confusing and different from other texts such as Reif, this book nontheless is highly recommendable. Particularly attractive is the choice of presenting statistical mechanics as a precursor to thermodynamics since as Gibbs is quoted, "the laws of thermodynamics may easily be obtained from the principles of statistical mechanics, of which they are the incomplete expression." Of course a book is seen in a different perspective depending upon the quality of the instructor, in my case the instructor was excellent, I find it very difficult to see where some of the negative reviews are coming from. The presentation has an elegance not to be found in other texts at this level, while the range of topics and the depth at which they are covered is very encouraging to any reader desiring something beyond a traditional course in thermodynamics. To reiterate, highly recommendable.
