I am looking for rigorous physics books on these five subjects: classical (or Newtonian) mechanics, electromagnetism, special relativity, general relativity, and quantum mechanics. I want books that are rigorous enough for a mathematician. I am a mathematician who is also interested in physics, but so far, the books I have read are not that rigorous. I am looking for some recommendations.
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Classical Mechanics: V.I. Arnold (short tour), Marsden, Ratiu (long tour). Electromagnetism: excerpts of J.D. Jackson; Relativity: Sachs & Wu or Hawking & Ellis. QM: Thirring (2nd volume). Also Thirring's first volume is good for classical physics. – DanielC Mar 27 '22 at 21:54
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3Physics is not math. I've seen people try this "math rigor" route before but IMO what they need is to learn the physics part of physics because that's always what's missing. We can construct beautiful math theories that don't ultimately match how the world works. They're published every day. Rigor won't teach you the intuition for how physics works and how to relate it to the real world (by experiment) and without that the math is not grounded in anything. So I'd recommend a rethink about math rigor. – StephenG - Help Ukraine Mar 27 '22 at 22:48
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I find the posting a bit humorous. Physicists are NOT mathematicians, and physics is not math, so you may not be able to find the book you are looking for. – David White Mar 28 '22 at 00:26