History Biographies, History, Philosophy of Physics

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The discussion highlights the often-overlooked contributions of lesser-known physicists in the field, emphasizing that many have made significant advancements without receiving the recognition they deserve. Participants express disappointment that only controversial figures tend to gain prominence, while countless others remain in obscurity. Various biographies and historical accounts of physicists are shared, including works on notable figures like the Curies and lesser-known scientists like Titus Pankey. The conversation also touches on the importance of collecting and sharing these narratives to enrich the understanding of physics history. Overall, the thread advocates for greater appreciation of all contributors to the field of physics.
  • #31
Fritz Haber is a fascinating and tragic figure. On one hand, his eponymous process saved 2.7 billion human lives by some estimates. However he also led the German chemical weapons program in World War One and developed Zyklon B, which the Nazis used some 25 years later to murder his surviving family members
 
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  • #32
More from Arxiv's physics.hist-ph

Swedish Beams -- The Story of Particle Accelerators in Sweden
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Did Louis de Broglie miss the discovery of the Schrödinger equation?
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E. Amaldi, C. Dilworth, G.P.S. Occhialini on F.G. Houtermans

Synopsis for this one as it doesn'y really say much in the title.

"In the Occhialini-Dilworth Archives of the University of Milan are preserved four typescripts by E. Amaldi, dealing with F.G. Houtermans, German physicist, who fled to the USSR to escape the Nazis. During a Stalinist purge he was arrested. The typescripts were sent to the two Milanese physicists so that they might give a judgement. G.S. Occhialini and C. Dilworth, in fact, had personally met Houtermans in 1934 and in 1950. The scenario is that of the role of nuclear physicists during the WW2. The exchange of letters between Amaldi and the two Milanese physicists will be analysed in order to identify possible influences on Amaldi. I will highlight Dilworth's contribution, which found room in a chapter of Amaldi's biography of Houtermans."
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Regards.
 
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  • #33
sbrothy said:
This is curious. He seems to have missed the equation because he wanted relativistic equations. Same as with Schrödinger's initial guess. I wonder how quick we would have found the Schrödinger equation if the discovery of relativity was delayed.
 
  • #34
Yes. An Schrödinger was kinda one of the last naturalist philosophers wasn't he? He span widely. His "What is Life?" book springs to mind. Thank God he evaded the Nazis.
 
  • #35
sbrothy said:
Yes. An Schrödinger was kinda one of the last naturalist philosophers wasn't he? He span widely. His "What is Life?" book springs to mind. Thank God he evaded the Nazis.
Not sure if he was the last, what about Bell or Bohm? Many now work on quantum interpretations. Schrödinger is surely one of the last successful ones.

According to what I could find Klein, Gordon, Fock, de Broglie, de Donder, Schrödinger and more came up with Klein-Gordon equation in an attempt to find the Schrödinger's equation.
 
  • #36
Schrödinger harbored a harem in his home. I don't recall whether the count was two or three. The man who created the Wonder Woman character had a similar lifestyle.

When Schrödinger came up with his equation he didn't know that the values were related to probabilities.
 
  • #37
Hornbein said:
Schrödinger harbored a harem in his home. I don't recall whether the count was two or three. The man who created the Wonder Woman character had a similar lifestyle.

When Schrödinger came up with his equation he didn't know that the values were related to probabilities.
It is worse than that. He's got a record of having sexual encounters with minors. Rooms and buildings of some universities are no longer called "Schrödinger" for this reason.
 
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  • #38
pines-demon said:
It is worse than that. He's got a record of having sexual encounters with minors. Rooms and buildings of some universities are no longer called "Schrödinger" for this reason.
News to me, but if true - and I seldom doubt two members on here being in agreement - that is indeed pretty disgusting. The man just went on my "list".
 
  • #40
BWV said:
Fritz Haber is a fascinating and tragic figure. On one hand, his eponymous process saved 2.7 billion human lives by some estimates. However he also led the German chemical weapons program in World War One and developed Zyklon B, which the Nazis used some 25 years later to murder his surviving family members
I saw a documentary on Einstein and remember Haber having a heart attack. Pretty sure he was portrayed as being remorseful that his talents were used to kill soldiers in the trenches.

I was wrong apparently

"during peace time a scientist belongs to the world, but during war time he belongs to his country". F. Haber.

His family founded of what was to become BASF, https://www.basf.com/global/en/who-we-are/history/chronology/1902-1924/1913.html
 
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  • #41
My work with Millikan on the oil-drop experiment
by Harvey Fletcher
(Physics Today, June 1962)
http://www.ub.edu/hcub/hfq/sites/default/files/fletcher.pdf

I remember one of the (visitors to the lab) was the great Charles Steinmetz from the General Electric Company. He was one who did not believe in electrons. He could explain all the electrical phenomena in terms of a strain in the Ether. After watching these little oil droplets most of one afternoon, he came and shook my hand and said, shaking his head, "I never would have believed it. I never would have believed it" and then left.

Video by Dr. Jorge S. Diaz:

 
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  • #43
Swamp Thing said:
My work with Millikan on the oil-drop experiment
by Harvey Fletcher
(Physics Today, June 1962)
http://www.ub.edu/hcub/hfq/sites/default/files/fletcher.pdf



Video by Dr. Jorge S. Diaz:


I can appreciate their enthusiasm doing real, down-to-basics, bareboned physics. Applying both theory and experiment.

On top of that I can actually follow the math!
 
  • #44
Boffin : a personal story of the early days of radar, radio astronomy, and quantum optics
R. Hanbury Brown

https://archive.org/details/boffinpersonalst0000brow/page/n5/mode/2up

To a surprising number of people the idea that the arrival of photons at two separated detectors
can ever be correlated was not ony heretical but patently absurd... If science had a Pope we would have been excommunicated.
 
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  • #45
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  • #46
Frabjous said:
“Landau’s Theoretical Minimum, Landau’s Seminar, ITEP in the Beginning of the 1950’s”
By Boris Ioffe
https://arxiv.org/abs/hep-ph/0204295

Nice find! And from one of the less soft sections of arXiv even. ;)
 
  • #48
Swamp Thing said:
Edwin Hall on his discovery of the Hall Effect:

https://web.archive.org/web/20070208040346/http://www.stenomuseet.dk/skoletj/elmag/kilde9.html

Although published as a scientific paper, it reads in part like a personal narrative... It would be fun if papers were written in that style today. Or like the old Royal Society papers.
Well, that was 1879. Scientific publishing was different then. A lot more was published.

I once read an article, probably from the late 1800's, about some guy working in a lab that had some cockroaches in it which were pissing him off.
The lab had gas lights on tubes coming out of the wall. When he found cockroaches on tubes, he would see what they would do when he heated up the tube near the wall (they went the other direction).
This got published in a scientific journal.
It was funny but stupid.
 
  • #51
History of the scanning electron microscope

 
  • #53
Millikan's experimental confirmation of Einstein's photoelectric effect & equation

 
  • #54
I have read that re-analysis of Eddington's eclipse data that allegedly confirmed general relativity were inconclusive.
 
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  • #55
Hornbein said:
I have read that re-analysis of Eddington's eclipse data that allegedly confirmed general relativity were inconclusive.
Source?

I don't have any idea, but Wiki says
It has been claimed that Eddington's observations were of poor quality, and he had unjustly discounted simultaneous observations at Sobral, Brazil, which appeared closer to the Newtonian model, but a 1979 re-analysis with modern measuring equipment and contemporary software validated Eddington's results and conclusions.[12] The quality of the 1919 results was indeed poor compared to later observations, but was sufficient to persuade contemporary astronomers. The rejection of the results from the expedition to Brazil was due to a defect in the telescopes used which, again, was completely accepted and well understood by contemporary astronomers.[13]

12. Kennefick, Daniel (5 September 2007). "Not Only Because of Theory: Dyson, Eddington and the Competing Myths of the 1919 Eclipse Expedition". Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A. arXiv:0709.0685. Bibcode:2007arXiv0709.0685K. doi:10.1016/j.shpsa.2012.07.010. S2CID 119203172.

13. Kennefick, Daniel (1 March 2009). "Testing relativity from the 1919 eclipse – a question of bias". Physics Today. 62 (3): 37–42. Bibcode:2009PhT....62c..37K. doi:10.1063/1.3099578.
 
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  • #56
gmax137 said:
Source?

It has been claimed that Eddington's observations were of poor quality,
 
  • #57
Polish Astrophysics: The First Half-Century, 1923-1973

"An attempt is made to evaluate progress of the Polish astrophysical research of stars and of the inter-stellar medium (ISM) on the basis of scientific paper citations in the ADS database. Rather modest citation levels were observed in the years before the mid-1950's. In the years 1958 - 1973, thanks to the partly opened foreign contacts and to strong support from astronomers of the older generation, work of a number of young, energetic enthusiasts reached the world science levels and formed a strong basis for the well recognized, international successes of the next generations."
 
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  • #60
I admit this one is pretty sought but at least it is history-related.

Jan Veth's paintings of Jacobus Kapteyn

"Jacobus C. Kapteyn is regarded as one of the coryfees of the University of Groningen. Part of his legacy is two paintings of him by Dutch painter Jan Pieter Veth. One, showing him at his desk, decorates the Kapteyn Room in the Kapteyn Astronomical Institute, and the other one, displaying him in academic attire, is in the University's gallery of professors in the central Academy Building. The first was offered to the Kapteyns on the occasion of his 40-th anniversary as professor in 1918 and the second to the University after his retirement in 1921.
It has been suggested that there must have been a third portrait that now is lost. Former director Adriaan Blaauw has proposed that the one in the Academy Building actually was first offered in 1918, but at Mrs. Kapteyn's request replaced by the one now in the Kapteyn Room. The first version was then later adapted to the requirements of the gallery of professors by Veth himself by overpainting it with academic attire. A preliminary trial version by Veth, in the possession of Kapteyn's greatgrandson, shows what it would have looked like before the adaption.
The following reports on new evidence: the biography of Jan Veth that historian Johan Huizinga, friend of Veth, wrote, and letters Veth wrote to his wife while he was working on these paintings. This provides strong support of Blaauw's sequence of events with a few modifications. No third painting has ever been produced."
 

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