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Uncertainty: Einstein, Heisenberg, Bohr, and the Struggle for the Soul of Science
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About Uncertainty: Einstein, Heisenberg, Bohr, And The
Product Description The gripping, entertaining, and vividly-told narrative of a radical discovery that sent shockwaves through the scientific community and forever changed the way we understand the world.Werner Heisenberg’s “uncertainty principle” challenged centuries of scientific understanding, placed him in direct opposition to Albert Einstein, and put Niels Bohr in the middle of one of the most heated debates in scientific history. Heisenberg’s theorem stated that there were physical limits to what we could know about sub-atomic particles; this “uncertainty” would have shocking implications. In a riveting and lively account, David Lindley captures this critical episode and explains one of the most important scientific discoveries in history, which has since transcended the boundaries of science and influenced everything from literary theory to television. Review Praise for David Lindley's Uncertainty“Provides a useful précis of the mind-blowing progress of physics in the early 20th century.” —The New York Times“Lindley captures the passion of the struggle, showing both the public controversies and the sometimes harsh private judgments. . . . The story is told with verve.” —Nature “A physicist and skilled science writer, Lindley neatly sketches the players and chessboard at the Solvay Conferences, where Einstein lost his battle against the quantum world.” —USA Today“Charmingly written and a delight to read. . . . Highlights the human element of science.” —The Economist “Layers keen human drama on top of mind-bending scientific advancement.” —Discover Magazine“Brilliantly captures the personalities and the science surrounding the most revolutionary principle in modern physics. . . . Truly thrilling.” —Walter Isaacson, author of Einstein: His Life and Universe “Far and away the best popular account of the development of quantum mechanics I have encountered.” —Michael D. Gordin, American Scientist About the Author David Lindley holds a Ph.D. in astrophysics from Sussex University and has been an editor at Nature, Science, and Science News. Now a full-time writer, he is the author of The End of Physics, Where Does the Weirdness Go?, The Science of Jurassic Park, Boltzmann’s Atom, and Degrees Kelvin. He is also a recipient of the Phi Beta Kappa science writing prize. He lives in Alexandria, Virginia. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Chapter 1 IRRITABLE PARTICLES Robert Brown, son of a Scottish clergyman, was the archetypal self–made scholar, sober, diligent, and careful to the point of fanaticism. Born in 1773, he trained in medicine at Edinburgh, then served for some years as a surgeon’s assistant in a Fifeshire regiment. There he put his spare time to worthy use. Rising early, he taught himself German (nouns and their declensions before breakfast, his diary records, conjugation of auxiliary verbs afterward) so that he could master the considerable German literature on botany, his chosen subject. On a visit to London in 1798, the young Scotsman met and so impressed the great botanist Sir Joseph Banks, president of the Royal Society, that on Banks’s recommendation he sailed three years later on a long voyage to Australia, returning in 1805 with close to four thousand exotic plant specimens neatly stowed on his ship. These he spent the next several years assiduously describing, classifying, and cataloging, serving meanwhile as Banks’s librarian and personal assistant. Brown’s remarkable Australian trove, along with Banks’s own equally notable collection, became the heart of the botanical department of the British Museum, of which Brown became the first professional curator. He was, said a visitor to Banks’s London house, “a walking catalogue of every book in the world.” Charles Darwin, before he was married, passed many a Sunday with the learned Robert Brown. In his autobiography Darwin describes a contradictory man, vastly knowledgeable but powerfully inclined to pedantry, generous in
