Download or read book True Genius written by Vicki Daitch and published by Joseph Henry Press. This book was released on 2002-10-28 with total page 488 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What is genius? Define it. Now think of scientists who embody the concept of genius. Does the name John Bardeen spring to mind? Indeed, have you ever heard of him? Like so much in modern life, immediate name recognition often rests on a cult of personality. We know Einstein, for example, not just for his tremendous contributions to science, but also because he was a character, who loved to mug for the camera. And our continuing fascination with Richard Feynman is not exclusively based on his body of work; it is in large measure tied to his flamboyant nature and offbeat sense of humor. These men, and their outsize personalities, have come to erroneously symbolize the true nature of genius and creativity. We picture them born brilliant, instantly larger than life. But is that an accurate picture of genius? What of others who are equal in stature to these icons of science, but whom history has awarded only a nod because they did not readily engage the public? Could a person qualify as a bona fide genius if he was a regular Joe? The answer may rest in the story of John Bardeen. John Bardeen was the first person to have been awarded two Nobel Prizes in the same field. He shared one with William Shockley and Walter Brattain for the invention of the transistor. But it was the charismatic Shockley who garnered all the attention, primarily for his Hollywood ways and notorious views on race and intelligence. Bardeen's second Nobel Prize was awarded for the development of a theory of superconductivity, a feat that had eluded the best efforts of leading theorists-including Albert Einstein, Neils Bohr, Werner Heisenberg, and Richard Feynman. Arguably, Bardeen's work changed the world in more ways than that of any other scientific genius of his time. Yet while every school child knows of Einstein, few people have heard of John Bardeen. Why is this the case? Perhaps because Bardeen differs radically from the popular stereotype of genius. He was a modest, mumbling Midwesterner, an ordinary person who worked hard and had a knack for physics and mathematics. He liked to picnic with his family, collaborate quietly with colleagues, or play a round of golf. None of that was newsworthy, so the media, and consequently the public, ignored him. John Bardeen simply fits a new profile of genius. Through an exploration of his science as well as his life, a fresh and thoroughly engaging portrait of genius and the nature of creativity emerges. This perspective will have readers looking anew at what it truly means to be a genius.
Download or read book Fritz London written by Kostas Gavroglu and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1995-05-11 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fritz London was one of the twentieth century's key figures in the development of theoretical physics. A quiet and self-effacing man, he was one of the founders of quantum chemistry, and was the first to give a phenomenological explanation of superconductivity. This thoroughly researched biography gives a detailed account of London's life and work in Munich, Berlin, Oxford, Paris, and finally in the United States. Covering a fascinating period in the development of theoretical physics, and containing an appraisal of London's work by the late John Bardeen, this book will be of great interest to physicists, chemists, and to anyone interested in the history of science.
Download or read book Dictionary of North Carolina Biography written by William S. Powell and published by Univ of North Carolina Press. This book was released on 2000-11-09 with total page 423 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The most comprehensive state project of its kind, the Dictionary provides information on some 4,000 notable North Carolinians whose accomplishments and occasional misdeeds span four centuries. Much of the bibliographic information found in the six volumes has been compiled for the first time. All of the persons included are deceased. They are native North Carolinians, no matter where they made the contributions for which they are noted, or non-natives whose contributions were made in North Carolina.
Download or read book The Conceptual Completion and Extensions of Quantum Mechanics 1932 1941 Epilogue Aspects of the Further Development of Quantum Theory 1942 1999 written by Jagdish Mehra and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2000 with total page 964 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book History of Artificial Cold Scientific Technological and Cultural Issues written by Kostas Gavroglu and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-11-19 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The history of artificial cold has been a rather intriguing interdisciplinary subject (physics, chemistry, technology, sociology, economics, anthropology, consumer studies) which despite some excellent monographs and research papers, has not been systematically exploited. It is a subject with all kinds of scientific, technological as well as cultural dimensions. For example, the common home refrigerator has brought about unimaginably deep changes to our everyday lives changing drastically eating habits and shopping mentalities. From the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 21st, issues related to the production and exploitation of artificial cold have never stopped to provide us with an incredibly interesting set of phenomena, novel theoretical explanations, amazing possibilities concerning technological applications and all encompassing cultural repercussions. The discovery of the unexpected and “bizarre” phenomena of superconductivity and superfluidity, the necessity to incorporate macroscopic quantum phenomena to the framework of quantum mechanics, the discovery of Bose-Einstein condensation and high temperature superconductivity, the use of superconducting magnets for high energy particle accelerators, the construction of new computer hardware, the extensive applications of cryomedicine, and the multi billion industry of frozen foods, are some of the more dramatic instances in the history of artificial cold.
Download or read book Pathways to Modern Chemical Physics written by Salvatore Califano and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-05-26 with total page 293 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this historical volume Salvatore Califano traces the developments of ideas and theories in physical and theoretical chemistry throughout the 20th century. This seldom-told narrative provides details of topics from thermodynamics to atomic structure, radioactivity and quantum chemistry. Califano’s expertise as a physical chemist allows him to judge the historical developments from the point of view of modern chemistry. This detailed and unique historical narrative is fascinating for chemists working in the fields of physical chemistry and is also a useful resource for science historians who will enjoy access to material not previously dealt with in a coherent way.
Download or read book World Views and Scientific Discipline Formation written by W.R. Woodward and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 474 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The various efforts to develop a Marxist philosophy of science in the one time 'socialist' countries were casualties of the Cold War. Even those who were in no way Marxists, and those who were undogmatic in their Marxisms, now confront a new world. All the more harsh is it for those who worked within the framework imposed upon professional philosophy by the official ideology. Here in this book, we are concerned with some 31 colleagues from the late German Democratic Republic, representative in their scholarship of the achievements of a curiously creative while dismayingly repressive period. The literature published in the GDR was blossoming, certainly in the final decade, but it developed within a totalitarian regime where personal careers either advanced or faltered through the private protection or denunciation of mentors. We will never know how many good minds did not enter the field of philosophy in the first place due to their prudent judgments that there was a virtual requirement that the candidate join the Socialist Unity (i.e. Communist) Party. Among those who started careers and were sidetracked, the record is now beginning to be revealed; and for the rest, the price of 'doing philosophy' was mostly silence in the face of harassments the likes of which make academic politics in the West seem child's play.
Download or read book Neither Physics nor Chemistry written by Kostas Gavroglu and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2011-10-07 with total page 367 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The evolution of a discipline at the intersection of physics, chemistry, and mathematics. Quantum chemistry—a discipline that is not quite physics, not quite chemistry, and not quite applied mathematics—emerged as a field of study in the 1920s. It was referred to by such terms as mathematical chemistry, subatomic theoretical chemistry, molecular quantum mechanics, and chemical physics until the community agreed on the designation of quantum chemistry. In Neither Physics Nor Chemistry, Kostas Gavroglu and Ana Simões examine the evolution of quantum chemistry into an autonomous discipline, tracing its development from the publication of early papers in the 1920s to the dramatic changes brought about by the use of computers in the 1970s. The authors focus on the culture that emerged from the creative synthesis of the various traditions of chemistry, physics, and mathematics. They examine the concepts, practices, languages, and institutions of this new culture as well as the people who established it, from such pioneers as Walter Heitler and Fritz London, Linus Pauling, and Robert Sanderson Mulliken, to later figures including Charles Alfred Coulson, Raymond Daudel, and Per-Olov Löwdin. Throughout, the authors emphasize six themes: epistemic aspects and the dilemmas caused by multiple approaches; social issues, including academic politics, the impact of textbooks, and the forging of alliances; the contingencies that arose at every stage of the developments in quantum chemistry; the changes in the field when computers were available to perform the extraordinarily cumbersome calculations required; issues in the philosophy of science; and different styles of reasoning.
Download or read book The rainbow stories for summer days and winter nights written by and published by . This book was released on with total page 634 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book 21 year Index written by United States. Congress. Senate. Judiciary and published by . This book was released on 1972 with total page 876 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The German Physical Society in the Third Reich written by Dieter Hoffmann and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2012 with total page 483 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book details the effects of the Nazi regime on the German Physical Society.
Download or read book Weimar Culture and Quantum Mechanics written by Paul Forman and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 2011 with total page 560 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume reprints Paul Forman's classic papers on the history of physics in post-World War I Germany and the invention of quantum mechanics. The Forman thesis has become famous as the first argument in favor of the cultural conditioning of scientific knowledge, in particular for its demonstration of the historical connection between the culture of Weimar Germany — known for its irrationality and antiscientism — and the emerging concept of quantum acausality. At the 2007 international conference in Vancouver, Canada, leading historians of physics discussed the implications of the Forman thesis in the historiography of modern science. Their papers collected in this volume represent a cutting-edge research on the history of quantum revolution.
Download or read book Instruments and Experimentation in the History of Chemistry written by Frederic Lawrence Holmes and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2000 with total page 454 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume moves chemical instruments and experiments into the foreground of historical concern, in line with the emphasis on practice that characterizes current work on other fields of science and engineering.
Download or read book Low Temperature Physics LT 13 written by K.D. Timmerhaus and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-04-17 with total page 673 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The 13th International Conference on Low Temperature Physics, organized by the National Bureau of Standards, Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, and the University of Colorado, was held in Boulder, Colorado, August 21 to 25, 1972, and was sponsored by the National Science Foundation, the U. S. Army Office of Scientific Research, the U. S. Atomic Energy Commission, the U. S. Navy Office of Naval Research, the International Institute of Refrigeration, and the Internation al Union of Pure and Applied Physics. This international conference was the latest in a series of biennial conferences on low temperature physics, the first of which was held at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1949. (For a complete list of previous L T conferences see p. viii. Many of these past conferences have been coordinated and sponsored by the Commission on Very Low Temperatures of IUPAP. Subsequent LT conferences will be scheduled triennially beginning in 1975. LT 13 was attended by approximately 1015 participants from twenty five countries. Eighteen plenary lectures and 550 contributed papers were presented at the Conference. The Conference began with brief introductory and welcoming remarks by Dr. R. H. Kropschot on behalf of the Organizing Committee, Professor J. Bardeen on behalf of the Commission on Very Low Temperatures of the IUP AP, and Pro fessor O. V. Lounasmaa on behalf of the International Institute of Refrigeration. The eighth London Award was then presented by Professor E.
Download or read book The Copenhagen Network written by Alexei Kojevnikov and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2020-12-02 with total page 129 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is a historical analysis of the quantum mechanical revolution and the emergence of a new discipline from the perspective, not of a professor, but of a recent or actual Ph.D. student just embarking on an uncertain academic career in economically hard times. Quantum mechanics exploded on to the intellectual scene between 1925 and 1927, with more than 200 publications across the world, the majority of them authored by young scientists under the age of 30, graduate students or postdoctoral fellows. The resulting theory was a collective product that no single authority could claim, but it had a major geographical nod – the Copenhagen Institute of Theoretical Physics – where most of the informal, pre-published exchange of ideas occurred and where every participant of the new community aspired to visit. A rare combination of circumstances and resources – political, diplomatic, financial, and intellectual – allowed Niels Bohr to establish this “Mecca” of quantum theory outside of traditional and more powerful centres of science. Transitory international postdoctoral fellows, rather than established professors, developed a culture of research that became the source of major innovations in the field. Temporary assistantships, postdoctoral positions, and their equivalents were the chief mode of existence for young academics during the period of economic crisis and post-WWI international tensions. Insecure career trajectories and unpredictable moves through non-stable temporary positions contributed to their general outlook and interpretations of the emerging theory of quantum mechanics. This book is part of a four-volume collection addressing the beginnings of quantum physics research at the major European centres of Göttingen, Copenhagen, Berlin, and Munich; these works emerged from an expansive study on the quantum revolution as a major transformation of physical knowledge undertaken by the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science and the Fritz Haber Institute (2006–2012). For more on this project, see the dedicated Feature Story, The Networks of Early Quantum Theory, at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, https://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/feature-story/networks-early-quantum-theory
Download or read book Superconductivity A Very Short Introduction written by Stephen J. Blundell and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2009-05-28 with total page 170 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Superconductivity is one of the most exciting areas of research in physics today. Outlining the history of its discovery, and the race to understand its many mysterious and counter-intuitive phenomena, this Very Short Introduction explains in accessible terms the theories that have been developed, and how they have influenced other areas of science, including the Higgs boson of particle physics and ideas about the early Universe. It is an engaging and informative account of a fascinating scientific detective story, and an intelligible insight into some deep and beautiful ideas of physics. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.
Download or read book The Quantum Exodus written by Gordon Fraser and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2012-02-23 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When the Nazis came to power in 1933, they immediately expelled Jewish academics, unwittingly changing the power balance of world science. When war came, these scientific refugees raced to engineer the atomic bomb, to prevent Nazi Germany getting there first. This book tells the story of how the Bomb and the Holocaust became locked in a grisly race.
