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RECENT PHILOSOPHY |
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Select: Max Planck - Sir James Jeans - Albert Einstein |
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Diagrams The Development of Modern and Recent Philosophical Thought Major Influences on American Social Thought The German physicist Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck (picture) was born on April 23, 1858, and died on October 3, 1947. After receiving his Ph.D. from the University of Munich in 1879, Planck taught at the University of Kiel (1885-89) and the University of Berlin (1889-1926). His appointment at the latter institution included the directorship of the Institute of Theoretical Physics that was newly founded for him. The first revolutionary novelty since Newton was introduced into the science of physics by Planck, the founder of the quantum theory. Before Planck, physical thinking rested on the assumption that all causal interactions are continuous. Planck, after studying entropy and radiation, showed that in a light or heat wave of frequency, the energy of the wave does not vary continuously, and established an "elementary quantum of action" of a definite numerical value as the unit of these variations. Quantum theory has made an inroad upon the concept of mass but it is most important in the regular occurrences of all atomic processes. Planck's elementary quantum of action could not be welded in the framework of classical physics. All theoretical difficulties were removed by Einstein's special theory of relativity which was published in 1905, five years after Planck had established his quantum theory. Through the cooperation of Planck and Einstein a new picture of the world emerged. Its elements are no longer chemical atoms but electrons and protons whose mutual interactions are governed by the velocity of light and the elementary quantum of action. Planck regarded the quanta as the building blocks of the universe and as proof of the existence in nature of something real and independent of every human measurement. He rejected positivism and believed in the possibility of reconciling natural science and religion. Planck was awarded a Nobel Prize in 1918 for his contribution to physics. The arrival of quantum mechanics gave rise to a variety of philosophical problems; it presented difficulties for traditional logic, constituted a challenge to scientific realism, and undermined deterministic views of the universe, with further repercussions in epistemology. In The Radical Academy Elsewhere On The Internet
Sir James Hopwood Jeans (1877-1946) Sir James Jeans (picture), one of the most eminent savants and an international authority in mathematics, theoretical physics and astronomy, has also been called "the Edgar Wallace of cosmology." Very few scientists of his rank have ever had his talents for combining profundity with a colorful, popular style. While his earlier books The Dynamical Theory of Gases (1904), Theoretical Mechanics (1906), Mathematical Theory of Electricity and Magnetism (1908) and numerous learned papers were written for experts, his later works The Stars in Their Courses (1931), The New Background of Science (1933) and Through Space and Time (1934) have been admired by tens of thousands of readers who were not prepared to read other scientific books. Jeans himself was fond of fiction and detective stories, and he knew how to charm the public, although he never made a confession to his readers which he could not justify before his scientific conscience. Towards the end of his life, Jeans became more and more convinced that the scientific viewpoint was synonymous with that of the astronomer. Human life was to be seen as a chain of causes and effects. The problems of the day were to be set against a background of time into which the whole of human history shrinks to the twinkling of an eye. Abstract problems of philosophy did not trouble him. Nor did he feel a need for seeking a rational basis for morals. According to Jeans, neither science nor philosophy has a voiced in the region of moral acting. This is left to the Christian religion only. In The Radical Academy Elsewhere On The Internet
Albert Einstein (picture) was born into a Jewish family at Ulm, Germany. They moved to Munich the following year, where his father Hermann and his uncle Jakob opened a small electrical and engineering works. His mother, Paulina Koch, encouraged him to study music during his youth, and he became an accomplished violinist, but it was Jakob who inspired his fascination for mathematics. Initially an unremarkable student, he was educated at Munich and Aarau, eventually going on to graduate in physics and mathematics from the Federal Polytechnic University in Zurich in 1900. He became a Swiss citizen in 1905, and was appointed examiner at the Swiss Patent Office from 1902 to 1909. The overwhelming majority of scientists continually testify that Einstein has accomplished "one of the greatest generalizations of all time" and "has revolutionized our nineteenth century concepts not only of astronomy, but also of the nature of time, space, and of the fundamental ideas of science." Modern humanity reveres Einstein as one of its profoundest thinkers, as well as a man of the highest intellectual integrity, free of personal ambition, an intrepid fighter for human rights, social justice, and social responsibility. In the few decades that have passed between the time that Einstein made his theory of relativity known to the public and his seventieth birthday, more than five thousand books and pamphlets in every language have been published about him and his work. Although Einstein himself did nothing to popularize his ideas, his fame spread internationally after he predicted that the deflection of light in a gravitational field would occur in 1916 and 1919. He had and still has opponents, some of whom are prejudiced against him because he remains conscious of his Jewish origin. But humble people throughout the world are comforted by the knowledge that Einstein, whose thoughts pervade the universe, feels with all who suffer from oppression and persecution. Seldom has it happened that any man has become so popular, even though his theory is largely beyond popular imagination and commonsense thought. While the achievements of Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, and Darwin have been, at least in broad outline, explicable to the public, it has been impossible up to the present time to translate Einstein's theory of relativity adequately into the non-technical language of popular literature. The most important consequence of Einstein's special theory of relativity for scientific and philosophical thought has been the change in the concepts of time and space. Einstein destroyed the assumption that there is a single all-embracing time in which all events in the universe have their place. He has shown that "it is impossible to determine absolute motion by any experiment whatever." As long as time and space are measured separately, there always remains a kind of subjectivity which affects not only human observers but all other things. Time and space, which for classical physics are absolute constituents of the world, are conceived by Einsteinian physics as dependent upon each other, forming a relationship which can be analyzed in many different ways into what is referred to as spatial distance or lapse of time. Time which previously had been regarded as a cosmic measure is presented by Einstein as "local time" connected with the motion of the earth. He conceives of time as so completely analogous to the three dimensions of space that physics can be transformed into a kind of four-dimensional geometry. On the other hand, the special theory of relativity confers an absolute meaning on a magnitude, namely the velocity of light, which had only a relative significance in classical physics. After this special theory, Einstein formulated his general theory of relativity which offers new explanations of the size of the universe, of gravitation and inertia. Einstein's achievements are by no means limited to the special and general theories of relativity. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1922 for his studies in photo- chemical equivalents. Later, he took a leading part in the investigation of atomic energy. On many occasions, he has expressed his personal views on problems of daily life, contemporary history, war, peace, education, religion, science and the fate of the Jews. In The Radical Academy Elsewhere On The Internet
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