The 70 years from 1880 to 1950 witnessed the final ascent of humankind into the modern age. Historically, this period is characterized by deep political, social and economic crises. However, parallel to this and much less known in the public, rational scientific thinking also experienced the darkest and deepest crisis of its own history. All the great modern scientific discoveries like quantum theory, genetics and neurology are products of this. Ground-breaking discoveries, profound crises, revolutionary thoughts, refutation of previously unshakable beliefs - these years are marked by scientific achievements of numerous great minds, who overturned our understanding of the world, of space, time and infinity, of life, logic and calculability almost overnight. The "intuitive genius" of these pioneers still forms the foundation of today’s scientific thinking and technological progress. In fact, tackling and overcoming those deep scientific crises shaped our modern life like nothing else. The resulting reorientation of our understanding of nature and ourselves allowed ancient philosophical questions to appear in a new light: "What is reality?", "What can we know about the world?" or "What is man's place in nature?". The most exciting period in the history of science is retold here in an entertaining way.
Author(s): Lars Jaeger
Publisher: Springer
Year: 2022
Language: English
Pages: 253
City: Cham
Prologue
Contents
Part I The Great Confusion
1 Newton’s World Formula that Wasn’t One—How the Speed of Light Shook Up Classical Physics
The Last Magician
Blank Spots on the Map of Science
Steam Flasks and Stills
The Twitching of Dead Frogs
Magnetic Forces and Magical Thinking
Faraday: From Magic to Science
The Last Riddle
Small Problems and Big Contradictions
2 The Battle for the Atom—From Boltzmann to Einstein—How Chance Broke into the Well-Ordered World of Physics
Locomotives and Hot Water Bottles
Chance Enters the Stage of Physics
A Gravestone at the Vienna Central Cemetery
Planck’s Act of Desperation
Einstein’s Solution and Other Fundamental Contradictions
Einstein’s Second Master Stroke
The Third Revolution from the Bern Patent Office
Wanderer Between Two Worlds
The Contours of the Atom—Further Contradictions
3 Mathematics Becomes Paradoxical—Georg Cantor and the Insurmountable Contradictions of the Infinite
The Forbidden Door
More Major Challenges
Rumbling Wheels
The Lies of the Cretans and the Truth About Infinities
New Construction Instead of Renovation
The Big Bang
Is It Worth the Effort?
4 Darwin’s Hesitation and Mendel’s Diligence—Life as a Plaything of Atomic Elements
Turtles and Mocking birds
Chance and Necessity
Darwin’s Struggle for Existence
Man Becomes Part of the Animal Kingdom
Darwin and Boltzmann
The Atoms of Life
Approach to the Gene
New Theories Without Answers
5 The Ground Slips from Under Our Feet—The Collapse of the Classical Sciences
A Short Excursion into Philosophy
The Fundamental Limits of Scientific Knowledge
Ignorabimus in Mathematics
No Longer Master in One’s Own House
Early Philosophical Crises: Nihilism and Existentialism
Total War
From International Cooperation to National Polemics
Whatever Happened to the Quest for Truth?
Science in the Soviet Union
Part II Geniuses Create a New World
6 The New Boys’ Physics—A New Generation Discovers the Abstract World of Quanta
Ups and Downs
With Hay Fever to Helgoland
Chance Shows up Again
Dispute Among Physicists
A Farewell to Classical Certainty
The Confounded Double-Slit Experiment
Dirac’s Stroke of Genius
7 Einstein and Schrödinger Versus Bohr and Heisenberg—How Philosophy Was Displaced by Mathematics
A Vivid Explanation from Denmark
An Unreliable World
Quantum Particles Without Identity
The Fate of a Cat Becomes the Fate of Quantum Theory
A New Addition to the Vocabulary of Philosophers and Physicists
Einstein Provides a Solution for Himself
Mathematics Becomes Substance
The Current State of Philosophy
8 The Final Dissolution of All Matter—The Shift from German to American Physics
The Electromagnetic Field is Quantised
The Photon Drops Its Mask
Fluctuations and More Permanent Emanations of Energy
The Disappearance of Matter
The New American Quantum World
Particle Zoo Without Theory
9 Mathematics Becomes a Superpower—How Emmy Noether, John Von Neumann, and Alan Turing Changed the World
The Unknown Universal Genius of the Twentieth Century
A Celebrated Bon Vivant
The Architect of the Red Button
The Computer Sees the Light of day
Alan Turing—The Birth of the Digital Age
The Mathematicians’ War
Emmy Noether Finds a Compass for the Abstract World
Cinderella at the Mathematical Institute
10 The Architecture of Life is Decoded—How the “Science Clowns” Watson and Crick Ended a Decades-Long Quest
The Birth of a New Science
Breakthrough in the Fly Lab
The Unknown Compound in the Centrifuge
The Molecule of Life
The Discovery of the Double Helix
From DNA to Proteins
11 The Pyrrhic Victory of Big Science—How Science Was Domesticated by the Military and Industry
Penicillin—The Miracle Drug of Modern Medicine
Quantum Effects in Everyday Life
A Strong Team: Quantum Theory, Logic, and Computer Science
In the Grip of the Military and Industry
12 What is a Human Being?—Our Mind as a Scientifically Ascertainable Entity
A Look into the Distant Past
The Neanderthal in US
An Organ Steps Out of the Shadows
A New View of Feeling and Thinking
Thinking About Thinking
At the Limits of the Explainable
Step by Step
The Self-Model in the World Model
Epilogue: The Fifth Virtue of Science
References
Index
