Faust in Copenhagen: A Struggle for the Soul of Physics - Hardcover

Segre, Gino

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 067003858X ISBN 13: 9780670038589

Verlag: Viking Pr, 2007

Inhaltsangabe

An exceptional copy; fine in an equally fine dw, now mylar-sleeved. Particularly and surprisingly well-preserved; tight, bright, clean and especially sharp-cornered. Literally as new.; 310 pages; Description: x, 310 p. : ill. ; 24 cm. Includes bibliographical references (p. [293]-297) and index. Subjects: Physicists --Intellectual life. Quantum theory --History --20th century. Summary: Known to physicists as the "miracle year, " 1932 saw the discovery of the neutron and the first artificially induced nuclear transmutation. However, while physicists celebrated these momentous discoveries--which presaged the era of big science and nuclear bombs--Europe was moving inexorably toward totalitarianism and war. In April of that year, about forty of the world's leading physicists--including Werner Heisenberg, Lise Meitner, and Paul Dirac--came to Niels Bohr's Copenhagen Institute for their annual informal meeting about the frontiers of physics. Physicist Gino Segre brings to life this historic gathering, which ended with a humorous skit based on Goethe's Faust--little knowing the Faustian bargains they would face in the near future. Capturing the interplay between the great scientists as well as the discoveries they discussed and debated, Segre evokes the moment when physics--and the world--was about to lose its innocence

Über diesen Titel

Reseña del editor:

Documents the 1932 gathering of some forty of the world's top names in physics, placing the meeting against a backdrop of key scientific developments while citing the contributions of specific figures and offering insight into how their unsuspecting collaborations gave way to subsequent historical events.

Biografía del autor:

Gino Segrè is professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Pennsylvania. An internationally renowned expert on high-energy elementary-particle theoretical physics, he is the author of A Matter of Degrees: What Temperature Reveals About the Past and Future of Our Species, Planet, and Universe. He has received awards from the National Science Foundation, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the John S. Guggenheim Foundation, and the U.S. Department of Energy.

Über diese Auflage

• Verlag: Viking Pr
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2007
• ISBN 10: 067003858X
• ISBN 13: 9780670038589
• Einband: Tapa dura
• Auflage: 1
• Anzahl der Seiten: 310