Related papers: Spreading the gospel: The Bohr atom popularised
Most physics textbooks at college and university level introduce quantum physics in a historical context. However, the textbook version of this history does not match the actual history. In this article, the first in a series of articles…
A complete history of early atomic models would fill volumes, but a reasonably coherent tale of the path from mechanical atoms to the quantum can be told by focusing on the relevant work of three great contributors to atomic physics, in the…
We discuss the influential role of Niels Bohr's work in the anti-realist realist re-foundation of physics that took place during the 20th century. We will focus in how, developing the modern co-relational matrix of scientific understanding,…
The atomic model that Niels Bohr suggested in 1913 celebrated its greatest victories in connection with one-electron atoms. Among them were the isotopic spectral effect and what became known as Rydberg atoms, insights that were fully…
The purpose of this work is to retrace the steps that were made by scientists of XX century, like Bohr, Schrodinger, Heisenberg, Pauli, Dirac, for the formulation of what today represents the modern quantum mechanics and that, within two…
In this paper I present and critically discuss the main strategies that Bohr used and could have used to fend off the charge that his interpretation does not provide a clear-cut distinction between the classical and the quantum domain. In…
Niels Bohr's arguments indicating the non-applicability of quantum methodology to the study of the ultimate details of life given in his book "Atomic physics and human knowledge" conflict with the commonly held opposite view. The bases for…
The idea of atoms is old but X-rays provided the first probe into the physical atom. Photographs of X-ray scattering from crystals -Laue spots- were the first visual proof for the physical existence of atoms arranged in a perfect geometric…
A brief account of the world view of classical physics is given first. We then recapitulate as to why the Copenhagen interpretation of the quantum mechanics had to renounce most of the attractive features of the clasical world view such as…
Superconductors have often been described as `giant atoms'. The simplest description of atoms that heralded their quantum understanding was proposed by Bohr in 1913. The Bohr atom starts from some simple assumptions and deduces that the…
The quantum theory of Bohr has roots in the theories of Rutherford and J. J. Thomson on the one hand, and that of Nicholson on the other. We note that Bohr neither presented the theories of Rutherford and Thomson faithfully, nor did he…
It is well known that Niels Bohr insisted on the necessity of classical concepts in the account of quantum phenomena. But there is little consensus concerning his reasons, and what he exactly meant by this. In this paper, I re-examine…
We provided an introduction to transition state theory and the connections it provides between atomic and celestial physics. We include brief discussions of historical background, recent applications in space mission design, and current…
The field of interpretation of quantum mechanics emerged in an attempt to solve the measurement problem. This turned on the perception that Niels Bohr avoided addressing the measurement problem by taking an instrumentalist view of quantum…
Modern atomic and nuclear physics took its start in the early part of the twentieth century, to a large extent based upon experimental investigations of radioactive phenomena. Foremost among the pioneers of the new kind of physics was…
The spectacular successes of quantum physics have made it a commonplace to assert that we live in a quantum world. This idea seems to imply a kind of "quantum fundamentalism" according to which everything in the universe (if not the…
We review Bohr's atomic model and its extension by Sommerfeld from a mathematical perspective of wave mechanics. The derivation of quantization rules and energy levels is revisited using semiclassical methods. Sommerfeld-type integrals are…
Superconductivity is macroscopic quantum phenomenon. From force of habit most physicists pay no heed to a paradoxicality of this fact. Niels Bohr considered quantum mechanics as atomic physics and the paradoxical quantum principles may be…
The famous gedanken experiments of quantum mechanics have played crucial roles in developing the Copenhagen interpretation. They are studied here from the perspective of standard quantum mechanics, with no ontological interpretation…
Evidence is recalled of the strong opposition of Niels Bohr, at the time of the Old Quantum Theory 1.913-25, to the Lichtquanten hypothesis of Einstein. Some episodes with H.A. Kramers, J.C. Slater and W. Heisenberg are recollected; Bohr's…