Related papers: Nietzsche for physicists
The von Neumann attitude on such a deep interpretational question as the role of a human observer in order for the quantum description of measurement to be consistent has been long misrepresented. The large majority of the subsequent…
We study influence of gravitational field on the mass-energy equivalence relation by incorporating gravitation in the physical situation considered by Einstein (Ann. Physik, 17, 1905, English translation in ref. [1]) for his first…
Einstein was deeply puzzled by the success of natural science, and thought that we would never be able to explain it. He came to this conclusion on the ground that we cannot extract the basic laws of physics from experience using induction…
The aim of this article is twofold. First, we shall review and analyse the Neo-Kantian justification for the application of probabilistic concepts in physics that was defended by Hans Reichenbach early in his career, notably in his…
In the last 175 years, the physical understanding of nature has seen a revolutionary change. Until about 1850, Newton's theory and the mechanical world view derived from it provided the dominant view of the physical world, later…
``No one has ever touched Zeno without refuting him''. We will not refute Zeno in this paper. Instead we review some unexpected encounters of Zeno with modern science. The paper begins with a brief biography of Zeno of Elea followed by his…
Physics was in crisis at the beginning of the twentieth century because the newborn Maxwell's electromagnetism defied mechanistic preconceptions. Albert Einstein understood that the solution to the crisis required an audacious reworking of…
A goal of physics is to understand the greatest possible breadth of natural phenomena in terms of the most economical set of basic concepts. However, as the understanding of physics has developed historically, its pedagogy and language have…
I provide a critical commentary regarding the attitude of the logician and the philosopher towards the physicist and physics. The commentary is intended to showcase how a general change in attitude towards making scientific inquiries can be…
In the seminal essay, "On the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the physical sciences," physicist Eugene Wigner poses a fundamental philosophical question concerning the relationship between a physical system and our capacity to…
The unification of gravity with the three other forces has been an important goal of physics for some time now, because a quantum theory of gravity is necessary to explain the universe at its earliest moments. Its pursuit has largely…
Albert Einstein postulated the equivalence of energy and mass, developed the theory of special relativity, explained the photoelectric effect, and described Brownian motion in five papers, all published in 1905, 100 years ago. With these…
Metaphysics is the science of being and asks the question ``What really exists?'' The answer to this question has been sought for by mankind since the beginning of recorded time. In the past 2500 years there have been many answers to this…
Energy has no definition, except that given by a conservation principle which essentially amounts to defining it as the elements of an open list of unknown cardinality. Entropy, identified by Shannon as information we lack, has too many…
The principle of sufficient reason asserts that anything that happens does so for a reason: no definite state of affairs can come into being unless there is a sufficient reason why that particular thing should happen. This principle is…
In two respects Ludwig Boltzmann was a pioneer of quantum mechanics. First because in his statistical interpretation of the second law of thermodynamics he introduced the theory of probability into a fundamental law of physics and thus…
It is said that Einstein's conceptual base for the theory of relativity was the philosophy formulated by Immanuel Kant. Then, is it possible to see how Kant played a role in Einstein's thinking without reading Kant's books? This question…
In the last quarter of the nineteenth century, Ludwig Boltzmann explained how irreversible macroscopic laws, in particular the second law of thermodynamics, originate in the time-reversible laws of microscopic physics. Boltzmann's analysis,…
The cultural infrastructure that let Galileo invent the modern physics is discussed. The key new element of modern physics was firm belief in its fundamental structure, which could be expressed in the double postulate: 1) There are…
Though the majority of physicists would probably not support preemptive wars, nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction would not exist without their contributions. Einstein's anti-militaristic position has been well-documented and the…