106. Niels Bohr, “Can Quantum-Mechanical Descriptions of Physical Reality Be Considered Complete?” Physical Review 48 (1935): 696–702.
107. Niels Bohr, The Philosophical Writing of Niels Bohr, Vol. III, Essays 1958–62 on Atomic Physics and Human Knowledge (Woodbridge: Ox Bow Press, 1987), p. 4.
108. Ne’eman and Kirsh, The Particle Hunters, p. 53. My simplified brief discussion of spin and the following description of the “Pauli Exclusion Principle” are based on this work as are the following three parenthetical citations, though I am responsible for any oversimplifications or misinterpretations. Describing these more recent quantum mechanical developments is much more difficult because of their greater complexity and the fact that their dependence on the mathematical formulation makes it difficult to render it in ordinary language. The following three mathematical quotations are to this work.
109. Crease and Mann, The Second Creation, p. 82. The subsequent parenthetical citation is to this work.
110. Pais, Inward Bound, p. 290.
111. Segrè, From X-Rays to Quarks, p. 171.
112. Crease and Mann, The Second Creation, p. 83. The subsequent parenthetical citation is also to this work.
113. Chris Quigg, “Elementary Particles and Forces,” Scientific American (April 1985): 83.
114. Ne’eman and Kirsh, The Particle Hunters, p. 59. The following five parenthetical citations are to this work.
115. Cf. George Johnson, Strange Beauty (New York: Vintage Books, 2000), pp. 267–96 for an excellent summary of this development. The immediately following parenthetical references are to this work unless or until otherwise indicated.
116. Crease and Mann, “How the Universe Works,” Atlantic Monthly (August 1984: 91.
117. Steven Weinberg, Dreams of a Final Theory: The Scientist’s Search for the Ultimate Laws of Nature (New York: Vintage Books, 1994), p. 237.
118. Harald Fritzsch, Quarks: The Stuff of Matter (New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1983), p. 10.
119. Crease and Mann, The Second Creation, p. 410.
120. For a review of The Grand Design see Steven Weinberg’s article, “The Universe We Still Don’t Know,” New York Review of Books, February 10, 2011.
121. Bill Bryson, A Short History of Nearly Everything (New York: Broadway Books, 2003), pp. 168–69. The following three quotations are also to this work.
122. Albert Einstein, Ideas and Opinions (New York: Bonanza Books, 1964), p. 266.
123. Albert Einstein, quoted from Manjit Kumar, Quantum (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2010), p. 320.
124. Brian Vastag and Joel Achenbach, “Scientists Laud Particle Discovery,” Washington Post, July 8, 2012, A1. The following three parenthetical citations as A2 are to this article.
125. John Horgan, The End of Science: Facing the Limits of Knowledge in the Twilight of the Scientific Age (New York: Broadway Books, 1997), p. 231.
126. Brian Vastag, “WIMPs: Hard to See but Vital to the Cosmos,” Washington Post, December, 4, 2012, pp. E1 and E5. The following parenthetical citations are also from E-5.
127. Kaku Michio, Parallel Worlds (New York: Doubleday, 2005), p. 191. Until otherwise indicated, all the subsequent parenthetical citations are also to this work.
128. Alex Rosenberg, The Atheist’s Guide to Reality: Enjoying Life Without Illusions (New York: W. W Norton & Company, Inc. 2012), pp. 25–26.
129. Michio Kaku, Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100 (New York: Anchor Books, 2011). Except for two additional citations, all of the subsequent parenthetical quotations are to this work.
130. Joshua Reynolds with Robert Heller, MD, 20/20 Brain Power (Laguna Beach, CA: 20/20 Brain Power Partners, LLC, 2005), chaps. 8 and 10.
131. Rosenberg, The Atheist’s Guide to Reality, p. 180. The immediately following parenthetical references are also to this work.
132. Michio Kaku, The Future of the Mind, p. 196.
133. David Deutsch, The Beginning of Infinity: Explanations that Transform the World (New York: Viking Penguin, 2011), pp. 379–88.
134. Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World, p. 263.
135. Ariana Eunjung Cha and Sandhya Somashekhar, “FDA Panel Debates Idea of Three-parental Babies,” Washington Post, February 26, 2014, pp. A1, A4.
INDEX
absolute space and time, cosmological theory of, 13, 63, 76, 77, 140, 164–65, 166, 198
Accademia dei Lyncei, 47
Achinstein, Peter, 111
Acta eruditorum [Acts/Reports of the Scholars] (Wallis), 88
Adams, John, 18
“addition of velocities” rule, 167, 169
adenine (A), 243
Æpinus, Franz V. T., 104–105
aether, 152
and absolute space, 165, 166
and celestial bodies, 23, 37
and Michelson-Morely experiments, 144–45, 165–66
Newton on Æthereal medium, 85, 98, 110, 144, 145, 165
“Age of Enlightenment.” See Enlightenment, Age of
AI. See artificial intelligence (AI)
alchemy, 35, 86, 87, 118, 157
Alexander the Great, 27
Almagest (Ptolemy), 29
alpha rays (α), 156, 157, 173–74, 176, 177, 178–79
American Philosophical Society, 102
Ampère, Andre Marie, 146
Anaxagoras, 11, 21, 117–18
Anaximander, 19, 87
Anaximines, 19
Anderson, Carl D., 208
Anglicanism, 71, 72, 81, 92
Ångstrom, Anders Jöns, 148
angular momentum, 180, 181, 184, 186, 205
Annalen der Physik [Annals of Physics] (journal), 163, 194
“antimatter,” 208
Apelles. See Scheiner, Christopher
Apollonius, 38
Arab Spring, 252, 253
Arago, François, 145–46
Archimedes, 28–29, 38, 43, 47
Arian Creed, 72
Aristarchus of Samos, 20–21, 28–29
Aristotle, 20, 27, 29, 31, 35, 117
Aristotle’s Lyceum, 24, 27
cosmological system of, 23, 37, 43, 46
dominance of philosophy from thirteenth to seventeenth centuries, 10, 21, 22–23, 28, 46, 53, 67
followers of, 141–42
and Galileo, 37, 43, 46, 53–54, 60, 64, 65
and Newton, 10, 67, 78, 79
artificial intelligence (AI), 223, 229, 231, 232, 234, 238, 239, 240, 254
ASIMO (robot), 231–32
Assad, Bashar al-, 250
Assayer, The [Il Saggiatore] (Galileo), 11, 47, 49–50
astrology, 35, 118
Astronomia Nova [New Astronomy] (Kepler), 39
astronomy, 10–12, 14, 20–21, 36–49, 53–58, 81–82
clockwork universe, 11, 37, 41, 64, 91
distance of stars, 56
latest explorations, 45, 222–23. See also celestial mechanics; geocentrism; heliocentrism; solar system; sun
astrophysics, 87, 148
Athanasian Creed and Isaac Newton, 71–72
atomic mass, 174, 177
atomic number, 174, 175, 176
atomic weights, 125–37, 147, 149, 176, 177
atoms and atomism, 205, 214
atomic stability, 175, 186, 188
Greek views on, 11–12, 21, 24, 25, 26, 117–18, 128, 137, 147
isotopes, 151, 157–58, 176, 177
modern atomism, 117–37, 147. See also radiation; subatomic particles
founder of, 118
solar model of the atom developed by Bohr, 14, 181, 183, 184, 186–87, 192, 194, 209
“plum pudding” model of the atom, 173, 179.
See also molecules; radiation
Augustine, Saint, 33
“Autobiographical Notes” (Einstein), 162–63
Avogadro, Amedeo, 130, 133–34, 162, 164
awareness and computers, 232–38
Bacon, Francis, 89
Balmer,
Johann, 180, 182, 206
Barberini, Francesco, 59
Barrow, Isaac, 70, 71, 72
baryons, 212, 214
Becher, Johann Joachim, 119
Becquerel, Henri, 150, 156, 157
Beginning of Infinity: Explanations that Transform the World, The (Deutsch), 222, 251
Bell, John Stewart, 205
Bellarmine, Cardinal, 48–49
Benghazi, killing of American diplomats, 250–51
Bentley, Richard, 76–77
Bergson, Henri, 242
Bernoulli, Daniel, 107
Bernoulli, Johann, 88
Berthollet, Claude Louis, 122
Berzelius, Jöns Jakob, 128, 131–32, 133, 135, 136
beta rays (19β), 156, 157, 158, 176, 182–83
Big Bang theory, 14, 140, 141, 214, 217, 223, 224, 252
Biography of Isaac Newton, A (Westfall), 68–69
biological method of scientific explanation, 65
Bjorken, James, 213
Black, Joseph, 93
blackbody radiation, 70, 84, 158–59, 160–61, 163, 182, 184, 185–86
black holes, 14, 172, 224, 226
Blue Gene (computer), 235
Bohr, Niels, 14, 178–84, 209, 219–20
Bohr-Sommerfeld quantum conditions, 190
“Bohr’s radius,” 182
and Einstein, 183, 188, 200
and Heisenberg, 187–91, 199, 200–201
on hydrogen, 180, 182, 183, 184, 186, 206
on meaning of understanding, 189–90, 204
on Pauli and Heisenberg unified field theory, 227
and quantum mechanics, 181, 184, 187, 201–202
Bohr’s Institute’s impact on, 206
Copenhagen Interpretation, 183, 203, 220
response to EPR article, 201–202
and Schrödinger, 199
solar model of the atom, 14, 181, 183, 184, 186–87, 192, 194, 205, 209
Boltzmann, Ludwig, 161, 164
Born, Max, 184, 190, 191–92, 193, 196–98
Bose, S. N., 210
bosons, 13, 208, 210, 212
Higgs boson (“God particle”), 208, 213, 221, 228, 243
vector bosons. See W particles; Z particles
Boston Marathon bombing, 254
Boulton, Mathew, 93
Boyle, Robert, 23, 67, 69, 76, 78, 96, 117, 118, 125
Bracciolini, Poggio, 25
Brahe, Tycho, 10, 38, 40, 42, 49
brain
compared to a computer, 232–33, 247–48
and consciousness, 246–47, 248
installing human brain in a robot, 240–42
“reverse engineering,” 234–35, 236–37
“Brane World,” 227
Brewster, David, 94–96
Brookhaven National Laboratory, 211, 213
Brougham, Henry, 110
Brown, Robert, 164
Browne, Edward, 88
Brownian motion, 163, 164
Bruno, Giordano, 12, 46, 55
Bunsen, Robert, 148
Buridan, Jean, 60
Caccini, Tommaso, 48
Callipus of Cyzicus, 20
Cambridge University, 67, 68, 70, 81–82, 88, 156, 207, 216
Cannizzaro, Stanislao, 134–35
“Can Quantum Mechanical Descriptions of Physical Reality Be Considered Complete?” (Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen), 201, 203, 215
Cartan, Élie, 213, 214
Castelli, 48, 58
cathode rays, 149, 150, 152–53, 154, 157, 175
Catholic Church, 10, 35, 37, 46, 252
attempts to return England to Catholicism, 81–82
and the Inquisition, 12, 26, 34, 48–49, 53, 58
treatment of scientists, 12, 37
Galileo Galilei, 12, 47–49, 53, 58–59, 61–62
Giordano Bruno, 12, 46, 55.
See also Christianity
Cavendish Laboratory, 156, 173, 177, 178, 180
celestial cosmology, 13, 119
celestial mechanics, 22, 66, 72–73, 74, 75, 117
distinction between celestial and terrestrial worlds, 13, 23, 36, 45, 47, 49, 64, 77
orbits of planets, 20–21
circular orbits, 29, 36–37, 43, 55, 78
elliptical orbits, 10–11, 38–39, 43, 53, 55, 68, 73, 78
and velocities and dimensions of planets, 40, 41, 43, 66.
See also astronomy; geocentrism; heliocentrism
CERN. See European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)
Chadwich, James, 177
Chaitin, Gregory, 223
Charles, Jacques, 125
Charlie Hebdo, attack on, 254
“charm,” 212, 213
Chemical Treatise on Air and Fire (Scheele), 119
chemistry, 13, 84, 117–37, 147, 148, 149, 151, 158, 183, 226
quantum chemistry, 182–83
Christianity
Arian Creed, 72
Athanasian Creed, 71–72
lack of rational credibility, 9–10, 15, 35, 252
and Plato’s philosophy, 21
transfer of Roman Empire to Constantinople, 32–33.
See also Anglicanism; Catholic Church; Protestant denominations
Christian News (newspaper), 90
circular orbits of planets. See celestial mechanics
Classical World, The (Fox), 17, 25
Clausius, R., 161
Clavelin, Maurice, 62
Cleisthenes, 17
clockwork universe, 11, 37, 41, 64, 91
Closing of the Western Mind: The Rise of Faith and the Fall of Reason, The (Freeman), 222
Cohen, I. Bernard, 83, 91
Collegio Romano, 47
Collins, John, 70–71
Collinson, Peter, 102
“Collision of Alpha Particles with Light Atoms” (Rutherford), 177
combining volumes, Gay-Lussac’s law of, 128–30, 133
combustion, 100, 118, 119, 120, 122, 147
Commentaries on the Movement of Mars (Kepler), 39
“common matter,” 104–105
common sense and robots, 234
commutative law, 191
complementarity, 181, 202
Compton, Arthur, 163–64, 184, 185
computer science, 14–15, 230–31, 239–40
brain compared to computer, 232–33
computers becoming aware, 232–38
Deep Blue beating Kasparov in chess, 232, 238
“reverse engineering of the human brain,” 234–35, 236–37
“Connection between Waves and Particles, The” (de Broglie), 184
consciousness, 31
computers becoming aware, 232–39, 241
human consciousness, 237–38, 242–43, 246–47, 248
conservation of momentum, principle of, 52, 68
Constantine, 32
constant proportions, law of, 122–23
“contextual realism,” 15, 18, 204
“Copenhagen interpretation,” 183, 203, 220
Copernicus, Nicholas, 10, 21, 23, 29, 36–38, 109, 139
corpuscular-mechanics worldview of Newton, 36, 50, 52, 63–90, 117, 141, 142, 155, 204
objections to, 109–111, 112, 142–44
wave theory of light replacing, 112–13
“correspondence principle,” 181
“Cosmic Multiverse,” 220
Cosmographic Mystery, The [Mysterium Cosmographicum] (Kepler), 20
cosmological theories
of “multiuniverses,” 14, 216–17, 220, 224, 227
of Newton, 13, 198
Coulomb, Charles, 107–108
Courant, Richard, 191
Cox, John, 157
Crampton, W. Gary, 90
Crease, Robert P., 191, 193, 195–96, 206, 207, 208, 214–15
Cremonini, Cesare, 46
Crick, Francis, 242–43
Crookes, William, 149, 152
Curie, Marie, 150–51, 156, 157, 158
Curie, Pierre, 150, 156, 157
Curiosity rover on Mars, 45, 223
Cyril (successor to Theophilus), 33, 34
cytosine (C), 243
Dalton, John, 93, 118, 123–30, 132, 135, 137, 147, 175
dark energy, 14, 224
“dark-matter particles,” 222, 224, 226
Darwin, Charles, 13, 23, 93, 179, 250
Darwin, Erasmus, 93, 179
Davy, Humphrey, 113, 131, 132
“Dawn” (computer), 235
de Broglie, Louis, 184, 185–86, 194
Declaration of Independence, 18
deductive method of scientific explanation, 21, 22, 65, 85, 189
Deep Blue (computer), 232, 238
deism, 87
De Magnete [On the Magnet] (Gilbert), 38, 94–96
Demetrius of Phaleron, 27
Democritus, 11, 21, 24, 117, 118, 122, 128, 137, 147
DeMoire, Abraham, 73
Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, The (Sagan), 18, 89–90, 115
De Motu [On Motion] (Galileo), 43
De motu corporum in gyrum [On the Motion of Bodies in Orbit] (Newton), 73–74
De rerum natura [On the Nature of Things] (Lucretius), 25
De revolutionibus orbium coelestium [On the Revolutions of Heavenly Spheres] (Copernicus), 10, 36
Desaguliers, John Theophilus, 98
Descartes, René, 10, 23, 50, 52, 61, 67–68, 69, 70, 79, 83, 89, 93, 109, 117
Deutsch, David, 251, 253
Dewey, John, 155
Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems—Ptolemaic & Copernican (Galileo), 12, 53–58
Dialogues Concerning Two New Sciences (Galileo), 12, 44, 59–60
Different Descriptions of Logarithmic Canons [Merifici Logarithmorum Canonis Descriptio] (Napier), 41
differential calculus (fluxions), 28, 77–78, 124
Diophantus, 32
Dioptrice (Kepler), 40
Dirac, Paul, 178, 184, 192–93, 198, 199, 206–207, 208
“Fermi-Dirac statistics,” 210
Discourse on Bodies on or in Water (Galileo), 47
diurnal rotation, 54–55
DNA, 224, 242–44, 247, 249–50, 254, 255
“junk DNA,” 244
Drake, Stillman, 47, 48, 52, 58–59, 61
Dreams of a Final Theory (Weinberg), 222
Dufay (du Fay), Charles François de Cisternay, 99–101, 105
Dulong, Pierre, 132–33, 134, 135
Dumas, J. B. A., 134
dynamic societies, 251, 252–53, 254
dynamo, 146
E = mc2, 81, 163, 168, 194, 211, 223.
See also relativity, theories of
earth
age of, 217
Three Scientific Revolutions: How They Transformed Our Conceptions of Reality Page 27