Books about Heisenberg from Amazon.com

Werner Heisenberg’s “uncertainty principle” challenged centuries of scientific understanding, placed him in direct opposition to Albert Einstein, and put Niels Bohr in the middle of one of the most heated debates in scientific history. Heisenberg’s theorem stated that there were physical limits to what we could know about sub-atomic particles; this “uncertainty” would have shocking implications. In a riveting account, David Lindley captures this critical episode and explains one of the most important scientific discoveries in history, which has since transcended the boundaries of science and influenced everything from literary theory to television..
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The Tony Award—winning play that soars at the intersection of science and art, Copenhagenis an explosive re-imagining of the mysterious wartime meeting between two Nobel laureates to discuss the atomic bomb.

In 1941 the German physicist Werner Heisenberg made a clandestine trip to Copenhagen to see his Danish counterpart and friend Niels Bohr. Their work together on quantum mechanics and the uncertainty principle had revolutionized atomic physics. But now the world had changed and the two men were on opposite sides in a world war. Why Heisenberg went to Copenhagen and what he wanted to say to Bohr are questions that have vexed historians ever since. In Michael Frayn’s ambitious, fiercely intelligent, and daring new play Heisenberg and Bohr meet once again to discuss the intricacies of physics and to ponder the metaphysical—the very essence of human motivation..
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The seminal work by one of the most important thinkers of the twentieth century, Physics and Philosophy is Werner Heisenberg's concise and accessible narrative of the revolution in modern physics, in which he played a towering role. The outgrowth of a celebrated lecture series, this book remains as relevant, provocative, and fascinating as when it was first published in 1958. A brilliant scientist whose ideas altered our perception of the universe, Heisenberg is considered the father of quantum physics; he is most famous for the Uncertainty Principle, which states that quantum particles do not occupy a fixed, measurable position. His contributions remain a cornerstone of contemporary physics theory and application.

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The inspiration for Michael Frayn's Tony Award-winning play Copenhagen, Heisenberg's War tells of the interplay between science and espionage, morality and military necessity, and paranoia and cool logic that marked the German bomb program and the allied response to it. On the basis of dozens of interviews and years of research, Thomas Powers concludes that Werner Heisenberg, who was the leading figure in the German atomic effort, consciously obstructed the development of the bomb and in a famous 1941 meeting with his former mentor Neils Bohr in effect sought to dissuade the Allies from their pursuit of the bomb..
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In 1941, two of the world's leading scientists met in Nazi-occupied Denmark. They were old friends, a mentor and his brilliant former protégé, and together they had changed the world of physics But one was German and a leading figure in Hitler's nuclear fission program. The other was Danish, half-Jewish, and a statesman in the global physics community. The meeting between Werner Heisenberg and Niels Bohr broke off in embarrassment and strained their relationship for the rest of their lives. What was said – what exactly happened that night – has been fiercely debated ever since. Michael Frayn's Tony Award-winning drama Copenhagen takes the controversial encounter to the stage. Was Heisenberg trying to forestall the development of nuclear weapons? Carrying out atomic espionage? Or just clumsily seeking personal rapprochement across a political chasm? Frayn's characters play through the different interpretations and find that their understandings, like quantum mechanics itself, are rooted in uncertainty. Michael Frayn illuminates the complexities of self-knowledge, memory, and the very possibility of recapturing the past. The production of Copenhagen stirred up a vigorous exchange between the playwright and historians of science. In 2002, the publicity prompted Bohr's family to release previously unavailable documents pertaining to the infamous conversation. In light of the new information, historians were forced to examine the incident yet again. Michael Frayn's Copenhagen in Debate collects essays specially written by leading historians in reaction to the play and the new documents. They debate Frayn's depiction, shed light on the mystery at its center, and reflect on the relation between history and drama. What conclusions can be drawn from Copenhagen? That is for the reader to decide. By special arrangement with the Niels Bohr Archive in Copenhagen, Bohr's now-famous documents are reproduced in this volume..
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Meeting the Universe Halfway is an ambitious book with far-reaching implications for numerous fields in the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities In this volume, Karen Barad, theoretical physicist and feminist theorist, elaborates her theory of agential realism. Offering an account of the world as a whole rather than as composed of separate natural and social realms, agential realism is at once a new epistemology, ontology, and ethics. The starting point for Barad’s analysis is the philosophical framework of quantum physicist Niels Bohr. Barad extends and partially revises Bohr’s philosophical views in light of current scholarship in physics, science studies, and the philosophy of science as well as feminist, poststructuralist, and other critical social theories. In the process, she significantly reworks understandings of space, time, matter, causality, agency, subjectivity, and objectivity.

In an agential realist account, the world is made of entanglements of “social” and “natural” agencies, where the distinction between the two emerges out of specific intra-actions. Intra-activity is an inexhaustible dynamism that configures and reconfigures relations of space-time-matter. In explaining intra-activity, Barad reveals questions about how nature and culture interact and change over time to be fundamentally misguided. And she reframes understanding of the nature of scientific and political practices and their “interrelationship.” Thus she pays particular attention to the responsible practice of science, and she emphasizes changes in the understanding of political practices, critically reworking Judith Butler’s influential theory of performativity. Finally, Barad uses agential realism to produce a new interpretation of quantum physics, demonstrating that agential realism is more than a means of reflecting on science; it can be used to actually do science..
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Over the years, Jeremy Bernstein has been in contact with many of the world’s most renowned physicists and other scientists, many of whom were involved in politics, literature, and language. In this diverse collection of essays, he reflects on their work, their personal relationships, their motives, and their contributions. Even for those people he writes about that he did not know personally, he provides important insights into their lives and work, and questions their character, their decisions, and the lives they led.

In the first three essays, Professor Bernstein looks at economic theory and how some physicists who developed interesting economic models based on derivatives and hedge funds almost led to the country into bankruptcy. In later essays, he discusses a suspect visit to Poland by the great Heisenberg during the Nazi era, a visit that there is almost nothing written about.

Included also are essays on ancient languages and a nuclear weapons program in South Africa that was supposedly dismantled. In one particularly humorous essay, he describes how an ill-conceived manned spaceship to be powered by an atomic bomb was being developed by some of the country’s most powerful intellects. The project never got off the ground.

Dipping into these pages is like rummaging around in the mind of a genius who has a potpourri of interests and an abundance of fascinating experiences. Bernstein has not only rubbed elbows with some of the finest minds in world, he has worked and played with them. He has sometimes mourned with them and laughed at them. His sharp wit and even sharper analysis make for a fascinating read.

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