Bonn 2025 – wissenschaftliches Programm

Bereiche | Tage | Auswahl | Suche | Aktualisierungen | Downloads | Hilfe

PLV: Plenarvorträge

PLV IX

PLV IX: Plenarvortrag

Freitag, 14. März 2025, 09:00–09:45, HS 1+2

Building the Cathedral of Quantum Mechanics — •Michel Janssen — University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA

The upheaval in quantum theory in the mid-1920s is often seen as a paradigmatic example of Kuhn's account of scientific revolutions, in which new buildings are erected on the ruins of the old ones, brought down by an accumulation of anomalies. In our book Constructing Quantum Mechanics, Anthony Duncan and I use a different building metaphor to characterize the emergence of quantum mechanics. As suggested by the subtitles of the two volumes of our book, The Scaffold: 1900-1923 and The Arch: 1923-1927, we see the architects of the new quantum mechanics using parts of the old quantum theory as scaffolds to build the arch of the new one. In this talk, after sketching the underlying alternative to Kuhn's account of scientific revolutions in general, I will give an overview, as non-technical as possible, of the genesis of quantum mechanics in the period 1900-1927.

Keywords: quantum centenary; history of quantum mechanics