History 181B - Class 30

History 181B: Modern Physics

Class 30 (4/7/03)
The rise of American physics

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Outline

On the radar screen: Transatlantic crossings
Forward: Training
Reverse: Guest lectures

What is worth seeing in the U.S.?
    The research university (late 19th-century)
        New model, new institutions (and old ones)
        Creating a national community with elite centers
    Industrial laboratories (ca. 1900)
        Origins: Technical and corporate
        The nature of industrial research

Measures of success
    Homegrown Ph.D.s
    Participation in an international network
    The Nobel Prizes

An American style of physics?
Experiment: Precision measurement and technical ingenuity
Theory: Philosophical pragmatism and experimental connections

Names and terms

Primary	Secondary
Ph.D. (Doctor of Philosophy) Johns Hopkins University (founded 1876) General Electric (GE) Bell Laboratories (AT&T) The Physical Review Rockefeller Foundation International Education Board The pragmatist philosophers: Charles S. Peirce, William James, John Dewey	Albert Michelson (1852-1931), NP 1907 Irving Langmuir (1881-1957), NP 1932 (chemistry) Samuel Goudsmit (1902-1978) George Uhlenbeck (1900-1988) John D. Rockefeller (1839-1937) Josiah Willard Gibbs (1839-1903) Henry Rowland (1848-1901)

Assignment

"Lawrence and his Laboratory: A Historian's View of the Lawrence Years," on the web .

    First assignment: Read ch. 1.
    What was the purpose of the nuclear physics machines built in the 1920s? That is, what research did people want to do with them?
    What technical insight led Lawrence to his machine?
    What in Lawrence's background and training prepared him for this work? How much nuclear physics did he need to know?

AND start reading Frayn, Copenhagen.