100th Anniversary of Quantum Physics

EricR writes "On December 14, 1900, Max Planck presented experimental results in front of the German Physical Society and announced that they could best be explained if energy exists in discrete packets, which he called "quanta." Today is the 100th birthday of Quantum Physics."

Comments

100th?

[servoled]

Would it be the 102nd? Or am I missing something here.

Re:100th?

[Anonymous Coward]

>Would it be the 102nd? Or am I missing something here.

The number 100 is correct.

Slashdot is simply very late with the news this time.

Re:100th?

[MrResistor]

It's slashdot math. You know, it's just like how 50+2-1=49

Re:100th?

[grub]

It's 102 in imperial years, 100 in metric years.

Re:100th?

[pimpinmonk]

Nah, it's correct. In the spirit of Planck they correctly accounted for the transformation from numbers to waves to particles and back.

Re:100th?

[Henry V .009]

Oh ye of little faith!

delta E * delta t >= h-bar

Therefore, the slashdot editors are being careful about not determining the time too precisely lest Max Planck and the German Physical Society accidently obtain an energy with an order of magnitude anywhere between a butterfly's wings and a supernova.

Re:100th?

[doubtless]

Yes, it is the 100th anniversary, but we have problem zeroing in the exactly street address Max Planck started all this. However, scientists are pretty sure he was somewhere in Germany.

Re:100th?

[Have Blue]

Given that Slashdot time was 100 years and wall-clock time was 102 years, we can determine that Slashdot is moving at an average velocity of 2.941 x 10^8 meters per second relative to the news source. No wonder no one has time to read the article...

Richard P. Feynman said...

[bartash]

"I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics."

Re:Richard P. Feynman said...

[grahamlee]

What Einstein disagreed with were things like the Uncertainty Principle, the EPR paradox (If he had lived to see it), and most likely even Schrodinger's Cat[1]. He disagreed with the assumptions that led to these conclusions.

I think his main problem was the idea of Universal instantaneous collapse of the wavefunction (which leads to "spooky action at a distance"[2] and God playing "dice with the Universe"). These concepts came from the Copenhagen Interpretation, and was the best way the Quantum theoreticians could think to explain the seemingly counterintuitive results of QM - it's pure philosophy and has nothing to do with the Physics.

Of course not everyone necessarily subscribes Copenhagen now. My personal favourite explanation is the proposition popular in the 80s and in Sliders - that multiple Universes are created at each instant multiple outcomes are possible, each reflecting the different outcomes.

So Einstein was most definitely NOT a supporter of quantum mechanics as we now know it.

Quantum mechanics as we currently know it includes Bose-Einstein statistics describing the behaviour of systems of integer-spin particles (which leads to the concept of a Bose-Einstein condensate - a highly active area of research today); Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation (described at the atomic scale by the Einstein coefficients); quantisation of electromagnetic radiation (proposed by Einstein); Einstein's explanation of the photoelectric effect (for which he received the Nobel prize). Stretching the boundaries a little, there are equations for the equilibrium number of charge carriers in Solid State physics which rely on the quantisation of charge in the material. These are known as the Einstein equations.

Even the greatest can be mistaken.

Such as when he removed lambda from his equation on the state of the Universe (his "biggest blunder", indeed :-)).

[1]Point of order: even Schroedinger didn't believe in Schroedinger's Cat. He set it up as a thought experiment to show how absurd QM is (I mean, who could really believe in a dead/alive cat? Not him). The experiment has of course, since been done, sans cat.

[2]He believed that the "instantaneous" collapse of the wavefunction would lead to information being propagated instantaneously throughout the Universe. Of course, the wavefunction is not a measurable quantity so this does not occur.

Enrico Fermi Institute - Dec 2nd

[VoidEngineer]

Gotta love quantum physics...

Check out the University of Chicago's Physics Department for all the information you could want to know about modern research in quantum physics.

Oh, and December 2, 2002 was the 60th Anniversy of the first self-sustaining controlled release of nuclear energy

boo hoo

[coloth]

I didn't understand the impact of uncertainty until I saw The Crying Game.

My thoughts on the matter.

[Sean Johnson]

Of course describing energy as quanta is just a way for us to understand how things work. Anytime we discover and present a theory as to how things work in the universe we are presenting a picture or an incomplete slice of the whole (as how we understand it). Sure it helps us understand better, but we have to realize that it is not the way things work out per say (as a whole). Meandering on: A GUT theory is an admiral thing to strive for, but we must understand what it must take to come to such a comprehensive theory. All present theories will have to be thrown out of the window. They will never make cohesive integral sense incorporated into a GUT. Each time we delve further into quantumn particles we find more and more suprises. Likewise with peering into the vastness of space.
It is all so amazing and we must realize that any theories we come up with will never be able to describe things as a whole. It is basically the universe trying to understand itself...when it already knows. Dang....now I am getting into Zen philosophy so I will jsut shut up becasue I don't know where this is leading towards.

Sorry about the spelling...

[VoidEngineer]

Since I goofed on the last post, I'll add the obligatory links to:

CERN
The Enrico Fermi Institute
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratories
Agronne National Laboratories
Los Alamos National Laboratories

Yep, all the information you could want on modern Quantum Physics.

Quantum Mechanically Speaking,

[eigerface]

There is a finite probability that this will be modded up to 5.

Tomble answers your questions!

[Tomble]

Maybe I'm just sleepy, but wasn't the anniversary two years ago?

Well, reader, that's certainly an easy mistake to make, considering the title of the story, but if you look a little more carefully at the body, it becomes clear that the title (perhaps chosen by someone else) was wrong and inaccurate in a very different way, probably only badly chosen, due to a simple misunderstanding of the facts:

On December 14, 1900, Max Planck presented experimental results in front of the German Physical Society and announced that they could best be explained if energy exists in discrete packets, which he called "quanta". Today is the 100th birthday of Quantum Physics

As you can doubtless see from a second look, it all fits into place that Planck's announcement, which lead to other scientists further investigating the full ramifications of the theory, was the conception of Quantum Physics as we know and love it today. Whilst the title is obviously innacurate, the observation that today is Quantum Physics' 100th birthday is clearly correct, as it is broadly accepted that models of reality have a 2 year gestation period- a similar duration to elephants, I believe.

Sadly, though, Quantum Physics has not been too lucky in love, having had occasional brief flings with 50's icon Relativity, whom everyone would have liked to see it matched up with, but it never quite seemed to work out for them- it seems they just had too many differences.

Although we all wish Quantum Physics well, and it seems surely impossible that such a great catch would never get married (who knows, maybe good old Q.P will be able to patch things up with Relativity after all), it shall obviously not be having any anniversaries for some time yet.

Hope this clears everything up,
Tomble

Public Advisory

[pyth]

Our teams of scientists have discovered that this article contains trace references to Quantum Mechanics.
As such, there is a risk of discussions developing that involve people talking out of their
completely uninformed ass. Some of the most common symptoms of Quantum Ass-Talking Syndrome (QATS) involve the following topics:

• Philosophy - free will, determinism, subjectivity
  
• Theology - god's omni-something, predestination, free will [again]
  
• Science - failure of predictability
  

If you feel the urge to discuss these topics, we advise that you immediately consult somebody who knows what the hell they're talking about. If further trouble develops, a dose of reality is recommended.

Re:Basis of all science

[the gnat]

I would like to salute Mankinds greatest discovery, Qauntum Physics. This shows teh flexibility of the human brain

Sounds like your brain is a little too flexible right now. Go home and sleep it off, dude.

What Planck actually discovered

[CactusCritter]

The wavelength distribution of blackbody radiation had been determined some (many?) years earlier. However, no one could figure out how to to explain how it could come about.

Somehow, Planck worked out an equation which yielded that wavelength distribution quite precisely. I believe that it is correct that his model was a "what if" conjecture about energy exisiting in discrete packets.

As discussed, the rest is history.

53 years of passing time has dimmed my memory, but I'm pretty sure that is the story.