If you want to say that the greatest impact on the study of physics in the 20th century, then it is the four great controversies between Bohr and Einstein, which can be said to have influenced the development of the physics community in the past hundred years, until now!
Before the 20th century, the whole physics was under the control of Newton's classical physics, Newton believed in the mechanical cosmology, the world is a precision clock, God made a good watch, fine clockwork, everything after that is certain. However, after entering the 20th century, Newton's classical physics became no longer applicable in the microscopic field!
At the beginning of the 20th century, the physics community gave birth to two universities that have influenced the present day, saying that these two schools, one is Einstein's theory of relativity, which is supported by one person, and the other is the quantum mechanics formed by the combined efforts of many masters.
However, the two schools cannot live in harmony, and the theory of relativity, although it overturns Newton's view of absolute space-time, still retains a strict causality and determinism, while quantum mechanics is more radical, abandoning the classical causal relationship, declaring that human beings cannot obtain definite results of the real world, claiming that it only speculates from this measurement the probability of the distribution of the results of the next measurement, and refuses to make a specific description of the behavior of things between the two measurements.
Therefore, this also led to the verbal battle between the big brother of the quantum school, Bohr and Einstein.
The Big Three of Quantum Mechanics, and one do you know who it is?
However, in fact, in the beginning, Bohr and Einstein were very much in love.
In 1921, Einstein won the Nobel Prize in Physics, and in 1922 Bohr won the Nobel Prize, and they congratulated each other and felt "great happiness" for each other's award.
However, as we all know, Bohr in 1913, he proposed the famous Bohr model, which perfectly explained the structure and properties of hydrogen atoms.
Later, after continuous improvement, a new physical system, quantum mechanics, was born.
This doctrine conflicts with Einstein's theory.
When all was said and done, bohr and Einstein engaged in four major polemics. And these four controversies are also known as the big PK between the big brother of the community and the lone hero!
Why this is so, because Bohr, in addition to being one of the founders of quantum mechanics and the leader of the Copenhagen School, Bohr applied for the creation of the Copenhagen Institute of Theoretical Physics in 1917 and was formally established in 1921.
He vouched for the institute as a well-known scientist and raised a large amount of money. During his 40 years as director, he attracted young talents from all over the world with his unique personality, making the institute the most important and active research center for quantum mechanics in the world at that time.
More than 600 physicists have been trained here, and 32 Nobel laureates have benefited from or worked here. He also often held small, private annual meetings here, inviting famous physicists from all over the world to attend, learn from each other, inspire exchanges, and people praised it as the "Copenhagen Spirit", "Copenhagen Spirit" is Bohr's eternal wealth to the scientific community. This spirit is still revered in the field of scientific research today. Every step forward in quantum mechanics is more or less related to the collaborative research of scientists of this school. It can be said that the Copenhagen School led by Bohr laid a solid foundation for the great development of physics since the 20th century!
However, although Bohr had some stuttering, Einstein's mouth cannon was still inferior to Bohr's. Immediately it was dried up.
In the beginning, everyone just tore through letters.
Albert Einstein: "Quantum mechanics is certainly magnificent. I am convinced in any way that God is not rolling dice. ”
Bohr: "Albert Einstein, don't direct God what to do. ”
The second controversy between the two men was the most famous sword of Huashan in the history of physics, the Fifth Solvay Conference.
It gathered the world's top physicists at that time, and it was a superstar lineup.
Seventeen of the participants won the Nobel Prize.
He is the founder of the Copenhagen School, the founder of quantum mechanics, and the founder of the Institute of Theoretical Physics at the University of Copenhagen. At this conference, Bohr also led the elite of his school - Heisenberg, Pauli, Born, Dirac and a total of 9 Nobel laureates attended.
Guess who these three are
This face is the rhythm of the beating!
However, at this meeting, Einstein was turned upside down by the dried man and was spooked by Bohr!
Empirically, Bohr not only proved that the model conformed to quantum mechanics, but also drew a schematic diagram of the experiment, indicating that the experiment still conformed to the characteristics of quantum mechanics.
At this meeting, Einstein continued to attack, and Bohr knocked Einstein to the ground for N consecutive days.
Einstein, still very faceless, refused to admit that he had lost, and wrote in a letter to a friend:
The philosophy of appeasement of Bohr and Heisenberg was so carefully planned that it allowed it to provide a comfortable soft pillow for the time being for those believers.
Uncle Bohr, the eldest brother of the society
That kind of person is not so easy to wake up from this soft pillow, so let them lie down. ”
When Bohr looked, he couldn't let you go. Immediately take advantage of the chase.
In 1929, Bohr published an article comparing his quantum theory to relativity.
And used the way Einstein refuted Newton's classical physical system to expound quantum mechanics, and treated the other in the other way.
Snap punch in the face.....
However, where Einstein was troubled, at the Sixth Solvay Conference he brought with him his ultimate killer, the Photon Box.
However, Bohr smiled slightly and used Einstein's theory of relativity to crack Einstein's big killing move.
Directly blinded Einstein. Einstein was forced to surrender.
The last polemic between the two men was when Einstein, Podolfsky, and Rosen jointly published an EPR article to fight back from the completeness of quantum theory. Pol, who had already won two rounds, gladly faced the battle, and this time the two sides argued that the understanding of "physical reality" was actually a problem of understanding the special laws of the microscopic world. This controversy gave birth to the famous EPR theory, but this controversy has not borne fruit.
Einstein and Bohr died in 1955 and 1962, respectively, but the great controversy over physics and the philosophy of science continued.
Quantum mechanics and relativity are gemini stars in the history of science in the 20th world. It is the most important achievement of the 20th century. Their arguments were protracted, and even after their deaths, all the theoretical physicists were engaged in the unfinished debate between the two of them.
There are also countless theoretical physicists who want to complete the unfinished business of the two, unifying the theory of relativity with quantum mechanics and achieving a great unification of physics. The great controversy between Bohr and Einstein can be said to have indirectly promoted the great development and prosperity of the scientific community since the 20th century!
String theory is now the most promising theory that unifies the elementary particles and the four interacting forces in nature.
The day before Bohr died, he sketched Einstein's photonic box on the studio's blackboard.
Send a photo of two people with a sense of CP
The relationship between the two people is like Chu Yunfei and Li Yunlong, although their scientific theories and ideological views have never been reconciled, they have formed a friendship that has lasted for decades. Bohr spoke highly of his academic rivalry with Einstein, arguing that it was the source of his own "many new ideas."
Albert Einstein also praised: "Few people have such a keen intuition for hidden things as Bohr, and at the same time have such a strong critical ability." He was one of the great discoverers of science of our time. "