On the Co‐Creation of Classical and Modern Physics

Abstract

While the concept of "classical physics" has long framed our understanding of the environment from which modern physics emerged, it has consistently been read back into a period in which the physicists concerned initially considered their work in quite other terms. This essay explores the shifting currency of the rich cultural image of the classical/ modern divide by tracing empirically different uses of "classical" within the physics community from the 1890s to 1911. A study of fin-de-siècle addresses shows that the earliest general uses of the concept proved controversial. Our present understanding of the term was in large part shaped by its incorporation (in different ways) within the emerging theories of relativity and quantum theory--where the content of "classical" physics was defined by proponents of the new. Studying the diverse ways in which Boltzmann, Larmor, Poincaré, Einstein, Minkowski, and Planck invoked the term "classical" will help clarify the critical relations between physicists' research programs and their use of worldview arguments in fashioning modern physics.

Strategic management cultures: historical connections with science

“…As classical science evolved, the precision of predictions came to be challenged, where precise prediction or description was made impossible in certain phenomena that started to be observed. With the advent of statistical mechanics the idea was introduced of using probabilistic reasoning instead of aiming at full precision (Boisot and McKelvey, 2010;Lyotard, 1979;Staley, 2005). Thus, the dynamics of a system started to be studied as the statistical behaviors of its constituent elements, where variance was usually interpreted as error or noise (Allen and Boulton, 2011).…”

“…In summary, classical science represents a way of encoding natural systems to produce theories in the language of mathematics, which based on experimentation, reductionism, causality, and parsimony predict either exactly or probabilistically the evolution of dynamic systems (Allen and Boulton, 2011;Boisot and McKelvey, 2010;Ghoshal, 2005;Gribbin, 2003;McMillan, 2004;Mikulecky, 2001;Staley, 2005). Classical science is an expression of modernism -of a progressive ethos-, as "the focus is on a phenomenal world directly and unproblematically observed" and understood (Boisot and McKelvey, 2010, p. 415).…”

How to manage a revolution: Isaac Newton in the early twentieth century

“…At this inaugural Solvay Congress, themed around the topic of radiation, Max Planck gave an address that, for those present, cemented a new quantum-focused definition of modern physics and a corresponding classical physics. 11 Although Planck's words had limited reach, they were evidence of a recurring preoccupation among physicists, concerning dramatic shifts in their discipline and the relationship between the old and the new. And while these physicists began to create their own particular brand of modernism, parallel changes were occurring elsewhere.…”

Hypothesis and Convention in Poincaré’s Defense of Galilei Spacetime

“…In the fall of 1911, he participated in discussions of the theory of quanta as a member of the First Solvay Council, along with Einstein, Planck, Sommerfeld, Nernst and others. As Staley (2005) observes, Poincaré was struck by the fact that these physicists already referred to relativistic mechanics as the "old mechanics," the new mechanics being that of energy quanta. Shortly after the Solvay Council, Poincaré showed (as did Paul Ehrenfest) the quantum hypothesis to be necessary and sufficient for the establishment of Planck's law (Prentis 1995).…”