A Short History of Physics in the American Century

by David C. Cassidy

As the twentieth century drew to a close, computers, the Internet, and nanotechnology were central to modern American life. Yet the advances in physics underlying these applications are poorly understood and widely underappreciated by U.S. citizens today. In this concise overview, David C. Cassidy sharpens our perspective on modern physics by viewing this foundational science through the lens of America's engagement with the political events of a tumultuous century.

American physics first stirred in the 1890s--around the time x-rays and radioactivity were discovered in Germany--with the founding of graduate schools on the German model. Yet American research lagged behind the great European laboratories until highly effective domestic policies, together with the exodus of physicists from fascist countries, brought the nation into the first ranks of world research in the 1930s. The creation of the atomic bomb and radar during World War II ensured lavish government support for particle physics, along with computation, solid-state physics, and military communication. These advances facilitated space exploration and led to the global expansion of the Internet.

Well into the 1960s, physicists bolstered the United States' international status, and the nation repaid the favor through massive outlays of federal, military, and philanthropic funding. But gradually America relinquished its postwar commitment to scientific leadership, and the nation found itself struggling to maintain a competitive edge in science education and research. Today, American physicists, relying primarily on industrial funding, must compete with smaller, scrappier nations intent on writing their own brief history of physics in the twenty-first century.

Genres: Physics, History, History Of Science

224 pages, Paperback

First published October 24, 2011

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads data base.

http://www.aps.org/units/fhp/newslett...

Reviews

[Liam · Rating 4 out of 5]

"The [first world] war also brought forth a characteristic feature and driving force of American success in physics during most of the century: the appearance of a few powerful scientist-administrators, 'scholar-politicians,' as one historian calls them, who made it all happen. Prepared for such a role through their experience as leaders of expensive, large-scale research projects, these managerial physicists applied their unique abilities in skilled diplomatic maneuvering and good business sense within and across the boundaries of physics and among their partners in government, business, the military, and philanthropy." (27)

"The message [of the Oppenheimer hearings] was that, as in the wartime Manhattan Project, physicists should be on tap, not on top. They were to stick to technical details and avoid expressing any troubling concerns or contributing any broader policy statements regarding their work and its uses unless their views supported those of their superiors." (122)

[Brian Pickering]

More politics than physics, a little to my disappointment, but perhaps that's appropriate in light of the title reference to "the American Century", certainly a political concept. A recurring theme is the concept of science in military/industry (practical/applied) vs. academia (pure knowledge), and how funding pays a major role.

[Matt Heavner · Rating 4 out of 5]

A bit dry and a bit uneven (I think due to trying to keep the book brief). Overall, a good arc of physics, US history of the 21st century, and science/policy. The book includes significant look at the evolution of women and minorities in US physics. There are good references to go further into the subject, so overall, this is a good overview and starting place.

[Tue Le · Rating 4 out of 5]

A brief but insightful book on the history of physics---research, education, and funding---in the twentieth century. Cassidy sometimes mangled certain technical concepts or terms. But his command of history, especially social and political history, was excellent. I am happy to see the research of physicist and historian of physics David Kaiser (at MIT) being cited here.

The timing of the book is a bit unfortunate. It was published in 2011, just a year before the experimental confirmation of the Higgs boson, mentioned in the book as one of the scientific objectives of the Large Hadron Collider at the European Center for Nuclear Research (CERN), near Geneva, Switzerland. Waiting for another year would have allowed Cassidy to close of a discussion on the Standard Model of particle physics in a satisfactory manner. Future runs of the LHC would (in fact, did) look for any possible signs of physics beyond the Standard Model. (No such evidence has been found. But that is a different story for a different essay or book.)

Towards the end of the book Cassidy made a prediction that at the time of writing this review (2026) has proven to be true, namely, the continued internationalization of scientific research (Big Science). For example, the teams working analyzing GRB221009A (the brightest gamma-ray burst of all time) and GW170817 (a merger of neutron stars) were indeed global. There are among the most observed ans studied astronomical events of all time. This trend in scientific collaboration and research occurs in the backdrop of, and is undoubtedly aided by, globalization, which began following the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the (First) Cold War.

At the time of writing, however, globalization appears to be in retreat, and the United States, under the second coming of Donald Trump, is aggressively turning against immigration and is cutting funding for higher education as well as scientific research, resulting in the nation's loss of status as a magnet for global talent, a possible brain drain, and a global hub for science and technology. While something similar had happened before, for instance, the McCarthy witch hunts of the early 1950s, resulting in a short-term brain drain, there is no guarantee that the United States would recover as quickly now. Meanwhile, the share of (young) Americans interested in higher education has been steadily declining, which is not necessarily a problem on its own, given high rates of unemployment or underemployment even among university graduates. However, the number of people studying STEM will likely drop soon, if it has not already, given the aforementioned shrinking of support for research and development. In the case of physics, the number of undergraduates has fallen for a few years now, according to data from the American Institute of Physics (AIP). These political trends are difficult, if not impossible, to foretell. But the decline of the number of physics students is not. It has happened a few times before, in the twentieth century, as mentioned in the book. While many (but not all) scientists will steer clear of politics, social and political trends can certainly help or harm the conduct of science.

It is still far too soon to say with any degree of certainty where any of this will lead. But I think it is fair to say that historians in the future will devote some thought to this strange and accelerated era of history I am living in, including in the context of science and technology. Even though this book was published a decade and a half ago, it already reads like a report from a bygone era of history.