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Understanding Relativity: Origin and Impact of a Scientific Revolution
The central subject matter of this book is Einstein's special theory of relativiry. While it is a book that is written primarily for a lay audience this does not necessarily mean an audience not versed in the ways of doing science. Rather, this book is written for anyone wishing to consider the nature of the scientific enterprise: where ideas come from, how they become established and accepted, what the relationships are among theories, predictions, and measurements, or the relationship between ideas in a scientific theory and the values held to be important within the larger culture. Some readers will find it strange that I raise any of these issues. It is a common view in our culture that the status of knowledge within science is totally different from the status of knowledge in other areas of human endeavor. The word "science" stems from the Latin word meaning "to know" and indeed, knowledge which scientists acquire in their work is commonly held to be certain, unyielding, and absolute. Consider how we use the adjective "scientific. " There are investors and there are scientific investors. There are socialists and there are scientific socialists. There are exterminators and there are scientific exterminators. We all know how the modifier "scientific" inttudes in our daily life. It is the purpose of this book to challenge the belief that scientific knowledge is different from other kinds of knowledge.
- GenresScience
494 pages, Hardcover
First published June 1, 1984
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February 20, 2024
I must admit that I didn't read all of this book--I read the first half closely, but then felt I needed to go back to really understand the scientific argument. And I gradually gave up.
Many years ago (I'm in my fifties) I was an undergraduate physics major. And though I learned what I thought was a good foundation in special relativity, it had been so long that I thought I would enjoy viewing relativity in a historical fashion.
As a history of the science and the scientific movement, this book is good. But it is not easy. Given that this book approaches relativity as it was historically approached and how the theory gradually gained acceptance, one first needs to learn some fundamentals about what was thought to be true before relativity came along. This means a lot of time discussing the ether, ether drift, and the search for an absolute frame of reference--necessary since the clear suggestion in Newtonian physics is that there is an absolute frame of reference. Which I found difficult to absorb, especially knowing that special relativity would demonstrate that such a frame does not exist.
The author believes that a non-mathematical approach is possible for learning special relativity and at some level I found it to be true. But, given that we need to approach the theory as it was gradually constructed and assimilated, rather than in its final form (as a textbook might approach it), this adds an extra burden to surmount. The book first approaches the Poincaré and Lorentz formulations of relativity, which I found less intuitive (or perhaps less familiar) than the Einstein thought experiments.
After the theory is created, then it must be propagated and this acceptance of relativity by the various physics communities at the time forms the second half and the true point of the book. The French school of physics, the German school, the English school and eventually the American school all approached the theory by viewing it through the lenses of their own biases and background. One thing that is perhaps lost on those of us of the modern generation, is that the physics community then was a very small one, and individual personalities and biases played a big part in a theory's acceptance. That scientists and scientific progress proceeds in fits and starts often owing more to the human nature of scientists, rather as a neutral search for 'truth' has been well demonstrated, and this book only builds upon that.
Though details of the various academic disputes seem trivial, the ultimate conclusions about how the theories acceptance was mediated by the various cultures is well developed and rings true, especially in the case of American assimilation:
I'm glad I attempted this. I didn't fully understand or read all of it, but valuable and illuminating none-the-less.
Many years ago (I'm in my fifties) I was an undergraduate physics major. And though I learned what I thought was a good foundation in special relativity, it had been so long that I thought I would enjoy viewing relativity in a historical fashion.
As a history of the science and the scientific movement, this book is good. But it is not easy. Given that this book approaches relativity as it was historically approached and how the theory gradually gained acceptance, one first needs to learn some fundamentals about what was thought to be true before relativity came along. This means a lot of time discussing the ether, ether drift, and the search for an absolute frame of reference--necessary since the clear suggestion in Newtonian physics is that there is an absolute frame of reference. Which I found difficult to absorb, especially knowing that special relativity would demonstrate that such a frame does not exist.
The author believes that a non-mathematical approach is possible for learning special relativity and at some level I found it to be true. But, given that we need to approach the theory as it was gradually constructed and assimilated, rather than in its final form (as a textbook might approach it), this adds an extra burden to surmount. The book first approaches the Poincaré and Lorentz formulations of relativity, which I found less intuitive (or perhaps less familiar) than the Einstein thought experiments.
After the theory is created, then it must be propagated and this acceptance of relativity by the various physics communities at the time forms the second half and the true point of the book. The French school of physics, the German school, the English school and eventually the American school all approached the theory by viewing it through the lenses of their own biases and background. One thing that is perhaps lost on those of us of the modern generation, is that the physics community then was a very small one, and individual personalities and biases played a big part in a theory's acceptance. That scientists and scientific progress proceeds in fits and starts often owing more to the human nature of scientists, rather as a neutral search for 'truth' has been well demonstrated, and this book only builds upon that.
Though details of the various academic disputes seem trivial, the ultimate conclusions about how the theories acceptance was mediated by the various cultures is well developed and rings true, especially in the case of American assimilation:
The American interpretation of the meaning of the theory of relativity is based on the belief that the theory is correct because both the postulates and the predictions of the theory are in agreement with measurement and observation. Such an interpretation is more easily integrated into traditional American views about the relationship between evidence and theory than is Einstein's view that theories are the free creation of the human spirit.
I'm glad I attempted this. I didn't fully understand or read all of it, but valuable and illuminating none-the-less.
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