137 - Arthur I. Miller [155]
where is the fine structure constant. (The numerator and denominator of are multiplied with 2 and c2, and then the defining equation for the fine structure constant, is applied.) This equation reveals the intimate relationship in atomic physics between the fine structure constant, , and the signature equation of relativity, E = mc2. It also reveals the “naturalness” of the fine structure constant in the way in which it emerges in equations describing the properties of atoms.
ways of doing this, all of which end up with 137, are: See Barrow (2003), pp. 73–76, for more examples.
seeking mystical truths and developing farfetched theories: http://home.earthlink.net/~mrob/pub/math/numbers-4.html#cult.
derive it from quantum electrodynamics: Heisenberg to Bohr, January 10, 1935: PLC2, p. 366.
prominent scholar of Jewish mysticism: Gershom Scholem was the person who had doubts about whether to visit Jung after the war. See chapter 10.
“the number associated with the Kabbalah”: Weisskopf (1992).
number of the beast—666—as follows: http://dgleahy.com/dgl/p22.html
“Never before or afterward”: Heisenberg (1971), p. 233.
“it’s a long way to go”: Heisenberg (1971), p. 234.
“conceptions of striking brilliance”: Rosenfeld (1967), pp. 118–119.
“there since the creation of the world”: Quoted from Elisabeth Heisenberg (1984), pp. 143–144.
“theory of the smallest particles”: Pauli to Jaffé, January 5, 1958: PLC8 [2825].
“what I should write and calculate”: Pauli to Jaffé, January 5, 1958: PLC8 [2825].
“mirror complex”: Pauli to Jaffé, January 5, 1958: PLC8 [2825].
about which he was still exultant: Pauli to Jaffé, January 5, 1958: PLC8 [2825].
“could almost feel the silence”: Interview with T. D. Lee by the author, Columbia University, April 23, 2008. At Pauli’s request Lee scheduled the lecture at Columbia University. Lee told me that he personally had misgivings about it right from the start, but Pauli insisted.
but it was clear that the passion had gone: Communication from Eugen Merzbacher, who was there.
the audience burst into applause: Dyson to von Meyenn, December 20, 1958: PLC8, p. 872. Freeman J. Dyson was also there.
“I was greatly saddened”: Yang to von Meyenn, August 27, 2002: PLC8, p. 871.
“the death of a noble animal”: Communication from Jeremy Bernstein who recalled this comment by Dyson during Pauli’s lecture.
“something entirely new, in other words very ‘crazy’”: Pauli to Wu, November 17, 1958: PLC8 [3111].
“It’s so totally stupid”: Pauli to Fierz, April 6, 1958: PLC8 [2956].
“the value reduced to 1/250”: Quoted from PLC8, p. 781.
“Professor Heisenberg and his assistant”: Weisskopf to Pauli, March 7, 1958: PLC8 [2912].
“Only the technical details are missing”: Pauli to Gamow, March 1, 1958: PLC8: [2992].
Pauli’s comment about Titian well in mind: Weisskopf to Pauli, March 7, 1958: PLC8 [2912].
“Since the Heisenberg equation is supposed to describe”: de-Shalit to Pauli, March 6, 1958: PLC8 [2910].
“certainly he needs vacations”: Pauli to de-Shalit, March 11, 1958: PLC8 [2917].
“Super-Faust, Super-Einstein and Super-man Heisenberg”: Pauli to Wu, mid-March 1958: PLC8 [2926].
“how he runs after me”: Pauli to Fierz, May 13, 1958: PLC8 [2992].
“a substitute for fundamental ideas”: Quoted from Cassidy (1992), p. 537.
“don’t laugh in the wrong place”: Quoted from PLC8, p. 1218.
“Things have changed too much”: Heisenberg (1971), p. 236.
“the sober American pragmatists”: Heisenberg (1971), p. 234.
“his belief that that was possible”: Franca Pauli to Mrs. Niels Bohr, in Pais (2000), p. 252.
“a classicist and no revolutionary”: Interview by Jagdish Mehra, February 1958, in Mehra and Rechenberg (1982), p. xxiv.
“a certain defensive wariness”: Glauber (2001).
“And how is your dear mother”: I thank Jeremy Bernstein for this story.
“better than your astronomical work”: Hoyle (1994), p. 310.
“wet after-session”: Schucking (2001), p. 47.
“It’s 137”: Enz (2002), p. 533.
sparked his greatest discoveries: “Theoretical Physics of the ETH to Heisenberg,” December 16, 1958: PLC8 [3130].
they were too busy