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Home , Physics and Beyond, Werner Heisenberg

Current Comments” EUGENE GARFIELD INSTITUTS F(X SCISNWIC lNFOFMATIO?~ 3501 MARKET ST PHILAOELR+ IA, PA 19104

David Cassidy’s Biography of --the Quantum Mechanic. Part 1. The Path to

Number 47 November 25, 1991

The is known to most scientists and widely used metaphori- cally. In David C. Cassidy’s new book Un- certainty: The Life and Science of Werner Heisenberg,l we learn the history of this concept and something of the personality of its controversial progenitor. While Heisen- berg was considered an opportunist by many, Cassidy concludes that he was a staunch nationalist, but not a card-crm-ying Nazi. He also believes the Germans were capable of making an atomic bomb. He at- tributes their failure to do so to the lack of confidence in Heisenberg’s team by the German high command. Indeed, Cassidy as- serts that the Nobel laureate was eager to build the bomb. At one point he pressed to convince Hitler of the merits of such a project.

Werner Heisenbag

The 1976. He is one of the principal founders of Werner Kad Heisenberg received the modem quantum . We have ex- in 1932 at the age cerpted materials from throughout his biog- of 31, although the award ceremony took raphy and present them below to give read- place the following year when he was 32. ers a flavor for the book, which is quite W.L. Bragg was the youngest Nobel laure- lengthy (669 pages). So we have split our ate in physics, receiving the award at the age verbatim excerpts into two parts. of 25. Heisenberg was the second youngest Heisenberg received the Nobel for his to receive the award in his , along with work on the spectra of and molecules. two others--cad Anderson and P.A.M. He provided the groundwork for solutions Dkac. The average age of a Nobelist is to some of the problems relating to the rota- about 55.2 tions of atoms by successfully predicting Heisenberg was born in 1901 at Sanderau, that hydrogen molecules would appear in a suburb of Wiitzburg, , and died in two forms.

186 His uncertainty principle led to significant As Harriet Zuckerman has note~z many advances in the then new field of quantum Nobelists tend to become philosophers late . The chairman of the Nobel com- in life. Heisenberg was no exception. In mittee for physics, H. Pleijel, of the Royal 1971, he published : Swedish Academy of Sciences, described Encounters and Conversations.5 Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle We learn in Cassidy’s work that while the “According to it is Nazis valued Heisenberg as a brilliant scien- unconceivsble to determine, at a given in- tist, they nevertheless distrusted him. He stant of time, both the position taken up by was subjected to a year-long investigation a particle and its velocity. Closer study of by the Gestapo for suspected disloyal~. quantum mechanics shows in fact that the And there were accusations that the physi- more one attempts to fm exactly the position cist, the eventual father of seven children, of a particle, the more uncertain the determi- was a homosexual, presumably because of nation of its velocity becomes, and vice his numerous friendships with younger verss.”q men. All charges were eventually dropped, Incidentally, 17 of Heisenberg’s dcles but his position remained precarious during listed in the Science Citatwn Index a (SCI @) the Third Reich. have been cited more than 100 times each. These articles were cited in more than 2,500 publications, based on data for 1945-1990 The “Bugs” at Farm Hall alone, ranking him in the top 1 percent of cited authors. His most-cited paper was An interesting account of what top Ger- published in 1948 on a statistical theory of man scientists were thinking during their .q It was cited more than 265 interment immediately after the war is con- times. tained in a book called The Gri&n by Ar- A more complete citation analysis of his nold Kramish.b Heisenberg, along with nine work awaits the compilation of a prewar other members of the so-called “ SC1, although we did a Physics Cikz- Club: were held at Farm Hall, a lovely tion Index as a National Science Foundation counhy estate in England used for intelli- project. In this index, Heisenberg’s work is gence purposes. cited more than 750 times during the The book implies that the German scien- lo-year period< tists during this period fabricated an account of their wartime atomic research that is still being recounted today. According to the book, the Germsns were unaware that Farm Implications Beyond Science Hall was extensively bugged, including the surrounding grounds. As indicated above, Heisenberg’s work The British Foreign Office, the book had implications far beyond the contlnes of notes, is expected to make a decision in science. The uncertainty principle perme- 1992 on whether to release the full tran- ated art and literature after World War 11, scripts of the Farm Hall conversations. fostering a sense of cultural insecurity. To Some parts of the tapes have rdready found many, especially artists and intellectuals, their way into print over the years. If the full the notion that it was impossible to measure transcripts are released, it could shed ccm- unlimitedly both the position and velocity sidersble on Heisenberg’s role in these of a translated to an ad- matters. mission that nothing could be considered Another book of historicrd interest that certain in this world, except, “death and documents Heisenberg’s activities during taxes.” this period is Mark Walker’s 1989 Gernmn

187 National Socialism and the Quest for Nu- of Rockefeller University. clear Powec 1939 -49.7 And a recent review Heisenberg’s relationship to Bohr is ex- by Jeremy Bemsteins of V]ctor plored in detail. This book was also re- Weisskopf’s book The Joy of Insight. Par- viewed by Bernstein. 13Another review of sions of a PhysicisP discusses in some de- the book by John Ziman appeared recently tail the Farm Hall days. in Nature. 14

Copenhagen and Neils Bohr Crw+idy’s Background

Heisenberg studied physics between the David Cassidy spent 6 years in Germany two world wars at , GtMingen, and during the 15 years he worked on the . His mentors were Arnold Heisenberg biography. He is the only histo- Sommerfield, (Nobel Prize in rian who has been granted, by Heisenberg’s physics—1954), and (1922), all widow, full access to all of her husband’s considered giants in modem physics. In sd- papers. Caasidy received his undergraduate dition, his friendships, intellectual collabo- and master’s degrees in physics from ration, and correspondence include the Rutgers University (1967 and 1970) and a names of Einstein (1921), Planck (1918), PhD in the from Purdue Schmdinger (1933), Pauli (1945), Dirac University (1976). (1933), Kramers, Ehrenfest, Franck ( 1925), Since 1983, he also has been on the edito- Oppenheimer, and others. All of these scien- rird staff of The Collected Papers of Albert tists are woven into the fabric of Uncer- Einstein, published by Princeton University tainty. In making our selections, we have Ptess. chosen to highlight the relationship with The excerpts of Heisenberg’s biography Einstein because of Cassidy’s expertise as that follow have been selected with an eye an editor in this area. toward giving you a brief glimpse into the There are, of course, many books on Ein- controversial scientist’s life. stein. One that comes to mind was edhed by Harvard physicist/science historian Gerry ***** Holton, in conjunction with Yehuda El- karta.lo Another is a biography by Ronald My thark to Paul R. Ryan for his help in Clark. 11 preparing this introduction and for selecting Another important book on the the following passages.

Heisenberg era appeared recently-Niels Ol?ms Bohr3 7imes, Philosophy and Polity12 by

REFERENCE’S

1. Caddy DC. Uncertainty: the hfe and science of Werner Heisenberg. New York Freeman. 1991. 669p. 2. Zuckermrrm H. Scierrrific elite. New York: Free Press, 1977.335 p. 3. MagfUF N, ed. 7he Nobel Prize winners: physics. Englewud Cliffs, NJ: Salem Press, 1989. 470p. 4. Heisarberg W. Zur statistischen theorie der turbulence (Towards a statistical themy of turbulence). Z Phys. 124:628-57, 1948. (Cited 265 times.) 5. ------Physics and beyond: encounters and conversations. New York: Harper& Row, 1971. 247p. 6. Kramish A. The gri~n Boston, MA: Houghton Mifilin, 1986. 294p. 7. Wafker M. German national socialkm and /he quest for rrucfsar powez 1939-49. New Yurk: CambridgeUniversity Press, 19S9, 290p, 8, BernsteinJ. The charms of a physicist. (Bouk review.) New YorkReview of Books 11 April 1991. p. 47-50 9, Weisskopf V. ‘thejoy ofinsighr. Pmsions @a physicist. New York Basic Books, 1991. 328p. 10.Holton G & Ettmna Y, eds. Einstein: historical arrd cuhural perspectives. Princeton, NJ: Princeturr University Press, 1984.439 p.

I 188 11, Ctarte R W. Einsrein: rhe life& rimes. New York Avon, 1982. 12, Psis A. Niels Bohr> times, philosophy andpoliry Oxford, UK: Clerendrm Press, 1991.552 p. 13. Bernstetn J. King of quantum. New YorkReview o~%oks 26 September 1991. p. 61-3. 14. ZhrIaeIJ. Deep truths snd trivialities. (Bmk review.) Narure 353:511-2, 1991.

Uncertainty: The Life and !kience of Werner Heisenberg by David C. Cassidy

ABSTRACT

Heisenberg’s family bxkgrormd; his gynrrmimn dsys am tit encmmtms with stems---disegieemerrts with his high school textbook and pnsseges fmm Plato’s lhnaew, his par :ipstion in the @msn youth movement.

Werner Heisenberg, born at the dawn of the twentieth century, became one of its greatest . He is rdso among its most controversial. While still in his early twenties, he was among the handful of bright young men who created quantum me- chanics, the basic physics of the , and he became a leader of nuclear physics and elementary particle research. He is best known for the uncertainty principle, a com- ponent of the so-called Copmhagen inter- p~tation of the meaning and uses of quan- tum mechanics. Heisenberg was also a man who chose to reside in Germany throughout his life. Born into art academic German family, Heisen- berg experienced all the upheavals of the cultural elite in Germany: two lost world wars, a Soviet revolution, military occupa- tion, two republics, and Hitler’s Third Reich. As the leading non-Jewish theoreti- DeNidC. Cassidy cal nuclear physicist to remain in Germany after Hitler came to power in 1933, climb so quickly to the top of his profession, Heisenberg, although not a Nazi, played a attaining a full professorship in theoretical prominent role in German nuclear research physics at the age of 25 and the Nobel prize during World War II, traveled frequently to at the age of 32? What impact did the most German occupied territories, and helped to turbulent period of hk life, the events sur- establish West German science after the war. He died in 1976.... rounding the end of World War I-the logt war, soviet revolution, and the German youth movement—have upon his mature V political and scientific views? What impact In approaching the life of this mars, sev- did his private and professional lives have eral questions immediately present them- upon his scientific achievements? Why did selves. How did this child, born in 1901, this brilliant young man, this product of the

189 best that Germany could offer, hold a prom- Two years out of gymnasium, August inent professorship under Hitler’s Third [Werner’s father] abruptly headed for Ba- Reich and perform research varia, attracted to the southern province by for Germany throughout World War II, the imperial Wagnerian music of the Bavar- working feverishly right up to end of the ian capital, Munich, and by its enthusiasm war?... [From the preface to Uncertainly: for the glories of ancient Greeze. Even more The Life and Science of Werner attractive were the efforts of Bavarian state Heisenbeq.] ofticials to raise the cultural level of the sural province through generous funding of # education and the importation of famous Prussian scholars, the so-called northern Family Matters . August was drawn to one of the these beacons at the University of Munich, Karl The Heisenberg family’s social mobility Krumbacher, a lecturer who soon founded is evident in a carefully constructed family Germany’s only chair for Byzantine studies tree preserved in Werner Heisenberg’s pri- (middle and modem Greek philology). vate papers. The me, rather a typed pedi- Heisenberg immediately converted to the gree replete with certificates of birth and promising yet nearly untouched field, as- baptism, owes its origin to the search by sured of bright career prospects in the rural Nazi authorities for a Jewish ancestor in the southern province. scientist’s past. It maces the Heisenbergs In 1893, August Heiserdxrg completed back five generations to one Heissenberg in his doctorate under Kmmbacher, passed the Heidenoldendorf, a village in the northern difficult teacher-qualifying examination, state of Westphalia. The eighteenth-century and soon became a teacher trainee at the ancestor is succeeded by a brandy burner, a prestigious Maximilians-Gymnasium in master cooper, and a lwksmith. The lock- Munich under its learned and powerful rec- smith, Wilhelm August Heisenberg (1831- tor, Nikolaus Wecklein.... 1913), droppd the seconds in his name and moved nosth to Osnabruck, then in the state W of Hanover, where he raised three daughters and two sons, one of whom was Werner’s Little is known of Werner’s mother, Annie father [August]. [Wecklein]. Neither she nor her sister re- Atler Werner’s grandfather learned the ceived a university education: German uni- locksmith trade, he set out on a “wander versities were closed to women, as a ride, year,” a common rite of passage in those until 1895, and Munich did not admit fe- days. He obviously did well: on his return male students until 1903. Nor are there in- he purchased his master’s business, barn, formative state personnel files on which to and house. Wkh business, propiwty,and title rely: German civil careers were only open to (master locksmith), he easily rose to the men. Both Wecklein girls no doubt attended rank of officird Burger of Osnabruck, a vot- one of the segregated girls’ middle schools, ing member of the town’s middle class. In which typically offered training in the fim- 1858 he ensured his status by marrying the damentals-math, history, and literature— daughter of a prosperous local farmer. The and prepared its pupils for their future roles two complemented each other well. as genteel wives and cultivated mothers of Wllheh-n Heisenberg is remembered as a educated sons.... quiet, cerebral man, an impression con- W firmed in a surviving photograph. His wife, Anne Marie, is remembered for her strong After Heisenberg completed his annual will and keen intelligence .... six weeks of military exercises in the sum-

190 mer of 1901, he and his family moved to increasingly distressed him. Like any other Witrzburg, about 400 kilometers (250 turn-of-the-centmy Burger family, the miles) northwest of Munich. August began Heisenbergs cherished the appearance of teaching in September, while his wife pre- genteel resp@ability, social grace, and rdle- pared to give birth to her second child giance to nationalist trappings .... ~emer] .... W d The bourgeois ambivalent of Werner’s childhood may have played a role in his August Heisenberg is remembered by his own adult ambivalence toward the sweep- family, superiors, and pupils as a rather stiff, ing claims of every system of thought and tightly controlled, authoritarian figure. A belief, including science. At middle age and former student nxalled that the schoohnas- again near the end of his life, Werner de- ter demanded “unbending fulfillment of clared science and religion to be “comple- duty, absolute self-control, and meticulous mentary” aspects of , each with its precision.” “He treats his pupils with propri- own language and symbolism and each with ety but tolerates no lazy boys in his class,” its own limited realm of validity. Different his Lindau redor noted. August must have religiously or intuitively apprehended truths applied the same standards in raising his should be viewed as different sides of the own two boys, who grew up in a family same truth, while rational science-his own structure typical of Burger families at the professio~should be viewed as just one turn of the century: father centered, authori- among a variety of ways of perceiving tarian, hierarchical .... reality....

V #

By the same token, a German woman of In his seventh-grade class, 1917-1918, that era, no matter what her interests or tal- Werner received a dose of trigonometry and ents, regarded as her obligation being an his otlkial introduction to physics. The sole obedient wife and a self-sacrificing mother. textbook for the three years of physics As the wife of a gymnasium teacher and the (1917-1920) WM SUr@ill@y good, thOU@ daughter of a gymnasium reztor, Annie’s rather elementary. It covered, without calcu- duties were self-evident. When Annie mar- lus, such subjects as elementary mechanics, ried AugusL she knew that self-realization electricity, magnetism, hea~ kinetic theory or recognition could be achieved only in of gases, optics, and energy conservation. ensuring the success of her husband and the Save for mathematics, it was comparable to well-being of their children. She excelled a sophomore physics text at a modem brilliantly .... She even learned Russian in American college. Contemporary physics— order to translate research papers for her the relativity and quantum theories-did husband’s use-all this, of course, in addi- not exist for the author of Werner’s gymna- tion to caring, no doubt without help, for the sium text. But, heeding the urgings of the two growing boys .... ministry, he did provide material on other physical sciences, such as meteorology, as- # tronomy, and geography, and offered expla- nations of such technical devices as the Children, on the other hand, wae at the steam engine, water pump, telescope, and bottom of the Heisenberg family hierarchy. telegraph. The SoO-page book was As Werner grew into adolescence., what he crammed with nearly 700 carefully detailed saw and felt from that position must have realistic drawings. Yet Heisenberg, although

191 supposedly entlmdled with technical appa- mostretentive of shap, and these are charw- ratus, insisted that he had little interest in teristics that must belong to the figure with physics until his last two years at the gym- the most stable faces .... And again we assign the smallest figure to fm, the largest to water, nasium, beginning in 1918. And even then, the intermediate to air.,,. Logic and likelihood he maintained, his curiosity was piqued by thus both require us to regard the pyramid as his philosophical ponderings on the prob- a solid figure that is the basic unit or seed of lem of atoms, rather than by any specific fue; and we may regard the second of the desire to study physics. figures we constructed [octahedron] as h Werner’s pondering, so he frequently basic UNt of air, the third [icosahedron] of water. We must, of course, think of the indi- claimed late in life, derived from two en- vidual units of all four bodies as king far too counters with atoms at about that time. One small to be visible, and only becoming visible involved a drawing of mtdtiatomic gas mol- when massed together in large numbers. ecules in his physics textbook. In it atoms Purist Werner seacted to this passage with were joined into molecules with little astonishment and dismay, as he had to the “hooks and eyes.” Accustomed to the realis- drawing in his textbook. How could the sa- tic drawings of technical devices elsewhere gacious Plato befieve that atoms are cubes in the book, the demanding adolescent was and pyramids? More important, “The whole disturbed to find molecules pottrayed in thing seemed to be wild speculation, par- what was to him such a superficial, utilitar- donable perhaps on the ground that the ian manner. ‘“Tomy mind, hooks and eyes Greeks lacked the necessary empiricaf were quite arbitrary structures whose shape knowledge.” Atoms were not to be so rudely could be altered at will to adapt them to treated as objects either of pure speculation different technicaf tasks, whereas atoms and or of superficial utility. Certainly, Plato’s their combination into molecules were sup- atoms bore no relevance to modem science. posed to be governed by strict natural laws. Or did they? This, I felt, left no room for such human In his 1969 memoir Der Teil und & inventions as hooks and eyes.” Ganze (English: Physics and Beyond), Heisenberg’s second remembered en- Heisenberg recalled turning to two close counter with atoms occurred when he read friends horn the gymnasium Military Pre- Plato’s limaeus while freed from school by paredness Association and the postwar military duty in May and June 1919. The youth movement, Kurt Pflugel and Robett relevant passage involved a fictional at- Honsell. As recounted in his memoir, the tempt by Timaeus to explain to Socrates that three young men entered into a neo-Galilean the observable properties of the four ele- discorsi on Plato’s limaeus soon after ments-earth, air, fue and water-can be Werner’s encounter with the puzzling pas- attributed to the transcendent properties of sage. In Heisenberg’s scenario, Kt@ a bud- ideal geometric “atoms.” To each of the four ding engineer, is cast as the crude pragmatist elements, Plato assigned one of the so- and Werner the perplexed seeker of enlight- called Platonic solids. Plato, or a member of enment, while Robert, the deep thinker, is his school, had proven that there exist in given the role of Platonist—atoms are not nature onfy five solid bodies composed of things but mentaf constructs, mathematical equal-sided, twodimensional geometsic ideafs or forms as transcendent yet reality- shapes. ‘fImaeus used the properties of four bound as mathematics itself. Werner’s two of these solids-cube, tetrahedron (pyra- friends argue their positions as though in a mid), octahedron, and icosahedron-in as- chess match, until Robert finally wins, con- signing each to one of the elements: vincing Werner of the validity of Platonism Let us assignthe cubeto earth;for it is the and helping him to comprehend Plato’s most immobile of the four bodies and the Timaean atoms.

192 In another account of this encounter with German youth movement, the experience Plato’s atoms, delivered in defense of classi- that most directly affected the formation of cal stmlies to the old Max-Gymnasium in his adult values.... 1949, Heisenbe~ went so far as to claim that his reading enlightened him to basic d notions of and that from then on “I was gaining the growing conviction For Heisenberg...the youth movement be- that one could hardly make progress in came a vehicle for hk adolescent rebellion, modem atomic physics without a knowl- adventurous impulses, and budding leader- edge of Greek natural philosophy... .“ ship qualities. It spurred his intellectual in- dependence, taught him how his primary d interests-science and music-could tran- scend the chaos of daily life, and gave him PatMnding close and secure friendships with his com- rades, with whom he formed valuable life- “It must have been in the spring of 1920. long relationships ... The end of the Fmt World War had thrown Germany’s youth into great turmoil. The # reins of power had fallen from the hands of a deeply disillusioned older generation, and Cetinly Werner’s relationships with his the younger one drew together in larger and followers and comrades went far beyond smaller groups in an attempt to blaze new mere friendship, even involving a type of paths, or at least to discover a new star to love for one another, but it seems more the steer by.” love of comrades in arms. Though perhaps With these opening words Heisenberg set not devoid of sexual overtones, it expressed the stage for his 1%9 reminiscences, Der itself most extensively as a nonphysical Pla- Teil und airs Ganze (English title Physics tonic love of kindred souls that excludes the and Beyond). He began not with childhocd outside world while uplifting and strength- or adolescence but with the pericd that most ening those privy to such feelings. Women, profoundly influenced him as both scientist of course, could not participate in such and citizen--the chaotic years immediately bonding; in fact, Werner and his fellows following World War I. And he focused nei- never had much to do with women .... ther on family nor on formal education but (To be continued) rather on his participation in the postwar

The above material has been excezptedwith the permission of W.H. Fremnaonod Co. C31991.

With the first issue of 1991, 1S1@implemented a schedule change in the front matter for Current Contents. ~ Citation Classics@ and the ISI @’Press Digest, including Hot Topics, now appear every other week. They alternate with either an essay by Eugene Garfield, a reprint with an appropriate introduction or an essay by an invited guest.

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