Uncertainty

Uncertainty: the Life and Science of Werner Heisenberg is a biography by David C. Cassidy documenting the life and science of Werner Heisenberg, one of the founders of quantum mechanics. The book was published in 1992 by W. H. Freeman and Company while an updated and popularized version was published in 2009 under the title Beyond Uncertainty: Heisenberg, Quantum Physics, and The Bomb. The book is named after the quantum mechanics concept known as Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. It has been reviewed many times and was generally well received. Background Cassidy is a historian of science and an associate professor at Hofstra University who specializes in the history of German science and quantum mechanics. He was previously an associate editor of the reference work Collected Papers of Albert Einstein. For the project, Cassidy was the first to be given access to the Heisenberg family's archives. Cassidy's grandparents died in the Armenian genocide during World War I and in studying the era he wanted, in his own words, to "comprehend the nature of genocide, dictatorship, and the hold of mass persuasion over people’s minds". Heisenberg was a twentieth-century physicist best known for developing the uncertainty principle of quantum mechanics as well as his role in the German nuclear weapons program during World War II. He received his doctorate degree at 22, just two years prior to his introduction of matrix mechanics. After being appointed professor theoretical physics at the University of Leipzig in 1926, Heisenberg published his uncertainty principle in 1927 and went on to win the 1932 Nobel Prize at the age of 32. The book draws its name from the uncertainty principle, which states that, in quantum mechanics, there exists pairs of quantities, such as position and velocity, in which you cannot know the precise value of both at the same time. Heisenberg was sympathetic to the Third Reich, though he never joined the Nazi Party. Themes In using the term "uncertainty" in the title, the book argues that a loose form of the uncertainty principle applies to Heisenberg's life as a whole. The book focuses largely on Heisenberg's work on the German nuclear weapons program during World War II, a program that would have given Hitler an atom bomb if it had been successful. The book shows that, contrary to the popular myth, there is no evidence Heisenberg ever tried to sabotage or delay the weapons program or otherwise prevent Hitler from obtaining a bomb.