Book Description
The first part of this third volume of Wigner's Collected Works is devoted to his analysis of symmetries in quantum mechanics, of the relativistic wave equations, of relativistic particle theory, and of field theory. It is introduced by the masterly annotation of Arthur S. Wightman. Abner Shimony annotates the second part where the reader will find Wigner's contributions to the foundations of quantum physics and to the problems of measurement. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Meet the Heros
This is a collection of lectures (I suppose in 1968) by those authoritieswho actually created the physic as we know it today. Very much accessibleand provides a rare chance to look into the minds of the giants. Tointroduce some of them:

Hans Bethe. A teacher, collaborator, and goodfriend of R.P. Feynman. Participated in the Manhattan Project and helpedcreate the bomb. The man who first realized what fuels the sun. Got hisNobel Prize for this realization (1967, thermonuclear processes).

P.A.M.Dirac. Created relativistic quantum mechanics and so-called the"symbolic formulation" of quantum mechanics (the bra-ketnotation). His theory formed a basis for later developments of quantumelectrodynamics (QED). More of a mathematician. Had a very deep faith inmathematics. Seldom talked in public.

Werner Heisenberg. Father of _the_quantum machanics. His formulation parallels Erwin Schrodinger's in that,though they used different mathematical languages, they described the samething. Heisenberg's so-called "matrix formulation" was madepossible by his great collaborators, i.e., Jordan, Born and Bohr. He was inthe German camp when the major forces concentrated their powers indeveloping the A-bomb. Heisenberg had thought an A-bomb was a theoreticalimpossibility. Philosophically, he was forever a disciple of Niels Bohr.With Bohr, he was the guru of an orthodox interpretation of quantummechanics, known as the Copenhagen Interpretation.

Eugene Wigner. Amathematician who won a Nobel prize in physics. A classmate of J. von.Neumann. He had a kind and gentle personality (quite rare among famousphysicists). Wigner was the man who gave a Ph.D. to E. Jaynes, who wasdoing research on QED under Oppenheimer and had some difficulties inaccepting quantum mechanics. Wigner, too, had troubles with the CopenhagenInterpretation and presented a unique interpretation that takesconsciousness into account. To most of us, known by his 3-j symbol.

Toobad that Landau (a god figure in condensed matter physics) was not there toshare his insights. ... Read more

Book Description
In this memorial volume, twenty-four of Dirac's closest friends, colleagues and contemporaries remember him with affection.Dirac, who died in 1984, was unquestionably one of the greatest physicists of the twentieth century.The book describes his human side, with many anecdotes about the man with a reputation for silence.His immense influence on modern physics is surveyed in chapters written by eminent scientists.Dirac was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1933 at the age of thiry-one.His tremendous contributions to the field included his prediction of the magnetic moment and antiparticles as well as the spin of the electron.His formulations of the quantum field theory, statistics of particles and fields, his work on gravitational waves, and his prediction of magnetic monopoles stand as monuments to his originality and deep understanding of natural phenomena.This book will appeal to anyone interested in the development of quantum theory or in Paul Dirac. ... Read more

Book Description
Eugene Wigner is one of the few giants of 20th-century physics. His early work helped to shape quantum mechanics, he laid the foundations of nuclear physics and nuclear engineering, and he contributed significantly to solid-state physics. His philosophical and political writings are widely known. All his works will be reprinted in Eugene Paul Wigner's Collected Workstogether with descriptive annotations by outstanding scientists. The present volume begins with a short biographical sketch followed by Wigner's papers on group theory, an extremely powerful tool he created for theoretical quantum physics. They are presented in two parts. The first, annotated by B. Judd, covers applications to atomic and molecular spectra, term structure, time reversal and spin. In the second, G. Mackey introduces to the reader the mathematical papers, many of which are outstanding contributions to the theory of unitary representations of groups, including the famous paper on the Lorentz group. ... Read more