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February 1, 2009 at 12:45 pm
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February 4, 2009 at 7:39 am
Hi Christine,
Thanks for the video as I wasn’t aware that there was ever any film footage of the fifth Solvay Conference which is certainly markes one of the watershed moments for theoretical physics. The announcer however down plays the role of Debroglie in it all and I’m always riled a bit when they repeat the dice playing god comment of Einstein’s. It’s also a popular notion that Einstein’s problem rested with him not understanding the subject matter yet when you consider that he himself, along with Planck was largely responsible for its beginnings and that he attended not just this conference but also the first and second, that claim is not only erroneous but I find it also insulting to Einstein.
Interesting enough Guido Bacciagaluppi & Antony Valentini have written a Book entitled “Quantum Theory at the Crossroads: Reconsidering the 1927 Solvay Conference” that will be published this April by Cambridge Free Press with a rough draft still available at http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0609184 that’s been posted their since late 2006.
They have poured over the transcripts of the conference to remove much of the myth from the facts of the meeting. Anyway, I’ve over a period of time read much of it and found it to be quite enlightening. I also notice that when it’s to be published in hard cover it will be around $140.00 U.S. so I think I will wait to see if the price will drop a bit before picking up a copy which I will eventually since I think it to be significant enough. Also I would be interested what the editing process has done.
Best,
Phil
P.S. Valentini was a long term visitor at Perimeter Institute a few years back where I first took note of him and his work. He is most definitely not mainstream and a bit of a maverick yet I find he holds a interesting perspective on it all.