History of Physics

(in Polish) kształcenia ogólnego
obligatory courses

Assumption of the subject is to introduce the student to the questions related to the historical evolution of the natural sciences and to emphasize the significance of the scientific revolutions. Moreover, the course pays the attention to the accumulative character of the physics and its associations with other areas of the mankind activities (humanities).

(in Polish) w sali

History of Physics is one semestral course of the subject. It includes 15 hour of the lecture and 45 hours of the discussion session.

The content is following:

1. Prehistoric commencements of physics, astronomy and mathematics in antiquity.

2. Physics in the medieval times.

3. Renaissance breakthrough in the exact sciences.

4. Seventeenth century physics.

5. Enlightenment discoveries in natural sciences.

6. Progress of natural sciences in the 19th century.

7. Advent of modern physics at the turn of the next century.

8. History of advanced physics in the 20th century.

History of Physics is one semestral course of the subject. It includes 15 hours of the lecture and 45 hours of the discussion session (1 hour of the lecture and 3 hours of the discussion session per a week).

Educational profile: general academic.

Type of the studies: full-time.

Block (unit): humanistic, mandatory subject.

Field of knowledge and discipline of science: physical science, history, history of science.

Year of the studies, semester: 3rd year, 6th semester, undergraduate studies.

Introductory conditions: none.

Didactic methods: lecture, presentations, discussions, consultations, unassisted studying.

ECTS points: 5.

Balance sheet of the student's work: lecture (15 hours), discussion session (45 hours), preparing of presentation (90 hours), discussions (5 hours), consultations (5 hours), unassisted studying (20 hours).

Quantitative indicators: lecture (0,5 ECTS points), discussion session with presentations (3 ECTS points), discussions and consultations (0,5 ECTS points), unassisted studying (1 ECTS points).

The content is following:

1) Prehistoric commencements of natural science, astronomy and mathematics. Beginnings of empirical physics. The Ionian Philosophers: school of Pythagoras, atomism of Democritus, Plato's Academy, Aristotle's Lyceum, Musaeum and Library of Alexandria, hellenistic philosophers, geocentric model of Claudius Ptolemaeus. Legacy of antic world in the Middle Ages: Boethius, Martianus Capella, Cassiodorus, Isidore of Seville, heyday of science in Arab world.

2) First universities. Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas. Mechanics in the Middle Ages: Oxford calculators, Nicolas Oresme, Jean Buridan, Vincent de Beauvais, Albert of Saxony.

3) World systems in the Middle Ages. Nicolaus Copernicus and heliocentric system of the world.

4) Optics in the Middle Ages: Robert Grosseteste, Roger Bacon, Witelon, Theodoric of Freiberg. First experiments with magnets and magnetism – Petrus Peregrinus.

5) Isaac Newton: first years of life and studies. Invention of differential and integral calculus. First optical works: reflecting telescope. Isaac Newton relationship with Robert Hooke. Publication of Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica (The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy) and its reception in the world.

6) Tycho de Brahe and Johannes Kepler – against and for system of the world of Nicolaus Copernicus. Physics of Galileo, publication of: Sidererus Nuncius (Sidereal Messenger), Il Saggiatore (The Assayer), Dialogo sopra i due massimi sistemi del mondo (Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems), Discorsi e dimonstrazioni matematiche, intorno à due nuove scienze (Discourses and Mathematical Demonstrations Relating to Two New Sciences). Trial of Galileo. Simon Stevin – under the shadow of Galileo. René Descartes: Discours de la méthode (Discourse on the Method). Achievements of Robert Hooke.

7) Evangelista Torricelli, Blaise Pascal, Otto von Guericke and Robert Boyle – discovery of atmospheric pressure and mechanical properties of air. Boyle's law. First measurements of temperature.

8) Optics in 17th century. Refraction of light, explanation of rainbow phenomenon, Snell's law, diffraction of light, double refraction of light, problem of velocity of light, astronomical instruments of Johannes Hevelius.

9) Two approaches to theory of light. Treatise on Light by Christiaan Huygens. Isaac Newton: New Theory about light and Colours and Optics. Great mechanicians of 18th century: Bernoulli family, Leonhard Euler, Jacob Hermann, Jean-Baptiste le Rond d'Alembert, Alexis Clairaut, Pierre-Louis Moreau de Maupertuis, Joseph Louis Lagrange. Beginning of analytical mechanics. Theory of vibrations. Pierre-Simon de Laplace and his programme. Laplace's Demon.

10) Determining mass of the Earth. Discovery of the Uranus. Discovery of aberration of starlight. Problem of size of the Universe. Discovery of shape of Milky Way by William Herschel. Cosmogonical opinions in the Enlightenment.

11) Eighteenth-century dispute between Cartesianism and Newtonianism. Temperature and heat, termometric scales, hiden heat, dispute over nature of heat, phlogiston, caloric theory. Rumford's and Davy's experiments, gas laws.

12) Electricity and magnetism in 18th century. Giovanni Battista della Porta: Magia naturalis (Natural Magic). William Gilbert: De magnete...(On the Magnet). Commencements of electricity physics, invention of leyden bottle, questions about number of electric fluids, thermal fluid versus electric fluids, Coulomb law, animal electricity, voltaic pile.

13) Electrostatics and electrochemistry at the beginning of 19th century. Discoveries of Oersted and Ampere. Discovery of laws of electricity flow.

14) Forming of chemical element idea in history of science. First Polish handbooks on physics.

15) Works of Michael Faraday, electromagnetic induction. Discovery of ultraviolet and infrared light. Young's wave theory of light. Fresnel's wave theory of light. Discovery ov polarized light, discovery of atomic and molecular spectra. Doppler's effect. Measurements of light velocity: Michelson-Morley experiments.

16) Joseph Henry – outstanding american researcher of laws of electromagnetism. Mathematical theory of heat – Jean-Baptiste Joseph de Fourier, Siméon Denis Poisson, Nicolaus Léonard Sadi Carnot.

17) Principles of thermodynamics: William Thomson (Baron Kelvin), Rudolf Clausius. Kinetic theory of gases: James Clerk-Maxwell, Ludwig Boltzmann. Statistical mechanics: Josiah Willard Gibbs. Conflict between atomism and energetism, suicide of Boltzmann.

18) Principle of energy conservation – works of Julius Robert Mayer, James Prescott Joule and Hermann Helmholtz. Condensation of gases.

19) Introduction of electric and magnetic systems of units. Weber's electrodynamics. Maxwell's synthesis of electricity and magnetism into electromagnetism. Vector notation of Heaviside. Discovery of electromagnetic waves – Heinrich Hertz. Electrodynamics of Lorentz. Physics at turn of centuries. Situation in science near 1900. Roentgen's discovery of the X-rays.

20) Forming of atomistic theory in 19th century. John Dalton. Invention of periodic system (table) of elements. Commencement of radioactivity investigations: Henri Becquerel, Maria Skłodowska-Curie and Pierre Curie, Ernest Rutherford, Frederick Soddy. First great social resonance of physical discoveries in world history.

21) Problem of black-body radiation. Rise of Planck's theory of ideal black-body radiation. Idea of quanats. 1905 – the year of Einstein: Über einen die Erzeugung und Verwandlung des Lichtes betreffenden heuristischen Gesichtspunkt (On a Heuristic Point of View Concerning the Production and Transformation of Light), Über die von der molekularkinetischen Theorie der Wärme gefordete Bewegung von in ruhenden Flüssigkeiten suspendierten Teilchen (On the Movement of Small Particles Suspended in Stationary Liquids Required by the Molecular-Kinetic Theory of Heat), Elektrodynamik bewegter Körper (On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies), Ist die Trägheit eines Körpers von seinem Energieinhalt abhängig? (Does the Inertia of a Body Depend upon its Energy Content?). Explanation of photo effect. Special Theory of Relativity. Theory of Brownian motion.

22) Joseph John Thomson – from cathode rays to electron. Kaufmann's experiments. Paris about the year 1900 – first international congress of physicists. Society of physicists at turn of centuries.

23) Bohr's model of atom. X-rays physics. Bohr-Sommerfeld model of atom. Stern-Gerlach experiment. Discovery of photon. Discovery of wavelike nature of electron. Birth of quantum mechanics: Heisenberg's matrix mechanics, Schrödinger's wave mechanics, Pauli's exclusion principle, Dirac's equation, Born's interpretation, Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen paradox, works of Bohm, entangled quantum states, Aspect's experiments.

24) In Einstein's circle: Marian Smoluchowski, Hendrik Lorentz, George FitzGerald, Max Abraham, Hermann Minkowski, Henri Poicaré. Years 1913 – 1917: Einstein developes General Theory of Relativity. First models of atom. Millikan's experiments. Measurement of elementary electrical charge. Discovery of atomic nucleus.

25) Year 1932 – discovery of neutron, discovery of positron, first nuclear reaction with usage of accelerator, Gamow's theory of alpha decay, cyclotron. Development of nuclear physics: Fermi's theory of beta decay, discovery of artificial radioactivity, discovery of uranium fission, production of first transuranic elements, atomic nuclei models.

26) Discovery of isotopes. Soddy and Fajans law of radioactive displacements. Proton–electron model of atomic nucleus. Rutherford's model of atomic nucleus. Nuclear transmutations by alpha and beta particles. Neutrino hypothesis. Discovery of cosmic radiation.

27) Yukawa's theory of nuclear binding forces. Discovery of muon and pion. Shelter island conference (1947). Birth of quantum electrodynamics. Hyperfine structure of hydrogen atom. Lamb's shift. Measurement of electron magnetic dipole moment. Danysz and Pniewski discovery: hypernuclei. Strangeness. Gell-Mann's quark hypothesis. Colour charges. Bootstrap. Birth of quantum chromodynamics. Physics of neutrinos.

28) Technical acceleration in the years of the Second World War. Fermi's atomic pile. Manhattan Project, role of Oppenheimer. 6th and 9th August 1945: Hiroshima and Nagasaki. German attempts to build atomic bomb: Virushaus. Soviets start to construct the bomb: Igor Kurtschatov. They turned into dark side of power: Fuchs and the Rosenbergs. Hydrogen bomb: Ulam and Teller. Hydrogen bomb in Russia: Andrei Sakharov – from Soviet scientist to dissident. Cold war. Nuclear disasters, Chernobyl.

29) Glashow, Weinberg, Salam: theory of electroweak interactions. Birth of Standard Model. Development of solid state physics and optics in latter half of 19th and in 20th century. Classical free electron theory of metals. Discovery of semiconductors. Quantum theory of solid states. Invention of transistor – mass culture. Development of research about superconductivity. Magnetism in solid states. Lasers, masers, holography. Physics at the beginnings of 21st century. Large research teams. Discovery of Higgs particle in Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Perspectives and directions of physics development in 21st century.

30) Astrophysics and cosmology in latter half of 19th and in 20th century. Discovery of Our Galaxy, structure of stars. Discovery of other galaxies. Cosmological implications of General Theory of Relativity. Expansion of the Universe. Birth of radio astronomy. Discovery of background radiation. The Big Bang cosmology.

The lecture is a preface to the problems presented during the discussion sessions.

1) Andrzej Kajetan Wróblewski: "History of Physics" (in Polish)

2) Jerzy Przystawa: "Discover the Taste of Physics" (in Polish)

3) Andrzej Kajetan Wróblewski: "The Truth and the Myths in Physics" (in Polish)

4) Andrzej Kajetan Wróblewski: "Scholars in Anecdote" (in Polish)

A student:

1. Understands fundamental significance of physics for technological achievements, economic growth and development of civilization.

2. Understands structure of physics, treated as a branch of science, acquires cognisance of connections between its domains and theories, knows examples of false physical hypothesis and false physical theories.

3. Knows restrictions of applicability for chosen physical theories, models of objects and description of physical phenomena.

4. Is capable to give popularily basic facts from learned parts of physics, to sketch structure of physics treated as a branch of science and to present historical evolution of this scientific discipline, emphasizing influence of chosen discoveries on technological achievements, economic growth and development of civilization.

5. Realizes necessity to share knowledge and necessity of popular presentation of physics achievements.

6. Is able to search individually informations in literature and Internet sources, including explorations in foreign languages.

Labels:

K_W01, K_W04, K_W05, K_U01, K_U02.

Students take part in lectures. They are stimulated for asking the questions and initiating the discussion.

Oral eventually written examinations undergo after the end of the course of History of Physics. They verify acquirement of knowledge.

Students get the lists of problems for individual and unassisted solving. Content of the lists is correlated with the lecture. During the courses, students reporting the problems. Lecturer is advised to pay close attention to understanding used concepts and clarity of presentations. He stimulates students group for asking the questions and discussions. Lecturer tries to create sense of responsibility for team inside the seminar group and he encourages the group to joint work.

Assessment of student learning is based on the grade, which includes:

1. Ability to report the problems from history of physics.

2. Ability to discuss subjects of the course.

3. Ability to use the literature and Internet sources.

4. Ability to collaborate inside the team.

5. Creative approach to solved problems.

Permanent grading by lecturer.

Final grade is expressed by the number established in the study regulation, which includes evaluation of the knowledge, abilities and competencies of the student.