Schrödinger: Life and Thought Hardcover – 28 July 1989 by Walter J. Moore (Author) 4.7 4.7 out of 5 stars 62 ratings
Erwin Schrödinger was a brilliant and charming Austrian, a great scientist, and a man with a passionate interest in people and ideas. In this, the first comprehensive biography of Schrödinger, Walter Moore draws upon recollections of Schrödinger's friends, family and colleagues, and on contemporary records, letters and diaries. Schrödinger's life is portrayed against the backdrop of Europe at a time of change and unrest. His best-known scientific work was the discovery of wave mechanics, for which he was awarded the Nobel prize in 1933. However, Erwin was also an enthusiastic explorer of the ideas of Hindu mysticism, and in the mountains of his beloved Tyrol he sought a philosophic unity of Mind and Nature. Although not Jewish, he left his prestigious position at Berlin University as soon as the Nazis seized power. After a short time in Oxford he moved to Graz, but barely escaped from Austria after the Anschluss. He then helped Eamon de Valera establish an Institute for Advanced Studies in Dublin. It was here that he spent the happiest years of his life, and also where he wrote his most famous and influential book What is Life?, which attracted some of the brightest minds of his generation into molecular biology. Schrodinger enjoyed a close friendship with Einstein, and the two maintained a prolific correspondence all their lives. Schrödinger led a very intense life, both in his scientific research and in his personal life. Walter Moore has written a highly readable biography of this fascinating and complex man which will appeal not only to scientists but to anyone interested in the history of our times, and in the life and thought of one of the great men of twentieth-century science. Read less
Review "It is an attempt to analyze a soul, and in that respect, it surpasses even `The Double Helix' by James Watson in its examination of the most visceral drives of a great scientist." The New York Times Book Review
"What is Life? That Schrödinger knew the answer, in more ways than one, is revealed to us in this biograpy." Nature
"This is the best book available today on the life and work of Schrödinger." Times Higher Education Supplement
"It is really two books in one: a clear, elegant and complete account of Schrödinger's scientific life and achievements, and a detailed and insightful account of Schrödinger's private life." Physics Today
"...a literate, readable biography accessible to scientists and humanists alike." American Historical Review
"It is very good on the science--sometimes too good--for it does not shirk detailed expositions of Schrödinger's theories." Observer
"An unusually thorough and competent scientific biography of one of the founders of 20th-century physical theory...an absorbing account of the social and scientific culture of Europe in the period after WWI." Choice
"...full and candid story." New York Review of Books
"The quality of this biography is outstanding, and it promises to be the key authority on the life of work of Erwin Schrödinger for years to come." Science Books and Films
"...a delightfully interesting and sympathetic view of a complex and multifaceted man....This book can be recommended as one of the best scientific biographies for how veridically and sympathetically it treats its difficult, complex subject." Perceptual and Motor Skills
Product details Publisher : Cambridge University Press; 1st edition (28 July 1989) Language : English Hardcover : 528 pages
Good:The book is a very good history about the life of Schrödinger. For meit gave details that I did not know. If you wanto to know how is the life of a physicist during the 30's and 40's ( Second War World) this is the book. Bad: the quality of the pressing is not got in the pages where there are photographies. I hope that in the future pressing this could be resolved. Lo bueno. Este libro es muy bueno si uno desea conocer la vida de Schrödinger. Al leerlo ( aún no lo termino pues estoy en la página 356) lo he encontrado muy claro y con detalles que no conocía. Además hace notar los hechos situados en el período de la Segunda Guerra Mundial donde las cosas eran muy dificiles para todo el mundo. Lo malo: La calidad de la impresión en las páginas donde hay fotografías no es buena. espero que en las próximas ediciones mejoren este tema.
Very interesting book. Of course, not all passages correspond to their own interests, but since I selected something, I learned a lot. The physical descriptions of his works and thoughts were very exciting.
Of all those who have walked this Earth, none can deny that Erwin Schrodinger must rank as one of the greatest geniuses of all time. He developed wave mechanics, the inspired discovery which revolutionized quantum mechanics. He derived both the non-relativistic and relativistic versions of his Schrodinger wave equation - the foundations of modern quantum mechanics. He also proved that the mathematical result arrived at by both wave and matrix mechanics was identical, thereby unifying quantum mechanics into a coherent whole. In short, Schrodinger helped us come closer to understanding the true nature of atoms and subatomic particles than perhaps anyone before or after him. His work made it possible for DNA to be discovered and for molecular biology to develop into the vibrant field that it is today. His discoveries are also relevant to the study of consciousness thanks to their applications to the 'Quantum Mind Theory'.
In the light of these great facts about Erwin Schrodinger, one would expect a considerably excellent effort to be made on any biography written about him. This is the case here. The author has written a thoroughly detailed and accurate account of the scientist's personal and professional life. All of his discoveries are described and explained in understandable language (the author is a research scientist himself). Care is also taken to emphasise the passion that Schrodinger had regarding his quest to find answers to seemingly insurmountable mathematical and physical questions.
Overall, this is a great and fitting book about the greatest of scientists.
Prompt delivery. Product complies with expectations. Extensive biography, sympathetically elaborated and with objective historical evaluation. Recommended for those who want to understand how a visionary grows and takes place.
I was impressed by the freshness of Moore's writing and his diligence in unearthing the daily life of Erwin Schrodinger over so many years. What do you make of a guy who spent his life falling in love easily with so many women and then seducing them? A man who in his forties suffers what Moore euphemistically calls a 'Lolita complex'? He ends up with three daughters, none by his wife, who he remains married to until the end. At least the girls got good intellectual genes.
Schrodinger was no friend to the concept of 'bourgeois marriage', and it might be argued in these enlightened times that he was doing nothing wrong. However, his lifelong self-centred and adolescent attitude to relationships led to collateral damage to many (not all) of the woman with whom he involved himself. Typically it was the younger or less well-educated who were left holding the baby, or worse.
His work was mostly blindingly competent in the spirit of mathematical physics. A strong visualiser, he was close in philosophy to Einstein and had little patience with the Bohr-Born interpretation of his wave equation. His culture, approach, techniques and beliefs all seem curiously dated now, but this was a first rate scientific biography.
This version of the book has the physics as well as the sex. The level is not particularly daunting ... first degree in physics or maths is fine.
Walter Moore captures the life of Erwin Schrödinger, one of the most important theoretical physicists of the 20th century, covering his career, science, philosophy and personal life.
In this ambitious book Moore tries to shed light on all aspects of Schrödinger's life, and tries to connect them, but no coherent picture evolves. I had the impression, however, that this is not Moore's fault, but that the pieces that made up Erwin Schrödinger did not fit into a coherent whole.
A gifted student from an early age on, he took on physics. After initially dwelling in different sub-fields, he developed wave mechanics at the (for creative work in theoretical physics) late age of 38. His almost unparalelled mathematical skills made this advance possible. Schrödinger never saw mathematics only as a tool, but he greatly appreciated it's beauty. Moore does an excellent job in describing the intellectual journey towards this discovery, as well as the giants on who's shoulders Schrödinger was standing. For this work Schrödinger received the Nobel prize in 1933.
In his later years, he dedicated a substantial part of his efforts to the search for a unified (quantum mechanics - relativity) theory of physics. Just like Einstein, with whom he had an extensive correspondence about the mater, he failed. Schrödinger's scientific work is explained in quite a bit of detail. Despite being quite familiar with differential equations, but without a background in theoretical physics, I must admit that I had a hard time following Schrödinger's insights as presented by Moore.
From his student days on, Erwin Schrödinger was a believer in the Indian teachings of Vedanta, proclaiming a one-ness of all minds, which make up reality. It is hard to see how a rational 20th century scientist could adhere so uncritically to an ancient religion. However, these beliefs seemingly did not influence his science much and neither did they influence his personal life.
His personal life was, nevertheless, unusual. He was a lover of interesting women, and he had many (I am all for that!), but many of his loves were still teenagers, while he was in his 30s and 40s (very weired!). For a man of such high intellectual capacity, this shows very poor moral judgment. He was not solely interested in sex, but sincerely in love with many of them and wrote them love poems.
Schrödinger also showed somewhat poor moral judgment in terms of politics, although the turmoils of the 20th century greatly affected him (he was removed from his professorship in Graz by the Nazis). He was not an opportunist, like so many of his fellow Austrian and German physicists. Although he leaned to the left, he basically was not interested in politics at all. An irresponsible neglect during the rise of fascism in Europe!
Moore brings together all these aspects of Erwin Schrödinger, and he does so with lots of knowledge of the local culture and history of the places Schrödinger visited and lived at (Vienna, Graz, Dublin, Cambridge). This is a well researched book in all aspects and one with lots of sympathy for "Erwin".
A brilliant book in every way, covering thoroughly and judiciously the physics and life of Schrodinger as well as placing both in historical context. Yes, at first sight the physics and mathematical equations may make this appear a specialist academic tome only of interest to mathematical physicists. But the math may be skipped around. The remainder gives a fascinating insight to the scientific networks and historical background against which the quantum revolution was worked out. The author writes in a straightforward, lucid style, scientific but including at suitable points nice references (for the literate) to, for example, Goethe, Virgil and Shakespeare (not to mention Schrodinger's own ditties). A compelling, highly recommended read.
Brilliant book. Arrived well on time and was well packaged. This was a gift and apparently the person has not yet read it, but I am sure he will be delighted. Thanks.
Bust of Schrödinger, in the courtyard arcade of the main building, University of Vienna, Austria
Erwin Rudolf Josef Alexander SchrödingerForMemRS[2] (UK: /ˈʃrɜːdɪŋə,ˈʃroʊdɪŋə/, US: /ˈʃroʊdɪŋər/;[3]German:[ˈɛɐ̯vɪnˈʃʁøːdɪŋɐ]; 12 August 1887 – 4 January 1961), sometimes written as Schroedinger or Schrodinger, was a Nobel Prize–winning Austrian and naturalized Irish physicist who developed fundamental results in quantum theory. In particular, he is recognized for postulating the Schrödinger equation, an equation that provides a way to calculate the wave function of a system and how it changes dynamically in time. He coined the term "quantum entanglement",[4][5][6] and was the earliest to discuss it, doing so in 1932.[7]
Spending most of his life as an academic with positions at various universities, Schrödinger, along with Paul Dirac, won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1933 for his work on quantum mechanics, the same year he left Germany due to his opposition to Nazism. In his personal life, he lived with both his wife and his mistress which may have led to problems causing him to leave his position at Oxford. Subsequently, until 1938, he had a position in Graz, Austria, until the Nazi takeover when he fled, finally finding a long-term arrangement in Dublin, Ireland, where he remained until retirement in 1955, and where he pursued several sexual relationships with minors.
His mother was of half Austrian and half English descent; his father was Catholic and his mother was Lutheran.He himself was an atheist.[14] However, he had strong interests in Eastern religions and pantheism, and he used religious symbolism in his works.[15] He also believed his scientific work was an approach to Divinity in an intellectual sense.[16]
He was also able to learn English outside school, as his maternal grandmother was British.[17] Between 1906 and 1910 (the year he earned his doctorate) Schrödinger studied at the University of Vienna under the physicists Franz S. Exner (1849–1926) and Friedrich Hasenöhrl (1874–1915). He received his doctorate at Vienna under Hasenöhrl. He also conducted experimental work with Karl Wilhelm Friedrich "Fritz" Kohlrausch. In 1911, Schrödinger became an assistant to Exner.[12]
Middle years
Erwin Schrödinger as a young man
In 1914 Schrödinger achieved habilitation (venia legendi). Between 1914 and 1918 he participated in war work as a commissioned officer in the Austrian fortress artillery (Gorizia, Duino, Sistiana, Prosecco, Vienna). In 1920 he became the assistant to Max Wien, in Jena, and in September 1920 he attained the position of ao. Prof. (ausserordentlicher Professor), roughly equivalent to Reader (UK) or associate professor (US), in Stuttgart. In 1921, he became o. Prof. (ordentlicher Professor, i.e. full professor), in Breslau (now Wrocław, Poland).[12]
In 1921, he moved to the University of Zürich. In 1927, he succeeded Max Planck at the Friedrich Wilhelm University in Berlin. In 1933, Schrödinger decided to leave Germany because he strongly disapproved of the Nazis' antisemitism. He became a Fellow of Magdalen College at the University of Oxford. Soon after he arrived, he received the Nobel Prize in Physics together with Paul Dirac. His position at Oxford did not work out well; his unconventional domestic arrangements, sharing living quarters with two women,[18] were not met with acceptance. In 1934, Schrödinger lectured at Princeton University; he was offered a permanent position there, but did not accept it. Again, his wish to set up house with his wife and his mistress may have created a problem.[19] He had the prospect of a position at the University of Edinburgh but visa delays occurred, and in the end he took up a position at the University of Graz in Austria in 1936. He had also accepted the offer of chair position at Department of Physics, Allahabad University in India.[20]
In 1938, after the Anschluss, Schrödinger had problems in Graz because of his flight from Germany in 1933 and his known opposition to Nazism.[22] He issued a statement recanting this opposition.[23] He later regretted doing so and explained the reason to Einstein: "I wanted to remain free – and could not do so without great duplicity".[23] However, this did not fully appease the new dispensation and the University of Graz dismissed him from his post for political unreliability. He suffered harassment and was instructed not to leave the country. He and his wife, however, fled to Italy. From there, he went to visiting positions in Oxford and Ghent University.[23][22]
Schrödinger (front row 2nd from right) and De Valera (front row 4th from left) at Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies in 1942
In the same year he received a personal invitation from Ireland's Taoiseach, Éamon de Valera – a mathematician himself – to reside in Ireland and agreed to help establish an Institute for Advanced Studies in Dublin.[24] He moved to Kincora Road, Clontarf, Dublin, and lived modestly. A plaque has been erected at his Clontarf residence and at the address of his workplace in Merrion Square.[25][26][27] Schrödinger believed that as an Austrian he had a unique relationship to Ireland. In October 1940, a writer from the Irish Press interviewed Schrödinger who spoke of Celtic heritage of Austrians, saying: "I believe there is a deeper connection between us Austrians and the Celts. Names of places in the Austrian Alps are said to be of Celtic origin."[28] He became the Director of the School for Theoretical Physics in 1940 and remained there for 17 years. He became a naturalized Irish citizen in 1948, but also retained his Austrian citizenship.[29] He wrote around 50 further publications on various topics, including his explorations of unified field theory.[30]
In 1944, he wrote What Is Life?, which contains a discussion of negentropy and the concept of a complex molecule with the genetic code for living organisms. According to James D. Watson's memoir, DNA, the Secret of Life, Schrödinger's book gave Watson the inspiration to research the gene, which led to the discovery of the DNAdouble helix structure in 1953. Similarly, Francis Crick, in his autobiographical book What Mad Pursuit, described how he was influenced by Schrödinger's speculations about how genetic information might be stored in molecules.[31]
Schrödinger stayed in Dublin until retiring in 1955.
A manuscript "Fragment from an unpublished dialogue of Galileo"[32] from this time resurfaced at The King's Hospital boarding school, Dublin[33] after it was written for the School's 1955 edition of their Blue Coat to celebrate his leaving of Dublin to take up his appointment as Chair of Physics at the University of Vienna.[34]
In 1956, he returned to Vienna (chair ad personam). At an important lecture during the World Energy Conference he refused to speak on nuclear energy because of his scepticism about it and gave a philosophical lecture instead. During this period, Schrödinger turned from mainstream quantum mechanics' definition of wave–particle duality and promoted the wave idea alone, causing much controversy.[35][36]
Schrödinger suffered from tuberculosis and several times in the 1920s stayed at a sanatorium in Arosa in Switzerland. It was there that he formulated his wave equation.[37] On 4 January 1961, Schrödinger died of tuberculosis, aged 73, in Vienna.[38] He left Anny a widow, and was buried in Alpbach, Austria, in a Catholic cemetery. Although he was not Catholic, the priest in charge of the cemetery permitted the burial after learning Schrödinger was a member of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences.[39]
Personal life
On April 6, 1920, Schrödinger married Annemarie (Anny) Bertel.[38][40]
When he migrated to Ireland in 1938, he obtained visas for himself, his wife and also another woman, Hilde March. March was the wife of an Austrian colleague and Schrödinger had fathered a daughter with her in 1934.[41] Schrödinger wrote to the Taoiseach, Éamon de Valera personally, so as to obtain a visa for March. In October 1939 the ménage à trois duly took up residence in Dublin.[41] His wife, Anny (born 3 December 1896), died on 3 October 1965.
At the age of 39, Schrödinger tutored a 14-year-old girl named "Ithi" Junger. Walter Moore relates in his 1989 biography of Schrödinger that the lessons "included 'a fair amount of petting and cuddling'" and Schrödinger "had fallen in love with his pupil".[44] Moore further relates that "not long after her seventeenth birthday, they became lovers". The relationship continued and in 1932 she became pregnant (then aged 20[45]). "Erwin tried to persuade her to have the child; he said he would take care of it, but he did not offer to divorce [wife] Anny... in desperation, Ithi arranged for an abortion."
Moore describes Schrödinger having a 'Lolita complex'. He quotes from Schrödinger's diary from the time where he said that "men of strong, genuine intellectuality are immensely attracted only by women who, forming the very beginning of the intellectual series, are as nearly connected to the preferred springs of nature as they". A 2021 Irish Times article summarized this as a "predilection for teenage girls", and denounced Schrödinger as "a serial abuser whose behaviour fitted the profile of a paedophile in the widely understood sense of that term"[46] Schrödinger's grandson and his mother were unhappy with the accusation made by Moore, and once the biography was published, their family broke off contact with him.[47]
Carlo Rovelli notes in his book Helgoland that Schrödinger "always kept a number of relationships going at once – and made no secret of his fascination with preadolescent girls". In Ireland, Rovelli writes, he fathered children from two students[48] identified in a Der Standard article as being a 26-year-old and a married political activist of unknown age.[47] Moore's book described both of these episodes, giving the name Kate Nolan as a pseudonym for the first and naming the other as Sheila May, though neither were students.[49] The book also described an episode of Schrödinger being "infatuated" with a twelve-year-old girl, Barbara MacEntee, while in Ireland. He desisted from attentions after a "serious word" from someone, and later "listed her among the unrequited loves of his life."[50] This episode from the book was highlighted by the Irish Times article and others.[47]
Walter Moore stated that Schrödinger's attitude towards women was "that of a male supremacist",[51] but that he disliked the "official misogyny" at Oxford which socially excluded women. Helge Kragh, in his review of Moore's biography, said the "conquest of women, especially very young women, was the salt of life for this sincere romantic and male chauvinist".[52]
The physics department of Trinity College Dublin announced in January 2022 that they would recommend a lecture theatre that had been named for Schrödinger since the 1990s be renamed in light of his history of sexual abuse,[53] while a picture of the scientist would be removed, and the renaming of an eponymous lecture series would be considered.[54]
Academic interests and life of the mind
Early in his life, Schrödinger experimented in the fields of electrical engineering, atmospheric electricity, and atmospheric radioactivity, but he usually worked with his former teacher Franz Exner. He also studied vibrational theory, the theory of Brownian motion, and mathematical statistics. In 1912, at the request of the editors of the Handbook of Electricity and Magnetism, Schrödinger wrote an article titled Dielectrism. That same year, Schrödinger gave a theoretical estimate of the probable height distribution of radioactive substances, which is required to explain the observed radioactivity of the atmosphere, and in August 1913 executed several experiments in Zeehame that confirmed his theoretical estimate and those of Victor Franz Hess. For this work, Schrödinger was awarded the 1920 Haitinger Prize (Haitinger-Preis) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences.[55] Other experimental studies conducted by the young researcher in 1914 were checking formulas for capillary pressure in gas bubbles and the study of the properties of soft beta radiation produced by gamma rays striking a metal surface. The last work he performed together with his friend Fritz Kohlrausch. In 1919, Schrödinger performed his last physical experiment on coherent light and subsequently focused on theoretical studies.[citation needed]
Quantum mechanics
New quantum theory
In the first years of his career, Schrödinger became acquainted with the ideas of the old quantum theory, developed in the works of Einstein, Max Planck, Niels Bohr, Arnold Sommerfeld, and others. This knowledge helped him work on some problems in theoretical physics, but the Austrian scientist at the time was not yet ready to part with the traditional methods of classical physics.[56]
Schrödinger's first publications about atomic theory and the theory of spectra began to emerge only from the beginning of the 1920s, after his personal acquaintance with Sommerfeld and Wolfgang Pauli and his move to Germany. In January 1921, Schrödinger finished his first article on this subject, about the framework of the Bohr–Sommerfeld quantization of the interaction of electrons on some features of the spectra of the alkali metals. Of particular interest to him was the introduction of relativistic considerations in quantum theory. In autumn 1922, he analyzed the electron orbits in an atom from a geometric point of view, using methods developed by his friend Hermann Weyl. This work, in which it was shown that quantum orbits are associated with certain geometric properties, was an important step in predicting some of the features of wave mechanics. Earlier in the same year, he created the Schrödinger equation of the relativistic Doppler effect for spectral lines, based on the hypothesis of light quanta and considerations of energy and momentum. He liked the idea of his teacher Exner on the statistical nature of the conservation laws, so he enthusiastically embraced the BKS theory of Bohr, Hans Kramers, and John C. Slater, which suggested the possibility of violation of these laws in individual atomic processes (for example, in the process of emission of radiation). Although the Bothe–Geiger coincidence experiment soon cast doubt on this, the idea of energy as a statistical concept was a lifelong attraction for Schrödinger, and he discussed it in some reports and publications.[57]
Creation of wave mechanics
In January 1926, Schrödinger published in Annalen der Physik the paper "Quantisierung als Eigenwertproblem" (Quantization as an Eigenvalue Problem)[58] on wave mechanics and presented what is now known as the Schrödinger equation. In this paper, he gave a "derivation" of the wave equation for time-independent systems and showed that it gave the correct energy eigenvalues for a hydrogen-like atom. This paper has been universally celebrated as one of the most important achievements of the twentieth century and created a revolution in most areas of quantum mechanics and indeed of all physics and chemistry. A second paper was submitted just four weeks later that solved the quantum harmonic oscillator, rigid rotor, and diatomic molecule problems and gave a new derivation of the Schrödinger equation. A third paper, published in May, showed the equivalence of his approach to that of Werner Heisenberg's matrix mechanics and gave the treatment of the Stark effect. A fourth paper in this series showed how to treat problems in which the system changes with time, as in scattering problems. In this paper, he introduced a complex solution to the wave equation in order to prevent the occurrence of fourth- and sixth-order differential equations. Schrödinger ultimately reduced the order of the equation to one.[59]
Schrödinger was not entirely comfortable with the implications of quantum theory referring to his theory as "wave mechanics".[60][61] He wrote about the probability interpretation of quantum mechanics, saying, "I don't like it, and I'm sorry I ever had anything to do with it." (Just in order to ridicule the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, he contrived the famous thought experiment called Schrödinger's cat paradox[62] and was said to have angrily complained to his students that "now the damned Göttingen physicists use my beautiful wave mechanics for calculating their shitty matrix elements."[63])
Work on a unified field theory
Following his work on quantum mechanics, Schrödinger devoted considerable effort to working on a unified field theory that would unite gravity, electromagnetism, and nuclear forces within the basic framework of general relativity, doing the work with an extended correspondence with Albert Einstein.[64] In 1947, he announced a result, "Affine Field Theory",[65] in a talk at the Royal Irish Academy, but the announcement was criticized by Einstein as "preliminary" and failed to lead to the desired unified theory.[64] Following the failure of his attempt at unification, Schrödinger gave up his work on unification and turned to other topics. Additionally, Schrödinger reportedly never collaborated with a major physicist for the remainder of his career.[64]
Color
Schrödinger had a strong interest in psychology, in particular color perception and colorimetry (German: Farbenmetrik). He spent quite a few years of his life working on these questions and published a series of papers in this area:
"Theorie der Pigmente von größter Leuchtkraft", Annalen der Physik, (4), 62, (1920), 603–22 (Theory of Pigments with Highest Luminosity)
"Grundlinien einer Theorie der Farbenmetrik im Tagessehen", Annalen der Physik, (4), 63, (1920), 397–456; 481–520 (Outline of a theory of colour measurement for daylight vision)
"Über das Verhältnis der Vierfarben- zur Dreifarben-theorie", Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftliche Klasse, Akademie der Wissenschaften, Wien, 134, 471, (On The Relationship of Four-Color Theory to Three-Color Theory).
"Lehre von der strahlenden Energie", Müller-Pouillets Lehrbuch der Physik und Meteorologie, Vol 2, Part 1 (1926) (Thresholds of Color Differences).
His work on the psychology of color perception follows the step of Isaac Newton, James Clerk Maxwell and Hermann von Helmholtz in the same area. Some of these papers have been translated into English and can be found in: Sources of Colour Science, Ed. David L. MacAdam, MIT Press (1970) and in Erwin Schrödinger’s Color Theory, Translated with Modern Commentary, Ed. Keith K. Niall, Springer (2017). ISBN978-3-319-64619-0doi:10.1007/978-3-319-64621-3.
Interest in philosophy
Schrödinger had a deep interest in philosophy, and was influenced by the works of Arthur Schopenhauer and Baruch Spinoza. In his 1956 lecture "Mind and Matter", he said that "The world extended in space and time is but our representation."[66] This is a repetition of the first words of Schopenhauer's main work. Schopenhauer's works also introduced him to Indian philosophy, more specifically to the Upanishads and Advaita Vedanta’s interpretation. He once took on a particular line of thought: "If the world is indeed created by our act of observation, there should be billions of such worlds, one for each of us. How come your world and my world are the same? If something happens in my world, does it happen in your world, too? What causes all these worlds to synchronize with each other?".
There is obviously only one alternative, namely the unification of minds or consciousnesses. Their multiplicity is only apparent, in truth there is only one mind. This is the doctrine of the Upanishads.[67]
Schrödinger’s attitude with respect to the relations between Eastern and Western thought was one of prudence, expressing appreciation for Eastern philosophy while also admitting that some of the ideas did not fit with empirical approaches to natural philosophy.[70] Some commentators have suggested that Schrödinger was so deeply immersed in a non-dualist Vedântic-like view that it may have served as a broad framework or subliminal inspiration for much of his work including that in theoretical physics.[70] Schrödinger expressed sympathy for the idea of Tat Tvam Asi, stating "you can throw yourself flat on the ground, stretched out upon Mother Earth, with the certain conviction that you are one with her and she with you."[71]
Schrödinger said that "Consciousness cannot be accounted for in physical terms. For consciousness is absolutely fundamental. It cannot be accounted for in terms of anything else."[72]
Legacy
The philosophical issues raised by Schrödinger's cat are still debated today and remain his most enduring legacy in popular science, while Schrödinger's equation is his most enduring legacy at a more technical level. Schrödinger is one of several individuals who have been called "the father of quantum mechanics". The large crater Schrödinger,[73] on the far side of the Moon, is named after him. The Erwin Schrödinger International Institute for Mathematical Physics was founded in Vienna in 1992.[74]
^Bub, Jeffrey (2023), "Quantum Entanglement and Information", in Zalta, Edward N.; Nodelman, Uri (eds.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2023 ed.), Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, retrieved 22 October 2023
^Christandl, Matthias (2006). The Structure of Bipartite Quantum States - Insights from Group Theory and Cryptography (PhD thesis). University of Cambridge. pp. vi, iv. arXiv:quant-ph/0604183. Bibcode:2006PhDT.......289C.
^ Jump up to:abcPhysics 1922-1941. Nobel Lectures. Amsterdam: Elsevier Publishing Company. 1965. Erwin Schrödinger Biographical. Archived from the original on 7 March 2023. Retrieved 19 February 2023 – via nobelprize.org.
^Moore 1994, pp. 289–290 Quote: "In one respect, however, he is not a romantic: he does not idealize the person of the beloved, his highest praise is to consider her his equal. 'When you feel your own equal in the body of a beautiful woman, just as ready to forget the world for you as you for her – oh my good Lord – who can describe what happiness then. You can live it, now and again – you cannot speak of it.' Of course, he does speak of it, and almost always with religious imagery. Yet at this time he also wrote, 'By the way, I never realized that to be nonbelieving, to be an atheist, was a thing to be proud of. It went without saying as it were.' And in another place at about this same time: 'Our creed is indeed a queer creed. You others, Christians (and similar people), consider our ethics much inferior, indeed abominable. There is that little difference. We adhere to ours in practice, you don't.'"
^Paul Halpern (2015). Einstein's Dice and Schrödinger's Cat. Perseus Books Group. p. 157. ISBN978-0-465-07571-3. In the presentation of a scientific problem, the other player is the good Lord. He has not only set the problem but also has devised the rules of the game--but they are not completely known, half of them are left for you to discover or deduce. I am very astonished that the scientific picture of the real world around me is very deficient. It gives a lot of factual information, puts all our experience in a magnificently consistent order, but is ghastly silent about all that is really near to our heart, that really matters to us. It cannot tell us a word about red and blue, bitter and sweet, physical pain and physical delight; it knows nothing of beautiful and ugly, good or bad, God and eternity. Science sometimes pretends to answer questions in these domains, but the answers are very often so silly that we are not inclined to take them seriously. I shall quite briefly mention here the notorious atheism of science. The theists reproach it for this again and again. Unjustly. A personal God cannot be encountered in a world picture that becomes accessible only at the price that everything personal is excluded from it. We know that whenever God is experienced, it is an experience exactly as real as a direct sense impression, as real as one's own personality. As such He must be missing from the space-time picture. "I do not meet with God in space and time", so says the honest scientific thinker, and for that reason he is reproached by those in whose catechism it is nevertheless stated: "God is a Spirit." Whence came I and whither go I? That is the great unfathomable question, the same for every one of us. Science has no answer for it
^Moore 1992, p. 4 Quote: "He rejected traditional religious beliefs (Jewish, Christian, and Islamic) not on the basis of any reasoned argument, nor even with an expression of emotional antipathy, for he loved to use religious expressions and metaphors, but simply by saying that they are naive." ... "He claimed to be an atheist, but he always used religious symbolism and believed his scientific work was an approach to the godhead."
^Hoffman, D. (1987). Эрвин Шрёдингер. Мир. pp. 13–17.
^Moore 1992, p. 482: "There was some problem about burial in the churchyard since Erwin was not a Catholic, but the priest relented when informed that he was a member in good standing of the Papal Academy, and a plot was made available at the edge of the Friedhof."
^Moore 1992 discusses Schrödinger's unconventional relationships, including his affair with Hildegunde March, in chapters seven and eight, "Berlin" and "Exile in Oxford".
^ Jump up to:abRonan Fanning, Éamon de Valera: A Will to Power, Faber & Faber, 2015
^Salerno, Bella (8 February 2022). "Schrödinger Lecture Theatre to be renamed the Physics Lecture Theater". Trinity News. Archived from the original on 7 March 2023. Retrieved 9 February 2022. The Schrödinger Lecture Theatre is to be renamed the Physics Lecture Theatre, as it was known during the early to mid 20th century. ... "...it was clear that a large majority of both staff and students now favour changing the name [of] the lecture theatre in the Fitzgerald Building that has borne his name since the 1990s" ... "The current approach continues to honour the indisputable scientific contribution of Erwin Schrödinger, while acknowledging disturbing information – much of it from Schrödinger's own diaries – which is now also known." ... a portrait of Schrödinger will be removed from the Fitzgerald building.
^Beller, Mara. “Matrix Theory before Schrodinger: Philosophy, Problems, Consequences.” Isis, vol. 74, no. 4, [The University of Chicago Press, The History of Science Society], 1983, pp. 469–91, http://www.jstor.org/stable/232208Archived 6 October 2021 at the Wayback Machine. "The Gottingen-Copenhagen physicists, however, presented a united front. They cooperated intimately, each contributing extensively to the emergence of the new philosophy. The distribution of talents in the Gottingen-Copenhagen group could not have been better. The youthful vigor and brilliance of Heisenberg, together with the mathematical virtuosity of Dirac, Jordan, and Born, were balanced by Bohr's philosophical profundity and Pauli's penetrating critical mind."
^Stone, A. Douglas (2013). "Confusion and Then Uncertainty." Einstein and the Quantum: The Quest of the Valiant Swabian. Princeton University Press, pp. 268–78, http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt3fgxvv.32."Ironically, Schrödinger was correct; his method was much more intuitive and visualizable than that of Heisenberg and Born, and it has become the overwhelmingly preferred method for presenting the subject. But with Born's probabilistic interpretation of the wave-function, Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, and Bohr's mysterious complementarity principle, the 'Copenhagen interpretation' reigned supreme, and the term 'wave mechanics' disappeared; it was all quantum mechanics."
^"A Quantum Sampler". The New York Times. 26 December 2005. Archived from the original on 15 September 2017. Retrieved 13 August 2021.
^Rechenberg, Helmut. "Werner Heisenberg: Die Sprache der Atome" Springer-Verlag, 2010, pp. 485, https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-540-69222-5Archived 28 May 2022 at the Wayback Machine. "Noch drastischer sollte Schrödinger seine Meinung im Züricher Seminar nach einem Vortrag über eine neue Arbeit der Konkurrenten ausgedrückt haben. Er setzte sich nachher leicht verzweifelt und verärgert auf die Straße und sagte: "Jetzt benützen die verdammten Göttinger meine schöne Wellenmechanik zur Ausrechnung ihrer Scheiß-Matrixelemente."
^Schrödinger, E., Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, Vol. 51A (1947), pp. 163–171Archived 6 April 2015 at the Wayback Machine. (accessed 3 November 2017)
^ Jump up to:abBitbol, Michel. "Schrödinger and Indian Philosophy"(PDF). Cahiers du service culturel de l'ambassade de France en Inde, Allahabad, August 1999: 20. Archived(PDF) from the original on 7 March 2023. Retrieved 22 January 2022.
^Schrödinger, Erwin. My View of the World, chapter iv, and What Is life?
^"General Scientific and Popular Papers." In Collected Papers, Vol. 4. Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences. Braunschweig/Wiesbaden: Vieweg & Sohn. p. 334.
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