Physicist

“ I shall therefore spend some time in presenting detached fragments of the experimental evidence and inferences upon which certain conclusions are based, hoping in this way to illustrate some of the constructive methods of reasoning employed in research.
The ideas which underlie all our thinking are space, time and inertia or mass. With space and time as a background, the physicist must pursue inertia and everything related to it, along every conceivable path. In this pursuit he comes upon four ultimate though related conceptions: matter, ether, electricity and energy. ”

“ Consequences of the Contraction. This result alone, although it may not quite lead you to the theory of relativity, ought to make you uneasy about classical physics. The physicist when he wishes to measure a length—and he cannot get far in any experiment without measuring a length—takes a scale and turns it in the direction needed. It never occurred to him that in spite of all precautions the scale would change length when he did this; but unless the earth happens to be at rest a change must occur. ”

“ No doubt an intelligent physicist is perfectly aware that the vibrations and wave lengths and electrons and forces by which he explains the changes that take place in the material world are fictions, and does not confuse them with the actual facts in which his actual knowledge of the material world consists. ”

“ The physicist, who knows more or less how the answer is going to come out, can sort of guess part way, and so go along rather rapidly. The mathematical rigour of great precision is not very useful in physics. ”

“ To sum up, the aim of mathematical physics is not only to facilitate for the physicist the numerical calculation of certain constants or the integration of certain differential equations. It is besides, it is above all, to reveal to him the hidden harmony of things in making him see them in a new way. ”

“ Physics investigates Nature, and consequently it knows time only as a length. But the physicist lives in the midst of the history of this Nature, and therefore he is forced to conceive motion as a mathematically determinable magnitude, as a concretion of the pure numbers obtained in the experiment and written down in formulæ. ”

“ With some reason it may be objected that we have here to do, not with an actual process and an actual physicist, but only with ideal processes, so-called thought experiments, and with an ideal physicist who operates with all the experimental methods with absolute accuracy. ”

“ But the process by which the external world of physics is transformed into a world of familiar acquaintance in human consciousness is outside the scope of physics. And so the world studied according to the methods of physics remains detached from the world familiar to consciousness, until after the physicist has finished his labours upon it. ”

“ The idea of one universal medium as the mechanical basis for all physical phenomena was not altogether new to the theoretical physicist but the unification of optics and electricity did much to strengthen this conception. ”

“ As soon as we adventure on the paths of the physicist, we learn to weigh and to measure, to deal with time and space and mass and their related concepts, and to find more and more our knowledge expressed and our needs satisfied through the concept of number, as in the dreams and visions of Plato and Pythagoras; ”

“ The physicist is pushing his researches into paths which but a few years since were thought to be for ever hidden somewhere in the vast realm of the "unknowable," and the boundary line between so-called physical and metaphysical science is continually narrowing. ”

“ The chemist, in turn, must know something of physics, while the physicist can not move a step until he calls in the mathematician to his aid. Astronomy long appeared to be an isolated study, requiring nothing more than geometrical and arithmetical skill ”

“ Most people are familiar with the broad academic breakdown of the sciences into physics, chemistry, biology, geology, engineering, and mathematics. It is therefore convenient to examine the activities of scientific personnel in each of these areas, as well as medicine, with emphasis on the nuclear energy aspects of each.
Physics
The physicist is dedicated to investigating the laws that govern the universe. He explores gravity, motion, mass, energy, and the myriad interrelated ways that the world is constructed to gain an understanding of his physical surroundings. ”

“ The same thing holds of any science. A boy picks up a bit of jagged stone, and with a jerk of his wrist flips it across the road. No physicist could tell you the exact course described by that stone, and no physicist wants to. Physics deals with the ideal course of ideal projectiles hurled under fixed conditions ”

“ If these points are understood we may pass to a definite example and investigate how the physicist will proceed when he wishes to determine whether or not two external events occurring in different places are simultaneous in the physical sense. ”

“ Therefore psychologically we must keep all the theories in our heads, and every theoretical physicist who is any good knows six or seven different theoretical representations for exactly the same physics. ”

“ In fact the total amount that a physicist knows is very little. He has only to remember the rules to get him from one place to another and he is all right, because all the various statements about equal times, the force being in the direction of the radius, and so on, are all interconnected by reasoning. ”

“ We might, perhaps, still use physician as the equivalent of the French physicien, in virtue of Aphorism V.; but probably it would be better to form a new word. Thus we may say, that while the Naturalist employs principally the ideas of resemblance and life, the Physicist proceeds upon the ideas of force, matter, and the properties of matter. ”

“ Research in quantum mechanics, to take one example on which my background allows me to speak at least semi-intelligently, might incorporate work from particle physicists doing empirical work with cloud chambers, high-energy particle physicists doing other empirical work with particle accelerators, and still other particle physicists investigating the mathematics behind spontaneous symmetry breaking. ”

“ It may be added that the temperature, electric condition, pressure, state of motion, chemical qualities, and all other circumstances concerning matter, except its mass, are indifferent as regards its gravitating power.
As natural science progresses, physicists gain a kind of insight and tact in judging what qualities of a substance are likely to be concerned in any class of phenomena. The physical astronomer treats matter in one point of view, the chemist in another, and the students of physical optics, sound, mechanics, electricity, &c., make a fair division of the qualities among them. ”

“ At the present time, however, the most advanced men of science are abandoning these later conceptions, as their predecessors abandoned the earlier ones. Magnetism, heat, light &c, which were awhile since spoken of as so many distinct imponderables, physicists are now beginning to regard as different modes of manifestation of some one universal force ”

“ Thus it may be realised that a discussion of the philosophical significance of the discoveries of physical and mathematical science must be left to the theoretical physicists and to the mathematicians. ”

“ Physicists like to think that all you have to do is say, ‘These are the conditions, now what happens next?’ But all our sister sciences have a completely different problem: in fact all the other things that are studied – history, geology, astronomical history – have a problem of this other kind. ”

“ For those who want some proof that physicists are human, the proof is in the idiocy of all the different units which they use for measuring energy. ”

“ What appeared to the earlier physicists to be the constant quantity of heat is nothing more than the whole motive power of the motion of heat, which remains constant so long as it is not transformed into other forms of work, or results afresh from them. ”

“ The theory that the heavy atoms are all built up of some simple fundamental unit of matter or protyle has been advanced at various times by many prominent chemists and physicists. ”

“ Maculay pondered for a moment. "Do you understand variable-matrix radiation mechanics?"
"Probably as little as you know synaptic pressure theory."
"That's the trouble. I can't explain in detail what I want. I can only explain by analogy. Look, Doc, for eight years I've been experimenting with some mathematics along an entirely new field of theory. Indications are that gross matter can exceed the velocity of light under certain conditions; but in attempting to define these conditions by mathematical formulation I've hit a snag." ”

“ The objective of the courses in General Physics is a knowledge of the fundamental laws of physical science, visualized as the foundation for later professional work. To this end, the courses are administered from the Engineering rather than the Scientific viewpoint.
Phys 2.
Elementary Mechanics—Linear and curvilinear motion; simple force system; energy and power; static forces in fluids; simple harmonic motion.
The laboratory work which accompanies this course is entirely quantitative and is designed to aid, by physical demonstration the development of the concepts originated in the classroom. ”

“ The principles of the science of mechanics, the only example yet existing of a complete physical theory, are altogether formed from the data of experience by the abstractive method. The class of objects to which the science of mechanics relates,—viz.,—material bodies,—are defined by means of those sensible properties which they all possess, viz., the property of occupying space, and that of resisting change of motion. The two classes of phenomena to which the science of mechanics relates are distinguished by two words, motion and force ”

“ It has forced upon us a fresh study of the fundamental ideas of physical theory, and will give us without doubt, a more satisfactory foundation for the superstructure which grows more and more elaborate.
It can well happen that scientists, some generations hence, will read of the. relativity mechanics with the same amused tolerance which marks our attitude towards, for example, Newton's theory of fits of easy transmission and reflection in his theory of the propagation of light. ”

“ Having aided the student in choosing his apparatus or constructing it, and given him some insight into the secrets of physical manipulation, the author, in the second part of the book, gives directions for making experiments illustrative of the principal laws of physics, as the equilibrium of forces, motion, acoustics, light, magnetism, heat, etc. The work appears to be very well adapted to meet the wants of the reader for whom it is intended. ”

“ Modern Astronomy, explains these motions on the principles of Mechanics.
The term Physics, when confined to a peculiar class of Sciences, is usually understood to exclude the Mechanical Sciences on the one side, and Chemistry on the other; and thus embraces the Secondary Mechanical and Analytico-Mechanical Sciences. But the adjective Physical applied to any science and opposed to Formal, as in Astronomy and Optics, implies those speculations in which we consider not only the Laws of Phenomena but their Causes ”

“ Physics has experienced an equally important development. It, too, at the beginning of the nineteenth century was in the preliminary state of collecting, coördinating, and trying to interpret data. In a century physics has, by experimentation and the application of mathematics to its problems, been organized into a number of exceedingly important sciences. In dynamics, heat, light, and particularly in electricity, discoveries and extension of previous knowledge of the most far-reaching significance have been made. ”

“ Accordingly, the greatest achievements in physical science have consisted in resolving one observed law of the production of motion into the laws of other known modes of production, or the laws of several such modes into one more general mode; as when the fall of bodies to the earth, and the motions of the planets, were brought under the one law of the mutual attraction of all particles of matter; when the motions said to be produced by magnetism were shown to be produced by electricity ”

“ It has now become possible to measure exactly the elements which enter into nearly all physical phenomena, and these measurements are taken with ever increasing precision. Every time a chapter in science progresses, science shows itself more exacting; it perfects its means of investigation, it demands more and more exactitude, and one of the most striking features of modern physics is this constant care for strictness and clearness in experimentation.
A veritable science of measurement has thus been constituted which extends over all parts of the domain of physics. ”

“ In physics we are to study the objects, forces, and changes about us, to understand them and their relations to one another. Accordingly, physics, dealing with the material world about us, is often defined as the science of matter and energy, matter being anything that occupies space and energy the capacity for doing work. ”

“ Each of these classes is surprised to learn that physics is mainly an explanation of common things. It is a study that systematizes our knowledge of the forces and changes about us; such as the pull of the earth, the formation of dew, rain and frost, water pressure and pumps, echoes and music, thermometers and engines, and many other things about us with which people are more or less familiar. Physics is like other school subjects, such as mathematics and language, in having its own peculiar vocabulary and methods of study ”