Its the birthday of Max Born, who was born in 1882 in Wrocław, Poland, when the city was part of the German Empire. Born studied physics and mathematics at the University of Göttingen. Borns research interests in theoretical physics were wide-ranging. He published on relativity and condensed matter physics, but he is best known for his and Werner Heisenbergs reformulation of quantum mechanics in terms of matrices and for his statistical interpretation of the wave function, which earned him the 1954 Nobel physics prize. Despite his many contributions to German physics, Born was stripped of his professorship in 1933 soon after the Nazis came to power. He spent most of the rest of his professional life in Britain, where he held positions at Cambridge and Edinburgh Universities. Born was interested in philosophical questions. In his 1964 book, Natural Philosophy of Cause and Chance, he wrote: There are metaphysical problems, which cannot be disposed of by declaring them meaningless. For, as I have repeatedly said, they are beyond physics indeed and demand an act of faith. We have to accept this fact to be honest. There are two objectionable types of believers: those who believe the incredible and those who believe that belief must be discarded and replaced by the scientific method.
Posted on: Thu, 11 Dec 2014 14:16:53 +0000