Ludwig Boltzmann : the man who trusted atoms / Carlo Cercignani.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Cercignani, Carlo.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Atomic structure--History.

Atomic structure.

Physicists--Austria--Biography.

Physicists.

Boltzmann, Ludwig, 1844-1906.

Boltzmann, Ludwig.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (348 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2006, c1998.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

The book presents the life and personality, the scientific and philosophical work of Ludwig Boltzmann. His tragic life ending with his suicide is described in detail. A substantial part of the book is devoted to discussing his work establishing the atomic structure of matter and his influence on modern physics. - ;This book presents the life and personality, the scientific and philosophical work of Ludwig Boltzmann, one of the great scientists who marked the passage from 19th- to 20th-Century physics. His rich and tragic life, ending by suicide at the age of 62, is described in detail. A subst

Contents:

Contents; Figure acknowledgements; Introduction; 1 A short biography of Ludwig Boltzmann; 1.1 Youth and happy years; 1.2 The crisis; 1.3 Restlessness; 1.4 Scientific debates and travels; 1.5 The tragic fate of a great scientist; 1.6 Boltzmann as a teacher; 1.7 Boltzmann and inventions; 1.8 Ludwig Boltzmann and his times; 1.9 A poem by Ludwig Boltzmann; 1.10 Boltzmann's personality; 2 Physics before Boltzmann; 2.1 From Galileo and Newton to the early atomic theories; 2.2 The first connections between heat and mechanical energy; 2.3 The springtime of thermodynamics

2.4 Electricity and magnetism3 Kinetic theory before Boltzmann; 3.1 Early kinetic theories; 3.2 The beginnings of modern kinetic theory and the problem of justifying the Second Law; 4 The Boltzmann equation; 4.1 Irreversibility and kinetic theory; 4.2 The great paper of 1872; 4.3 A critique of Boltzmann's approach; 5 Time irreversibility and H-theorem; 5.1 Introduction; 5.2 Loschmidt's paradox; 5.3 Poincaré's recurrence and Zermelo's paradox; 5.4 The physical and mathematical resolution of the paradoxes; 5.5 Time's arrow and the expanding universe

5.6 Is irreversibility objective or subjective?5.7 Concluding remarks; 6 Boltzmann's relation and the statistical interpretation of entropy; 6.1 The probabilistic interpretation of thermodynamics; 6.2 Explicit use of probability for a gas with discrete energies; 6.3 Energy is continuous; 6.4 The so-called H-curve; 7 Boltzmann, Gibbs, and equilibrium statistical mechanics; 7.1 Introduction; 7.2 A great American scientist of the nineteenth century: J.W. Gibbs; 7.3 Why is statistical mechanics usually attributed to Gibbs and not to Boltzmann?; 7.4 Gibbs's treatise

7.5 French scientists on statistical mechanics7.6 The problem of trend to equilibrium and ergodic theory; 7.7 Planck and statistical mechanics; 8 The problem of polyatomic molecules; 8.1 The problem of specific heats; 8.2 The H-theorem for polyatomic molecules; 8.3 Specific heats again; 8.4 Boltzmann's ideas on specific heats, and twentieth century contributions; 9 Boltzmann's contributions to other branches of physics; 9.1 Boltzmann's testing of Maxwell's theory of electromagnetism; 9.2 Boltzmann lays the foundations of hereditary mechanics; 9.3 Back to electromagnetism

9.4 A true pearl of theoretical physics9.5 Mathematics and foundations of mechanics; 10 Boltzmann as a philosopher; 10.1 A realist, but not a naïve one; 10.2 Laws of thought and scientific concepts; 10.3 Ethics, aesthetics, religion; 10.4 Philosophy of science; 10.5 Boltzmann's views on scientific revolutions; 10.6 Boltzmann's education in philosophy; 10.7 Did Boltzmann abandon realism?; 11 Boltzmann and his contemporaries; 11.1 The contacts between Boltzmann and his colleagues; 11.2 Maxwell; 11.3 Lorentz; 11.4 Boltzmann and the energetists; 11.5 Planck; 11.6 Students and younger colleagues

12 The influence of Boltzmann's ideas on the science and technology of the twentieth century

Notes:

Originally published: 1998.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

0-19-160698-7

0-19-850154-4

1-4294-6929-3

1-280-84567-8

OCLC:

437108603