If, in some cataclysm, all of scientific knowledge were to
be destroyed, and only one sentence passed on to the next generation of
creatures, what statement would contain the most information in the fewest
words? I believe it is the atomic hypothesis that
All things are made of atoms-little particles that that
move around in perpetual motion, attracting each other when they are a little
distance apart, but repelling upon being squeezed into one another.
In that one sentence, you will see, there is an enormous
amount of information about the world, if just a little imagination and
thinking are applied.
Richard Feynman was the ultimate physicist and the greatest science lecturer of all time. It's unbelievable physical insight into all matters, his original way of thinking and his unique character made him one of the most influential personalities ever. His influence is so strong that can be transmitted even through a single web page collecting some of his ideas, 15 years after his death.
Physics is like sex; sure, you can get some interesting results, but that's not why we do it.
The Universe in a Glass of Wine
A poet once said, "The whole universe is in a glass of wine." We will probably
never know in what sense he said that, for poets do not write to be understood.
But it is true that if we look in glass of wine closely enough we see the entire
universe.
There are the things of physics: the
twisting liquid which evaporates depending on the wind and weather, the
reflections in the glass, and our imagination adds the atoms. The glass is a
distillation of the earth's rocks, and in its composition we see the secrets of
the universe's age, and the evolution of the stars. What strange array of
chemicals are in the wine? How did they come to be? There are the ferments, the
enzymes, the substrates, and the products. There in wine is found the great
generalization: all life is fermentation. Nobody can discover the chemistry of
wine without discovering the cause of much disease. How vivid is the claret,
pressing its existence into the consciousness that watches it!
If in our small minds, for some
convenience, divide this glass of wine, this universe, into parts -
physics, biology, geology, astronomy, psychology, and so on - remember that
nature does not know it! So let us put it all back together, not forgetting
ultimately what it is for. Let us give one more final pleasure: drink it and
forget it all!
The Feynman Lectures on Physics
In the early 60's Feynman (at the time faculty member
at Caltech) was asked to teach Caltech's undergraduate 2 year introductory
course in physics. He agreed to teach the course only once. The lectures he gave during these 2 years were
audio recorded and the blackboards where photographed. A couple of years later,
these lectures came out in written form as The Feynman Lectures on Physics, and
are considered one of the most important achievements of the 20th century: the
encapsulation of the entire field of physics, by its greatest living
practitioner.
He taught physics like none had before him; in the normal physics course they
usually went through all the historical developments until in the final weeks
they reach the chapter on atoms and molecules, the very essence of our world.
However in Feynman's very first lecture in the fall of 1961, over 200 students
were gathered to listen to him announcing the words you can find at the
beginning of
this page. In his second lecture he summed up "Physics before 1920's" in less
than half an hour and went on to quantum physics, the new stuff that students
came excited to hear.
Here is an audio sample on his concluding remarks on
the near symmetry in nature - one of Feynman's finest moments:
symmetry.mp3 (2min - 700KB)
And this is his explanation of the existence of our world: why atoms do not fall
apart! atoms.mp3 (2min - 700KB)
Apart from these official lectures, for more than 20
years he taught unofficially a course called Physics X; once every week people
gathered somewhere on campus under the sun of LA and they could ask Feynman any
physics question they wanted. The students were meeting the previous days in
order to come up with questions that could possibly frustrate him, although it
is said that none ever managed to do that.
On Causality
You see, when you ask why something happens, how does a
person answer why something happens?
For example, Aunt Minnie is in the
hospital. Why? Because she went out on the ice and slipped and broke her hip.
That satisfies people. But it wouldn't satisfy someone who came from another
planet and knew nothing about things... When you explain a why, you have
to be in some framework that you've allowed something to be true. Otherwise
you're perpetually asking why... You go deeper and deeper in various
directions.
Why did she slip on the ice? Well,
ice is slippery. Everybody knows that-no problem. But you ask why the ice
is slippery... And then you're involved with something, because there aren't
many things slippery as ice... A solid that's so slippery?
Because it is in the case of ice that
when you stand on it, they say, momentarily the pressure melts the ice a little
bit so that you've got an instantaneous water surface on which you're slipping.
Why on ice and not on other things? Because water expands when it freezes. So
the pressure tries to undo the expansion and melts it...
I'm not answering your question, but
I'm telling you how difficult a why question is. You have to know what it
is permitted to understand... and what it is you're not.
You'll notice in this example that
the more I ask why, it gets interesting after a while. That's my idea, that the
deeper a thing is, the more interesting...
The Challenger Destruction
On January 1986 the space shuttle Challenger carrying 7 people exploded in the air shortly after its launch. A committee was called in order to investigate the accident and Feynman was in it. Figuring out the causes of the accident became a matter of national importance (plus some government pressure), being the main topic discussed in TV and newspapers these days.
2 weeks after the accident a press conference was held. Feynman kept asking for a glass of ice water, which he got after numerous attempts. Then he interrupted the conference by putting a small piece of rubber material (same as on the shuttle) inside the glass of water, which immediately contracted due to the cold. When the cameras focused on him, he pulled the piece out and showed that it didn't regain its original shape explaining what he did:
I
took this stuff that I got out of your seal and I put it in ice water, and I
discovered that when you put some pressure on it for a while and then undo it it
doesn't stretch back. It stays the same dimension. In other words, for a few
seconds at least and more seconds than that, there is no resilience in this
particular material when it is at a temperature of 32 degrees.
I believe that has some significance to our problem.
Not only it had some significance to the problem, but it it was indeed the physical cause of the accident, and he managed to demonstrate it simply in front of everyone. The video with his demonstration played again and again the following days and Feynman also became known to a vast majority of non-technical people (he was already quite famous among scientists and science-related people).
More on Feynman
- The best way to get to know him is seeing him in action, i.e. lecturing. In 1979 he gave 4 lectures on Quantum Electrodynamics (QED) appealing to general audience. He chose New Zealand to deliver these lectures because he didn't want to risk a possible failure by lecturing at his native Caltech. Fortunately you can find these memorable lectures online here, so that you can witness Feynman at his best.
- James Gleick's Genius is by far the best book about Feynman; Gleick writes as if he knows him since childhood, keeping a distinct balance between his life and his research. In that book you will also find an excellent account on geniuses, investigating the reasons why they seem to have vanished in modern years. You can find on Amazon.
- The Tuva trader sells every possible Feynman related material, including his QED lectures on DVD.
- www.feynman.com is his official website; you will find lots of information about him written by people they knew him really well.
- No need to say that if you are (even indirectly) involved or like Physics, you should purchase his Lectures right now. They are expensive, but they are worth every single buck.
Side note:
After watching Feynman, reading Feynman and reading
about Feynman I sometimes wish I was born a few years before; just to have
the slightest chance of talking to him once.
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