Summary Of "The Crisis Of The Mechanistic-Materialist Conception Of The Universe" By Werner Heisenberg: UNIVERSITY SUMMARIES

By MAURICIO ENRIQUE FAU

We have summarized the essential of this book by the author.

THE CRISIS OF THE MECHANISTIC-MATERIALIST CONCEPTION OF THE UNIVERSE

With Newton's physics, the material world began to be understood under the model of a clockwork mechanism. The way in which material elements came into relationship, the laws that governed these relationships, were understood by analogy with machines (it is not by chance that mechanism is the way of understanding the world at the time of the industrial revolution).
Newton's physics is indebted to the scientific investigations of Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler, among others. Now we are going to study how this conception lost its validity.
Hertz's Principles of Mechanics (1876) serves as a document showing how physics is no longer considered the true picture of the world and is being conceived instead as what we now call "a model."
In this book Hertz maintains that physical concepts, which make up a structure, are nothing more than IMAGES whose presumed correspondence with reality we cannot fully prove. At best, what can be done to establish a match between those images and reality itself is the following: the images (which have the form of sentences of physics) have LOGICAL CONSEQUENCES, that is, other sentences that are deduced from them logically. These logical consequences describe particular phenomena. What is sought is that these logical consequences of the images coincide with the EMPIRICAL CONSEQUENCES of the corresponding phenomena.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BOOKS AND SUMMARIES BY MAURICIO FAU
• Release date: Dec 29, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201370428

MAURICIO ENRIQUE FAU

Mauricio Enrique Fau nació en Buenos Aires en 1965. Se recibió de Licenciado en Ciencia Política en la Universidad de Buenos Aires. Cursó también Derecho en la UBA y Periodismo en la Universidad de Morón. Realizó estudios en FLACSO Argentina. Docente de la UBA y AUTOR DE MÁS DE 3.000 RESÚMENES de Psicología, Sociología, Ciencia Política, Antropología, Derecho, Historia, Epistemología, Lógica, Filosofía, Economía, Semiología, Educación y demás disciplinas de las Ciencias Sociales. Desde 2005 dirige La Bisagra Editorial, especializada en técnicas de estudio y materiales que facilitan la transición desde la escuela secundaria a la universidad. Por intermedio de La Bisagra publicó 38 libros. Participa en diversas ferias del libro, entre ellas la Feria Internacional del Libro de Buenos Aires y la FIL Guadalajara.

Book preview

Summary Of The Crisis Of The Mechanistic-Materialist Conception Of The Universe By Werner Heisenberg

UNIVERSITY SUMMARIES

MAURICIO ENRIQUE FAU

Published by BOOKS AND SUMMARIES BY MAURICIO FAU, 2021.

While every precaution has been taken in the preparation of this book, the publisher assumes no responsibility for errors or omissions, or for damages resulting from the use of the information contained herein.

SUMMARY OF THE CRISIS OF THE MECHANISTIC-MATERIALIST CONCEPTION OF THE UNIVERSE BY WERNER HEISENBERG

First edition. December 29, 2021.

Copyright © 2021 MAURICIO ENRIQUE FAU.

ISBN: 979-8201370428

Written by MAURICIO ENRIQUE FAU.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

Heisenberg, Werner | THE CRISIS OF THE MECHANISTIC-MATERIALIST CONCEPTION OF THE UNIVERSE

Sign up for MAURICIO ENRIQUE FAU's Mailing List

Further Reading: Summary Of Introduction To Behavioral Psychology By Gladys Curone

Also By MAURICIO ENRIQUE FAU

About the Author

About the Publisher

Heisenberg, Werner

THE CRISIS OF THE MECHANISTIC-MATERIALIST CONCEPTION OF THE UNIVERSE

With Newton's physics , the material world began to be understood under the model of a clockwork mechanism. The way in which material elements came into relationship, the laws that governed these relationships, were understood by analogy with machines (it is not by chance that mechanism is the way of understanding the world at the time of the industrial revolution).

Newton's physics is indebted to the scientific investigations of Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler, among others. Now we are going to study how this conception lost its validity.

Hertz's Principles of Mechanics (1876) serves as a document showing how physics is no longer considered the true picture of the world and is being conceived instead as what we now call a model.

In this book Hertz maintains that physical concepts, which make up a structure, are nothing more than IMAGES whose presumed correspondence with reality we cannot fully prove. At best, what can be done to establish a match between those images and reality itself is the following: the images (which have the form of sentences of physics) have LOGICAL CONSEQUENCES, that is, other sentences that are deduced from them logically. These logical consequences describe particular phenomena. What is sought is that these logical consequences of the images coincide with the EMPIRICAL CONSEQUENCES of the corresponding phenomena.

Let's see this with an example: the law that all metals expand with heat is a conceptual image: it can never be observed that ALL metals expand with heat, because there are too many metals for anyone to observe them (it is about of ALL metals, existing and to be had). But that law has a series of logical consequences, such as the one that says that if my watch is made of metal, then it will expand when I heat it. An empirical consequence does correspond to this conceptual image: it could be possible to observe how the clock, after being heated, expands. The logical consequence should not be confused with the empirical consequence: the conceptual image is in the plane of LANGUAGE and thus also all the statements that are deduced from it. On the other hand, the empirical consequence is at the level of the EMPIRICAL, that is, of what we can observe through the five senses.

CRITERIA TO DECIDE WHETHER THE IMAGES ARE USABLE OR NOT:

IMAGES MUST BE ...

• LEGITIMATE (THEY CANNOT CONTACT THE LAWS OF THOUGHT)

• ADEQUATE (MUST COINCIDE WITH EXTERNAL EXPERIENCE)

• MANAGEABLE (MUST INCLUDE THE GREATEST POSSIBLE NUMBER OF ESSENTIAL PROPERTIES OF THE OBJECTS AND THE LOWEST NUMBER OF SUPERFLUOUS PROPERTIES)

The second criterion, of adequacy, is the one that requires concordance between the logical consequences of the images and the empirical consequences of the phenomena. The first criterion requires logical coherence: the hypothetical images have to