Description
Book SynopsisFollowing the path by which humanity learned quantum mechanics can lead to an improved teaching and understanding of the fundamental theory and the origins of its perceived limitations. The purpose of this textbook is to retrace the development of quantum mechanics by investigating primary sources (including original published papers and letters) with attention to their timing and influence. Placing the development of quantum mechanics in its historical context, from the nascent philosophical notions of matter, atoms, and void in Ancient Greece, to their scientific realization in the 19th and 20th centuries, the book culminates with an examination of the current state of the field and an introduction to quantum information and computing.
Table of ContentsPART I - BASIS OF THE THEORY 1: Introduction 2: Properties of the quantum world: indeterminacy, interference, superposition, entanglement 3: The origin of quantum theory in the crisis of classical physics 4: Further steps to quantum mechanics: the old quantum mechanics of Bohr and Sommerfeld 5: Further steps to quantum mechanics: Louis de Broglie and the world's most important PhD thesis 6: The invention of quantum mechanics - matrix mechanics 7: Schrödinger and the development of wave mechanics 8: Further developments of wave mechanics by Schrödinger 9: Quantum statistics and the origin of wave mechanics 10: Early attempts at interpretation of the theory 11: The final synthesis of quantum mechanics: the 'transformation theory' and Dirac notation 12: Dirac and Jordan commit 'sin squared': Second quantization and the beginning of quantum field theory 13: The 'completion of quantum mechanics' - the fifth Solvay Conference on Physics, October 1927 14: von Neumann>'s mathematical foundations of quantum mechanics: Redux 15: Einstein and Schrödinger renew the assault on quantum mechanics 16: Weimar culture and quantum mechanics 17: Further development of the interpretation of quantum theory PART II - APPLICATIONS OF QUANTUM MECHANICS 18: Operator techniques and the algebraic solutions of problems 19: Spin-1/2 and two-level systems 20: Path integrals and scattering 21: Introduction to quantum computing (with the assistance of Edward D. Davis) Free
