{"title":"The Prediction and Interpretation of Singularities and Black Holes: From Einstein and Schwarzschild to Penrose and Wheeler","authors":"Dennis Lehmkuhl","doi":"10.1007/s00016-025-00331-2","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s00016-025-00331-2","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>The Schwarzschild solution was the first exact solution to Einstein’s 1915 field equations, found by Karl Schwarzschild as early as 1916. And yet, physicists, mathematicians and philosophers have struggled for decades with the interpretation of the Schwarzschild solution and the two singularities appearing in it when it is written in polar coordinates. This article distinguishes between eight different ways in which the two singularities have been interpreted between 1916 and the late 1960s, when Penrose’s first singularity theorem shed new and lasting light on the interpretation of the Schwarzschild solution.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":727,"journal":{"name":"Physics in Perspective","volume":"27 2","pages":"176 - 209"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2025-08-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s00016-025-00331-2.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144914684","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"An Account of Diffraction Before Grimaldi (1665) in Maurolico’s Problemata ad perspectivam et iridem pertinentia (1567)","authors":"Dominique Raynaud, Sylvie Zanier","doi":"10.1007/s00016-025-00327-y","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s00016-025-00327-y","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Contrary to the standard account that credits Francesco Maria Grimaldi (1618–1663) with the discovery of diffraction, we show that this optical phenomenon had been described nearly a century earlier in <i>Problemata ad perspectivam et iridem pertinentia</i> by Francesco Maurolico (1494–1575). This text probably served as a source for Grimaldi’s <i>Physico-mathesis de lumine</i>, in which Maurolico’s observation is reported almost verbatim. We must therefore backdate the discovery of diffraction to 1567 and reassign the roles. We translate the passage, reconstruct the result, and draw the consequences of this discovery.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":727,"journal":{"name":"Physics in Perspective","volume":"27 2","pages":"89 - 95"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2025-07-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144914538","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Correction: The Value of the Einstein-Besso Manuscript","authors":"Michel Janssen","doi":"10.1007/s00016-025-00330-3","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s00016-025-00330-3","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":727,"journal":{"name":"Physics in Perspective","volume":"27 2","pages":"211 - 211"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2025-07-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144914668","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"General Relativity: Then and Now","authors":"Michel Janssen, Dennis Lehmkuhl","doi":"10.1007/s00016-025-00333-0","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s00016-025-00333-0","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":727,"journal":{"name":"Physics in Perspective","volume":"27 2","pages":"128 - 131"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2025-06-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144914852","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Climério Paulo da Silva Neto, Martin Speirs, Richard Staley
{"title":"Origins?","authors":"Climério Paulo da Silva Neto, Martin Speirs, Richard Staley","doi":"10.1007/s00016-025-00332-1","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s00016-025-00332-1","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":727,"journal":{"name":"Physics in Perspective","volume":"27 2","pages":"85 - 88"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2025-06-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144914853","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Einstein’s Socks and American Style","authors":"Peter Pesic","doi":"10.1007/s00016-025-00328-x","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s00016-025-00328-x","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Albert Einstein’s choice not to wear socks reflected his personal experience, yet also became a path of nonconformism many others took. The real issue was going barefoot, with all that meant in terms of social convention. In the 1940s, Einstein adopted the khakis and sweatshirts of young Americans, who in their turn began wearing shoes without socks in the 1950s. This “Ivy” or “preppy” style was an amalgam of conformism and rebellion that reflected a larger search for new personal freedom. The reactions to this style in Japan as well as the US illuminate the wider resonance of Einstein’s ambivalence about acceding to social norms that went against his own needs. The resultant story interweaves Einstein’s personal and medical history, stylish hedonists expanding their pleasures, veterans returning to school after the war, and young people trying to reconcile rebellion with submission.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":727,"journal":{"name":"Physics in Perspective","volume":"27 2","pages":"96 - 127"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2025-06-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144914675","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Correction: Nuclear Physics and Technology in Finland from World War II to the Early Cold War","authors":"Markus Ahlskog","doi":"10.1007/s00016-025-00326-z","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s00016-025-00326-z","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":727,"journal":{"name":"Physics in Perspective","volume":"27 2","pages":"210 - 210"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2025-05-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s00016-025-00326-z.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144914769","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Astrophysical Thoughts of Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker","authors":"Michael Wiescher, Karlheinz Langanke","doi":"10.1007/s00016-025-00325-0","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s00016-025-00325-0","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker published two important papers on topics of nuclear astrophysics in 1937 and 1938 before he turned his attention elsewhere motivated by the discovery of fission and the outbreak of war in 1939. It seems, however, that he continued to actively think about issues related to astrophysics, namely the discussion and role of neutron stars and cosmology. Both are contemporary topics today. This paper presents the development of Weizsäcker’s thoughts in the years between 1935 and 1945, making use of his personal notes and letters.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":727,"journal":{"name":"Physics in Perspective","volume":"27 1","pages":"26 - 49"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2025-04-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s00016-025-00325-0.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143861157","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Total Solar Eclipse of 1869 as Stimulus for Adoption of Physical-astronomy Techniques in the United States","authors":"Jennifer Lynn Bartlett, Thomas Hockey","doi":"10.1007/s00016-025-00322-3","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s00016-025-00322-3","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>In the United States, techniques that would one day be called astrophysical were applied later than elsewhere and comparatively suddenly. Their entry into US main-stream astronomy was motivated by a quasi-stochastic phenomenon: a total eclipse of the Sun visible between the contiguous borders of that country. In reaction to the upcoming event, the US Nautical Almanac Office in particular invested time, workforce, and a great deal of money into the measurements of physical astronomy, especially spectroscopy. This occurred although none of its employees had ever expressed—at least, in writing—expertise or even interest in the subject beforehand. Once adopted, physical astronomy, and the investigations it enabled, moved slowly, but steadily, into the mainstream of American astronomy despite objections from traditionalists. In the twenty-first century, spectroscopy and other physical astronomy techniques are essential tools for all astronomers.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":727,"journal":{"name":"Physics in Perspective","volume":"27 1","pages":"3 - 25"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2025-03-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s00016-025-00322-3.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143861296","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Nuclear Physics and Technology in Finland from World War II to the Early Cold War","authors":"Markus Ahlskog","doi":"10.1007/s00016-025-00323-2","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s00016-025-00323-2","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>In Finland, as elsewhere, the emergence of nuclear energy as a viable technology in the 1930s led to strong cross connections between nuclear physics and the concurrent politics. Lennart Simons from the University of Helsinki was the only internationally recognized nuclear physicist in Finland, but when the Finnish atomic energy initiative was created in 1955, Simons was completely sidelined from the investments into research on nuclear energy technology, although he continued to be the leading person in basic nuclear physics. In this article I discuss the Cold War political tensions in Finland and the long term effects of these internal disputes within Finnish nuclear science on its research structures.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":727,"journal":{"name":"Physics in Perspective","volume":"27 1","pages":"50 - 84"},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2025-03-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s00016-025-00323-2.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143861252","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}