scholarly journals LA REALTÀ FISICA, MON BEAU SOUCI

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paolo Perinotti
Keyword(s):  
Personal Experience ◽  
Physical Science ◽  
Secondary Level ◽  
Axiomatic Approach ◽  
Quantum Information Theory ◽  
Theoretical Physics ◽  
Conceptual Maps ◽  
Theoretical Physicist ◽  
Effective Description ◽  
Personal Viewpoint

The personal viewpoint of a theoretical physicist about the relation between reality and physical science is exposed, starting from his personal experience in the context of quantum foundations and quantum information theory. The effectiveness of an axiomatic approach is argued as a navigation system between the abstract landscape of quantum theory and the reality of facts, along a road that is intrinsically unaccessible to classical conceptual maps. The present approach requires physics to accept the notion of information at its deepest level, in place of matter and space-time, that are recovered only as an effective description of phenomena on a secondary level. As a result of the above operation, a simplified conceptual scenario is achieved, where new possibilities are available for facing the open challenges of theoretical physics.

scholarly journals Precision tests of the Standard Model: Rare B-meson decays

2017 ◽  
Vol 32 (09) ◽  
pp. 1741015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ahmed Ali
Keyword(s):  
Standard Model ◽  
Model Building ◽  
B Meson ◽  
Hadron Collider ◽  
Theoretical Physics ◽  
Concrete Form ◽  
The Standard Model ◽  
Theoretical Physicist ◽  
Lively Debate ◽  
The Government

The charge given to me by the organisers of the memorial meeting for Prof. Abdus Salam’s 90th birthday is to recall my personal impressions of him and review an aspect of the standard model (SM) physics related to my work. Salam was, first and foremost, a brilliant theoretical physicist whose work is still very much en vogue, currently being tested precisely by the experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Salam was, however, equally effective as a scientific advisor to many institutions, such as IAEA and CERN, but also to the government of Pakistan as the chief scientific strategist. He was also an untiring advocate of scientific research and higher education in developing countries, which took a concrete form in the International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) in Trieste. I discuss these aspects of his scientific life seen from my perspective in the first part. In the second part of my talk, which may appear as a disjoint piece to the first, I summarise some selected topics in rare B-decays — the current flavour physics frontier. Experiments carried out over several decades are largely in agreement with the SM, thanks also to dedicated theoretical effort in their interpretation. However, this field is undergoing an anomalous phase in a number of key measurements, in particular reported by LHCb, triggering a very lively debate and model building. These anomalies, which I review here, are too numerous to be ignored, but none is individually significant enough to announce a breakdown of the SM.

Dying in lockdown

2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 247-256
Author(s):  
Tina Wallace
Keyword(s):  
Personal Experience ◽  
Design Methodology ◽  
Personal Perspective ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Loved One ◽  
Personal Viewpoint

Purpose This study aims to share a personal viewpoint on the hardship imposed by lockdown measure. Design/methodology/approach A personal experience of losing a loved one during the Covid-19 lockdown in England. Findings The costs of lockdown go far beyond the economic ones. Originality/value A unique, personal perspective.

scholarly journals David Ian Olive. 16 April 1937—7 November 2012

2020 ◽  
Vol 69 ◽  
pp. 467-498
Author(s):  
Edward Corrigan ◽  
Peter Goddard
Keyword(s):  
Field Theory ◽  
String Theory ◽  
Original Work ◽  
Gauge Theories ◽  
Matrix Theory ◽  
Theoretical Physics ◽  
Quantum Field ◽  
Physics Community ◽  
New Ideas ◽  
Theoretical Physicist

David Olive, who died in Barton, Cambridgeshire, on 7 November 2012, aged 75, was a theoretical physicist who made seminal contributions to the development of string theory and to our understanding of the structure of quantum field theory. In early work on S -matrix theory, he helped to provide the conceptual framework within which string theory was initially formulated. His work, with Gliozzi and Scherk, on supersymmetry in string theory made possible the whole idea of superstrings, now understood as the natural framework for string theory. Olive’s pioneering insights about the duality between electric and magnetic objects in gauge theories were way ahead of their time; it took two decades before his bold and courageous duality conjectures began to be understood. Although somewhat quiet and reserved, he took delight in the company of others, generously sharing his emerging understanding of new ideas with students and colleagues. He was widely influential, not only through the depth and vision of his original work, but also because the clarity, simplicity and elegance of his expositions of new and difficult ideas and theories provided routes into emerging areas of research, both for students and for the theoretical physics community more generally.

The Pope of Condensed Matter Physics

2021 ◽  
pp. 276-315
Author(s):  
Andrew Zangwill
Keyword(s):  
Nobel Prize ◽  
Physical Science ◽  
Condensed Matter ◽  
Theoretical Physics ◽  
Condensed Matter Physics ◽  
Science Laboratory ◽  
Half Time ◽  
Santa Barbara ◽  
Star Wars ◽  
Superconducting Super Collider

This chapter gives an overview of Anderson’s life at the top of the theoretical condensed matter world. He became very influential at Bell Labs and retired as a Consulting Director of the Physical Science Laboratory. He moved his half-time professorship from Cambridge to Princeton in 1975, but it took a decade to break down the resistance there to condensed matter physics. He was heavily involved with the Aspen Center and turned down an offer of the Directorship of the Institute for Theoretical Physics in Santa Barbara. He wrote the magisterial “Basic Notions of Condensed Matter Physics” but was widely regarded as a poor classroom instructor. His Nobel Prize gave him a platform to oppose the ABM and Star Wars ballistic missile systems, and the Superconducting Super Collider.

A. N. WhiteheadIsabelle Stengers (2011)Thinking with Whitehead: A Free and Wild Creation of Concepts, trans. Michael Chase, Cambridge and London: Harvard University PressDidier Debaise (2006)Un Empirisme spéculatif: Lecture deProcès et réalitéde Whitehead, Paris: VrinA. N. Whitehead (2011)An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Natural Knowledge, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press [paperback re-issue of 1955 reprint of 1925 2nd edn]A. N. Whitehead (2011)The Principle of Relativity with Applications to Physical Science, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press [paperback re-issue of 1922 edn]

2014 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 542-568
Author(s):  
Nardina Kaur (Guy Callan)
Keyword(s):  
Physical Science ◽  
Radical Change ◽  
Harvard University ◽  
Theoretical Physics ◽  
Empirical Science ◽  
Cambridge University ◽  
Natural Knowledge ◽  
Principle Of Relativity ◽  
Major Study ◽  
Isabelle Stengers

Two books on Whitehead, a major study by the noted philosopher of science, Isabelle Stengers, and a shorter one by Didier Debaise are reviewed, along with two earlier mathematical and scientific works by Whitehead himself, which have been re-issued. This provides the basis for a wide-ranging discussion of the relationships between Whitehead's love of poetry and Heidegger's approach to it, Whitehead's background in mathematics and theoretical physics and his attitude to empirical science and more general problems of the philosophy of the event, in particular how radical change can come about.

Representing Theoretical Physics Research in and on Ceramics

Leonardo ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Nadav Drukker
Keyword(s):  
Public Engagement ◽  
Theoretical Physics ◽  
Sensory Stimuli ◽  
Theoretical Physicist ◽  
Two Sides

A theoretical physicist and potter, the author presents his practice which fuses these two sides of him in one. His art aims to circumvent the regular pitfalls of scientific public-engagement, replacing a didactic approach with sensory stimuli from tactile objects, eliciting curiosity for science. The author presents the origins of his practice and focuses on several series of ceramic pots. He explains the design of their form and decoration, exemplifying the interconnections between physics, mathematics and some of his artistic influences. The paper concludes with a discussion of his experience presenting the work and its reception.

»mit saurem Schweiß sagen, was man nicht weiß«

2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 213-254
Author(s):  
Magdalena Gronau ◽  
Martin Gronau
Keyword(s):  
Present Article ◽  
Atomic Physics ◽  
Small World ◽  
Nobel Prize Winner ◽  
Theoretical Physics ◽  
Erwin Schrödinger ◽  
Theoretical Physicist ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Epistemological Position ◽  
Style Of Writing

AbstractThe present article focuses on the theoretical physicist and Nobel Prize winner Erwin Schrödinger (1887−1961) and his early attempts to popularize physics in the twenties and early thirties. Special attention is drawn to the ›entanglement‹ of media prerequisites and the subject Schrödinger deals with. Exemplary analysis of the magazines in which Schrödinger published, illustrations, and Schrödinger’s rather journalistic, zeitgeisty style of writing reveals a specific way of imparting the small world of atomic physics, hidden to the eye, to a broader audience. While the majority of contemporary quantum theorists rejected the allegedly old-fashioned physics of pictures and models, Schrödinger’s popular scientific praxis of a vivid explanation is even reflected in his epistemological position regarding the central goal of theoretical physics - namely, producing clear and illustrative models.

Statistical Field Theory

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giuseppe Mussardo
Keyword(s):  
Field Theory ◽  
Form Factors ◽  
Theoretical Physics ◽  
Quantum Field Theories ◽  
Boundary Field ◽  
Conformal Field ◽  
Statistical Field ◽  
Statistical Field Theory ◽  
Substantial Progress ◽  
Theoretical Physicist

This book is an introduction to statistical field theory, which is an important subject within theoretical physics and a field that has seen substantial progress in recent years. The book covers fundamental topics in great detail and includes areas like conformal field theory, quantum integrability, S-matrices, braiding groups, Bethe ansatz, renormalization groups, Majorana fermions, form factors, the truncated conformal space approach and boundary field theory. It also provides an introduction to lattice statistical models. Many topics are discussed at a fairly advanced level but via a pedagogical approach. In particular, the book presents in a clear way non-perturbative methods of quantum field theories that have become decisive tools in many different areas of statistical and condensed matter physics, and which are currently an essential foundation of the working knowledge of a modern theoretical physicist.

scholarly journals John Michael Ziman. 16 May 1925 — 2 January 2005

2006 ◽  
Vol 52 ◽  
pp. 479-491 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Berry ◽  
John F. Nye
Keyword(s):  
Quantum Mechanics ◽  
Quantum Theory ◽  
Transport Properties ◽  
Liquid Metals ◽  
Theoretical Physics ◽  
Crystalline Solids ◽  
Disordered Solids ◽  
Theoretical Physicist ◽  
Physics Department ◽  
Human Enterprise

John Ziman was a theoretical physicist whose work was characterized by its clarity and simplicity and was always firmly grounded in experimental reality. He developed and refined the application of quantum mechanics to the transport properties of crystalline solids, and pioneered the quantum theory of disordered solids and liquid metals. He served as Head of the Physics Department at Bristol University, and created the theoretical physics group there. In many influential books and articles he broke fresh ground in his studies of science as a collective human enterprise.

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