A thorough grounding in contemporary physics while placing the subject into its social and historical context. Based largely on the highly respected Project Physics Course developed by two of the authors, it also integrates the results of recent pedagogical research. The text thus teaches the basic phenomena in the physical world and the concepts developed to explain them; shows that science is a rational human endeavour with a long and continuing tradition, involving many different cultures and people; develops facility in critical thinking, reasoned argumentation, evaluation of evidence, mathematical modelling, and ethical values. The treatment emphasises not only what we know but also how we know it, why we believe it, and what effects this knowledge has.

Three events, which happened all within the same week some ten years ago, set me on the track which the book describes. The first was a reading of Emile Meyerson works in the course of a prolonged research on Einstein's relativity theory, which sent me back to Meyerson's Ident ity and Reality, where I read and reread the striking chapter on "Ir rationality". In my earlier researches into the origins of French Conven tionalism I came to know similar views, all apparently deriving from Emile Boutroux's doctoral thesis of 1874 De fa contingence des lois de la nature and his notes of the 1892-3 course he taught at the Sorbonne De ['idee de fa loi naturelle dans la science et la philosophie contempo raines. But never before was the full effect of the argument so suddenly clear as when I read Meyerson. On the same week I read, by sheer accident, Ernest Moody's two parts paper in the JHIof 1951, "Galileo and Avempace". Put near Meyerson's thesis, what Moody argued was a striking confirmation: it was the sheer irrationality of the Platonic tradition, leading from A vem pace to Galileo, which was the working conceptual force behind the notion of a non-appearing nature, active all the time but always sub merged, as it is embodied in the concept of void and motion in it

This book provides a comprehensive treatment of intensity dependent particle beam instabilities in accelerating rings. Written for researchers, the material is also suitable for use as a textbook in an advanced graduate course for students studying accelerator physics.The presentation starts with a brief review of the basic concept of wake potentials and coupling impedances in the vacuum chamber followed by a discussion on static and dynamic solutions of their effects on the particle beams. Special emphasis is placed separately on proton and electron machines. Other special topics of interest covered include Landau damping, Balakin-Novokhatsky-Smirnov damping, Sacherer's integral equations, Landau cavity, saw-tooth instability, Robinson stability criteria, beam loading, transition crossing, two-stream instabilities, and collective instability issues of isochronous rings. After the formulation of an instability, readers are provided a thorough description of one or more experimental observations together with a discussion of the cures for the instability.Although the book is theory oriented, the use of mathematics has been minimized. The presentation is intended to be rigorous and self-contained with nearly all the formulas and equations derived.

Mass ideology is unique to modern society and rooted in early modern philosophy. Traditionally, knowledge had been viewed as resting on metaphysics. Rejecting metaphysical truth evoked questions about the source of -truth.- For nineteenth-century ideologists, -truth- comes either from dominating classes in a progressively determined history or from a post-Copernican freedom of the superior man to create it. In From Physics to Politics Robert C. Trundle, Jr. uncovers the relation of modern philosophy to political ideology. And in rooting truth in human nature and Nature by modal reasoning, he resolves the problem of politicized truth. Our concepts of scientific truth, logic, and necessity are essentially connected. Modern philosophy restricts our understanding of necessity to the political dreams and aspirations of Enlightenment intellectuals. As a result, these intellectuals refuse to acknowledge as factual or meaningful whatever is not intelligible within the practical goals of establishing science as a system of enlightened ideas. The effect of these ideas is that in our time metaphysical principles, speculative truths, our understanding of science, and the nature of logic have become subordinated to ideological dreams. Fascism, Nazism, Marxism, political correctness, and moral relativism are not historical aberrations but essential consequences. Trundle's work is groundbreaking and daring, and his underlying thesis demonstrates why scientific truth demands a modal defense. The defense not only integrates science, ethics, and politics, but shows how -truth- may be ascribed to moral and scientific principles in contrast to a modern philosophical tradition. Since this tradition is the origin of political ideology, it has led to an irrational politicization of truth. The book will appeal particularly to those interested in political history, histories of philosophy, the philosophy of sciences, and ethics.

Physics: 100 Ideas in 100 Words offers the essential facts at your fingertips, satisfying your scientific curiosity and helping you to understand the biggest concepts in physics in concise, 100-word summaries. One of the first titles in a cutting-edge new series created in partnership with The Science Museum, this book introduces 100 key areas of physics - such as gravitational fields, momentum, general relativity and quantum uncertainty - and explains each topic in just 100 words. Perfect for getting your head around big ideas clearly and quickly, or refreshing your memory of the fundamentals of physics, this book covers the most up-to-date terms and theories and inspires a heightened level of understanding and enjoyment to the core areas of physics explored in The Science Museum.

Many authoritarian leaders want nuclear weapons, but few manage to acquire them. Autocrats seeking nuclear weapons fail in different ways and to varying degrees—Iraq almost managed it; Libya did not come close. In Unclear Physics, Målfrid Braut-Hegghammer compares the two failed nuclear weapons programs, showing that state capacity played a crucial role in the trajectory and outcomes of both projects. Braut-Hegghammer draws on a rich set of new primary sources, collected during years of research in archives, fieldwork across the Middle East, and interviews with scientists and decision makers from both states. She gained access to documents and individuals that no other researcher has been able to consult. Her book tells the story of the Iraqi and Libyan programs from their origins in the late 1950s and 1960s until their dismantling. This book reveals contemporary perspectives from scientists and regime officials on the opportunities and challenges facing each project. Many of the findings challenge the conventional wisdom about clandestine weapons programs in closed authoritarian states and their prospects of success or failure. Braut-Hegghammer suggests that scholars and analysts ought to pay closer attention to how state capacity affects nuclear weapons programs in other authoritarian regimes, both in terms of questioning the actual control these leaders have over their nuclear weapons programs and the capability of their scientists to solve complex technical challenges.