21–30 of 31 posts
Amazing to think there was a similar vibe in the 1920’s around trying to merge quantum mechanics and special relativity. They seemed incompatible at a basic level, yet this cool guy on the autism spectrum came along and said here ya go fixed that for you.
Paul Dirac looks and sounds a lot like my father's father, though he delivers his words faster and with more emotion. I almost never heard my grandfather speak.
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Not an expert either, esp. because I'm too young and socialized in West Germany with family ties to Thuringia, though. What always struck me was Eastern Germans' tendency to practical things (and an enormous creativity in fixing broken stuff!). In addition, this is 1949 Eastern Germany, the country was devastated and this part under Soviet rule. It might sound a bit weird as a gift from today's wealthy point of view…
> historically "a good pair of shoes" was always something people appreciated throughout all times and cultures (It seems I am indulging in anecdotes a bit in this page, but anyway) In the portrait of "Lenin" Ulyanov by Paul Johnson in Modern Times , you will read > Lenin left Zurich to return to Russia on 8 April 1917. [...] At Stockholm, comrade Karl Radek bought him a pair of shoes, but he refused other clothes, r…
Some great stories about Dirac's "unusual" personality: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Dirac#Personality One of my favorite theologians, physicist-turned-Anglican-priest Dr. John Polkinghorne FRS, did his Ph.D in Dirac's group. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Polkinghorne
The book "the strangest man" goes in depth about his life and how weird that guy was. No surprise a psychologist suggested me to read it while I talked about the possibility of being autistic. Of course you can't diagnose a dead person, but let's say it wouldn't have been surprising had he discovered to be nd
Had to listen to see if Dirac had a Bristolian accent, but unfortunately not.
I read in Friedrich Hund's Wikipedia biography that while he was in Jena in after WWII in East Germany, the head of the Thuringen state government awarded him in 1949.... a voucher for a pair of shoes (a copy of the letter is on Wikipedia) as recognition of his academic merits. He ended up emigrating to the West in 1951, and thus avoided the bloody 1953 Soviet repression of unions demands in Jena. Question to Germans…
I can imagine 1949 East Germany to not have overabundance of shoes maybe.
I'm not a physicist, but it's very pleasant listening to a conversation between two old intellectuals.
With regard to the "effect", what about listening to an intellectual hero of the beginning of the XX Century, and seeing him active near the end of the XX Century, discussing thus the experimental contributions of "radar" (1940), "atomic clock" (1955), "spacecrafts on Mars" (1964) and the "Viking lander" (1976)...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
With regard to the "effect", what about listening to an intellectual hero of the beginning of the XX Century, and seeing him active near the end of the XX Century, discussing thus the experimental contributions of "radar" (1940), "atomic clock" (1955), "spacecrafts on Mars" (1964) and the "Viking lander" (1976)...
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