We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
Mechanical materialism and modern physics.
- Authors
Hessen, Boris M.
- Abstract
He even identifies the "mechanistic" worldview with energy conservation (Skvortsov-Stepanov 1928b, 96).[11] Undoubtedly, the law of energy conservation was a powerful tool for expelling all mysterious forces from natural science. Hertz's mechanics does not really represent physics of today, but physics of the future, a sort of confession of faith for physics" (Planck 1960a, 31). Stepanov says, "there is no and can be no other methods besides the methods of analysis" (Skvortsov-Stepanov 1928a, 47n1). Of course, along with gravitational forces acting between particles, it was possible to introduce electrical forces, chemical affinities, etc., but until these new properties of the elementary particle (i.e. the molecule, atom, electron) were explained as the motion and arrangement of elementary particles, the criterion of the mechanical worldview was not yet fulfilled. Stepanov instructs us, "applies physico-chemical methods to the study of life processes, revealing in them the I same laws i that we observe in the field of inanimate nature" (Skvortsov-Stepanov 1928a, 61).
- Subjects
SCIENTIFIC apparatus &; instruments; PHYSICS; SCIENTIFIC knowledge; PHILOSOPHY of science; PENDULUMS
- Publication
Science in Context (0269-8897), 2021, Vol 34, Issue 1, p155
- ISSN
0269-8897
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1017/S0269889722000060