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The Early History of David Bohm’s Quantum Mechanics Through the Perspective of Ludwik Fleck’s Thought-Collectives

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Abstract

This paper analyses the early history of David Bohm’s mechanics from the perspective of Ludwik Fleck’s thought-collectives and shows how the thought-style of the scientific community limits the possible modes of thinking and what new possibilities for the construction of a new theory arise if these limits are removed.

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Notes

  1. Here I follow the translation of Denkzwang as thought-pressure, which is suggested in Cohen and Schnelle (1986).

  2. For a popular biography see Peat (1997), while Russel Olwell (1999) focuses on Bohm and Cold War politics. Olival Freire (2005) gives a detailed insight into Bohm’s exile in Brazil and the reception of his theory. Other books, like Kevin J. Sharpe, David Bohm’s World: New Physics and New Religion (Sharpe 1993), that concentrate on the philosophy of Bohm’s later work are of no relevance to this study.

  3. Letter from David Bohm to Miriam Yevick, 28 Januar 1952, David Bohm Papers (DBP), Birkbeck College, London, uncatalogued.

  4. Letter from David Bohm to Miriam Yevick, 20 November [1951], DBP, uncatalogued.

  5. Interview with Giovanni R. Lomanitz, conducted by Shawn Mullet, 26/27 July 2001, American Institute of Physics (AIP), Center for History of Physics, College Park, MD, USA (pp. 16–17, 24). See also Schrecker (1986, pp. 24–62) and Herken (2003, pp. 28–32).

  6. Interview with David Bohm conducted by Martin Sherwin, 15 June 1979, DBP, Folder A.116; Interview with David Bohm, conducted by Maurice Wilkins, 1986, AIP, (pp. 198–226).

  7. Interview Bohm-Wilkins, (pp. 257–258).

  8. United States Atomic Energy Commission, In the Matter J. Robert Oppenheimer. Transcript of the Hearing before Personnel Security Board and Text of Principal Documents and Letters, Washington, DC April 12, 1954, through June 29, 1954 (Reprint Cambridge: M.I.T. Press, 1971, pp. 149–150).

  9. Hearings Regarding Communist Infiltration of Radiation Laboratory and Atomic Bomb Project at the University of California, Berkely, Calif.—Vol. I. Hearings before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representives, Eighty-First Congress (Washington 1949, pp. 319–327, 347–353).

  10. Ibid. As Olival Freire Jr. shows, Bohm became quite well integrated in the Brazilian community and took part in international conferences in Brazil. See Freire (2005, pp. 1–34). So it seems that Bohm was not as isolated in Brazil as it has been assumed in other articles and books; the main difference is that Bohm was able to build up his own research group with many people who sympathized or shared his world view, like the physicist and philosopher Mario Bunge or the French physicist Jean-Pierre Vigier. So the US-community and its thought-style lost importance for Bohm and his own group gained increasing importance for his research.

  11. Interview with David Bohm conducted by Lilian Hoddeson, 8 May 1981, AIP, (p. 11).

  12. Letter from David Bohm to Miriam Yevick, 7th January 1952, DBP, uncatalogued.

  13. See footnote 12.

  14. Letter from David Bohm to Miriam Yevick, 7th January, DBP, uncatalogued and (Bohm 1952a, p. 167). In an interview with Max Jammer in 1967 Bohm stated that he was motivated by a paper written in English by Blokhintsev or Terletzkii. The paper Bohm mentioned could never be identified, but Bohm’s statement led to speculations about the influence of the Russian physicists. See Jammer (1974, p. 279).

  15. Interview Bohm-Wilkins, (pp. 348–351), Interview Bohm-Hoddeson, (pp. 13–14).

  16. Bohm’s discussions with Einstein were only a starting point for Bohm’s search for a new quantum theory. Finally he arrived at a non-local theory which was objected to by Einstein again, who favored a local theory and tried to find a solution on the basis of a general field theory. For Einstein’s critics see Fine (1986).

  17. Interview Bohm-Wilkins, Part II, (p. 46). Accentuation by the author.

  18. Letter from David Bohm to Melba Philips, undated [spring/summer 1954], DBP, Folder C.47.

  19. David Bohm, Causality and Chance in Modern Physics (Bohm 1984[1957]). The main ideas of this book refer to Bohm’s ideas from 1951/52 which he worked out in the following years. Bohm finished the Book in Brazil but it was not published before 1957 in London supported by the left wing physicists Eric Burhop and John D. Bernal. Cf. Interview Bohm-Wilkins, Part II, (pp. 44, 33, 22–24). See Forstner (2007, pp. 132–139).

  20. Telephone interview with Joseph Weinberg conducted by F. David Peat, see Peat (1997, p. 59) and letter from David Bohm to Miriam Yevick, 20 November [1951], DBP, uncatalogued.

  21. See Bohm and Vigier (1954, pp. 208–216), letter from David Bohm to Miriam Yevick, 7th January 1952, DBP, uncatalogued, and letter from David Bohm to George Yevick, not dated [January/February 1952], DBP, uncatalogued.

  22. See Jammer (1974, pp. 287–296). For a detailed discussion of the reception of Bohm’s paper see Freire (2005, pp. 10–28).

  23. Interview with Ernst Schmutzer conducted by the author, 24th September 2002, Archive of the author. For example, in the German Democratic Republic there was a meeting of the Physical Society in March 1953, where a talk about Bohm’s quantum theory was given by Gerhard Heber, but no publication resulted from this meeting. The author thanks Gerhard Heber who provided a copy of the program of the meeting to him. On similar approaches see Freire (1997, pp. 137–152).

  24. For Bohr’s seminar see Feyerabend (1997, p. 110) and letter from Paul Feyerabend to F. David Peat, 30th August 1993, DBP, Folder A.21. For Weiszäcker’s seminar attended by Heisenberg see Jammer (1974, p. 376).

  25. Letter from Wolfgang Pauli to Markus Fierz, 6th January 1952, reprinted in Pauli (1996, pp. 499–502).

  26. See George (1955).

  27. See for example Bohm, Schiller, and Tiomno (1957, pp. 48–66) and Bohm and Schützer (1955, pp. 1004–1047). It should be acknowledged that Bohm’s ideas on the “ether” have been published nowhere; nevertheless he did send preprints to his friends (see letter from David Bohm to George Yevick, not dated [January/February 1952], DBP, uncatalogued.).

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Acknowledgements

Thanks are due to the Hans-Böckler-Stiftung and the Max-Planck-Institute for the History of Science for supporting this study. For many helpful suggestions and discussions I thank the Minerva referees, Carsten Reinhardt, Christoph Meinel, Skùli Sigurdsson, Christoph Lehner, and Erik Banks.

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Correspondence to Christian Forstner.

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Forstner, C. The Early History of David Bohm’s Quantum Mechanics Through the Perspective of Ludwik Fleck’s Thought-Collectives. Minerva 46, 215–229 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11024-008-9090-2

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