About the philosophy and books of Werner Heisenberg
One of the most outstanding physicists of the 20th century, the founding father of Quantum Mechanics, Werner Heisenberg wrote not only works on physics, but also amazingly deep and insightful books on philosophy, accessible to everyone, because there are no formulas or complex natural science concepts in them.
In general, it has become very fashionable today to contrast philosophy and science (we are talking, first of all, about natural sciences). Moreover, both “camps” are engaged in such contrasting.
There are philosophers who are very literate and deep-thinking, but who to one degree or another deny the ability of science to know the essence, deny the progress of science and progress in general. I usually suggest to such people to treat their teeth without anesthesia or to get from home to work on a horse, because both the development of medicine and the appearance of, for example, the metro are manifestations of social progress in general, and scientific progress in particular.
But more often you can find a dismissive attitude towards philosophy from scientists (physicists, biologists, and sometimes even historians). And this is indeed a very common phenomenon: they say that philosophy is just chatter; there are specific sciences – and they are the ones that reveal the truth. In the opinion of such people, philosophy may have been necessary and interesting 2000-3000 years ago, when science as such did not exist, but now philosophy in understanding the world has no more significance than collecting stamps or any other hobby.
In 99% of cases, a dismissive attitude towards philosophy, even if it comes from a PhD, is a marker of a superficial person with a narrow outlook, who, as a rule, is very well versed not even in his science as a whole, but in his one small specific specialization and nothing more. A dismissive attitude towards philosophy is always an inability to see the whole, it is thinking in parts, pieces. Therefore, such people can become good scientists-specialists in narrow fields, who, hiding behind their academic degree, deny any cognitive value of philosophy.
Meanwhile, almost any great scientist, especially in physics, is almost always a philosopher in spirit. There are many examples: M. Faraday, A. Einstein, N. Bohr and many others.
V. Heisenberg, the greatest physicist of the 20th century, a Nobel laureate, and one of the founders of Quantum Physics in its modern form, also highly valued philosophy. He even wrote several philosophical works:
“Physics and Philosophy”
“Part of the whole”,
“Steps Beyond the Horizon” and others.
V. Heisenberg especially highly valued Plato and Kant (the latter, by the way, is also highly valued, apparently, by our domestic physicist and popularizer of science A.M. Semikhatov, who is gaining popularity: he never mentions Kant's name directly, but often pronounces Kantian ideas and concepts). V. Heisenberg believed that the development of physics is a return to the ideas of the ancient Greeks at a new level.
Here are some very interesting quotes from W. Heisenberg that allow us to get a rough idea of his philosophical books and what he thought about philosophy in general:
“In other words, in all spheres of modern life, if only – systematically, historically or philosophically – we enter into the essence of the matter, we come across spiritual structures that go back to antiquity or Christianity” (from the book “Steps Beyond the Horizon”).
“It is hardly possible to advance in modern atomic physics without knowing Greek natural philosophy” (“Steps Beyond the Horizon”).
“The concept of possibility, which played such a significant role in Aristotle's philosophy, has once again come to the forefront in modern physics. The mathematical laws of quantum theory can well be considered a quantitative formulation of the Aristotelian concept of “dunamis” or “potency”” (“Steps Beyond the Horizon”).
“If we want to compare the results of modern particle physics with the ideas of any of the old philosophers, then Plato's philosophy seems the most adequate: the particles of modern physics are representatives of symmetry groups, and in this respect they resemble the symmetrical figures of Plato's philosophy” (From the article by W. Heisenberg “The Nature of Elementary Particles”).
And here is the greatest quote by V. Heisenberg, which is so deep and amazing that I could not cut anything in it, from the book “Physics and Philosophy”:
“The struggle of opposites, characteristic of the philosophy of Heraclitus, finds its prototype here in the interaction of various forms of energy. In the philosophy of Democritus, atoms are eternal and indecomposable units of matter: they cannot transform into each other. Modern physics opposes the position of Democritus and takes the side of Plato and the Pythagoreans. Elementary particles are not eternal and indecomposable units of matter; in fact, they can transform into each other. When two elementary particles collide at high speed, many new elementary particles are formed; arising from the energy of motion, the colliding particles can disappear in the process. Such processes are often observed and are the best proof that all particles consist of the same substance – energy. But the similarity of the views of modern physics with the views of Plato and the Pythagoreans extends even further. The elementary particles mentioned in Plato's dialogue “Timaeus” are, after all, not matter, but mathematical forms. “All things are numbers” is a proposition attributed to Pythagoras. The only mathematical forms known at that time were geometrical and stereometric forms, like the regular solids and the triangles of which their surface is formed. In modern quantum theory there can hardly be any doubt that elementary particles are ultimately mathematical forms, only of a much more complex and abstract nature. The Greek philosophers thought of static, geometrical forms and found them in the regular solids. Modern natural science, at its inception in the 16th and 17th centuries, made the problem of motion its central problem, and therefore introduced the concept of time into its foundation. Invariably since Newton, physics has investigated not configurations or geometrical forms, but dynamic laws. The equation of motion refers to any moment in time, it is in this sense eternal, while geometrical forms, such as the orbits of the planets, change. Therefore, the mathematical forms representing the elementary particles must ultimately be the solution of the immutable law of the motion of matter.”
That is why V. Heisenberg was a great scientist – he was a man with a truly broad outlook, a philosopher in spirit. Philosophy helped him see in physics what others could not see. Remember this when some other armchair smart-ass tells you that philosophy is just chatter, unlike “real science”. Philosophy is unthinkable without science, just as science is unthinkable without philosophy.
