Beyond Uncertainty



Beyond Uncertainty: Heisenberg, Quantum Physics, and the Bomb is a biography of Werner Heisenberg by David C. Cassidy. Published by Bellevue Literary Press in 2009, the book is a sequel to Cassidy's 1992 biography, Uncertainty: the Life and Science of Werner Heisenberg and serves as an updated and popularized version of the work. The release of new material after the 1992 publication of the first book rekindled controversy surrounding Heisenberg and his role in the German nuclear weapons program, resulting in the need for an updated version of the biography. The book's name is adapted from the first biography, whose title is taken from Heisenberg's uncertainty principle.

Background
The book serves as an updated and popularized version of Cassidy's 1992 biography, Uncertainty: the Life and Science of Werner Heisenberg. Some reviewers noted that the book's target audience is the general public, rather than scientists and historians. The book does not contain any formulas or even experimental setups; concepts are described only qualitatively. The book uses resources that were not available in 1992, including documents from the Soviet archives. Some of this new material, and the Michael Frayn play Copenhagen rekindled controversy surrounding Heisenberg and his role in the German nuclear weapons program, resulting in the need for an updated version of the biography. The book takes its name, Beyond Uncertainty, from the first book, Uncertainty, which itself is named after the quantum mechanics concept Heisenberg's uncertainty principle.

Content

 * Table of contents:


 * 1) The Early Years
 * 2) The World at War
 * 3) The Gymnasium Years
 * 4) The Battle of Munich
 * 5) Finding His Path
 * 6) Sommerfeld’s Institute
 * 7) Confronting the Quantum
 * 8) Modeling Atoms
 * 9) Channeling Rivers, Questioning Causality
 * 10) Entering the Quantum Matrix
 * 11) Awash in Matrices, Rescued by Waves
 * 12) Determining Uncertainty
 * 13) Reaching the Top
 * 14) New Frontiers
 * 15) Into the Abyss
 * 16) Social Atoms
 * 17) Of Particles and Politics
 * 18) Heir Apparent
 * 19) The Lonely Years
 * 20) A Faustian Bargain
 * 21) One Who Could Not Leave
 * 22) Warfare and Its Uses
 * 23) A Copenhagen Visit
 * 24) Ordering Reality
 * 25) Professor in Berlin
 * 26) Return to the Matrix
 * 27) One Last Attempt
 * 28) Explaining the Project: Farm Hall
 * 29) Explaining the Project: The World
 * 30) The Later Years

Reception
The book was reviewed by Sam Kean, Sara Jane Lippincott, and Benjamin B. Bederson in 2009 as well as Michael D. Gordin in 2010 and Alexander Soifer in 2011. Publishers Weekly posted a review that stated the book "offers a new view of the German wunderkind", is "[e]xhaustively detailed yet eminently readable", and "is an important book", though it noted the book "moves too quickly through Heisenberg’s 30 postwar years." A review in Physics Today wrote that the book "is interesting, well written, and amply documented" and that the book provides an "excellent discussion of science, society, and the influence of the individual scientist." Lippincott wrote in The Los Angeles Times that the book is "an excellent piece of science writing". The book has received several other reviews as well. In 2016, Gerald Holton called the book a "definitive biography";. it has been used as a benchmark for other books on Heisenberg. In his review, Benjamin B. Bederson called the book a "masterful work" that "carefully describes the private and public lives of Heisenberg" and wrote: "One can gain a pretty full picture of Heisenberg and of German and Western European physics during that amazing time by reading this single volume." He goes on to state that "hopefully for the last time" the work "clearly debunks the claim" that Heisenberg actively hindered the German atomic bomb project. Michael D. Gordin, in his review, called the book "a page-turner". Alexander Soifer, in his review, wrote that the "book is very well written, and is an easy popular reading".

Publication history

 * (hardcover)
 * (paperback)
 * (eBook)
 * (audiobook)