Henri Poincaré: Electrons to Special Relativity
Translation of Selected Papers and Discussion
Authors: Popp, Bruce D
Free Preview- Features translations by an award-winning translator of Henri Poincaré Recounts the discovery of radioactivity and the characterization of its componentsAn insightful reanalysis of data from 1902 concerning high-speed electronsOffers a clear comparison of contributions by M. Abraham, H. A. Lorentz and H. Poincaré to a theory of electrons
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- About this book
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Produced by an award-winning translator of Henri Poincaré, this book contains translations of several seminal articles by Poincaré and discusses the experimental and theoretical investigations of electrons that form their context. In the 1950s, a dispute ignited about the origin of the theory of special relativity and thrust considerable notoriety on a paper written by Henri Poincaré in 1905. Accordingly, Part I presents the relevant translations of Poincaré’s work showing that radiation carries momentum and the covariance of the equations of electrodynamics, the continuity equation for charge, and the spacetime interval. Part II then discusses investigations by Thomson, Becquerel, and Kaufmann of electrons in diverse contexts; contributions of Abraham, Lorentz and Poincaré to a theory of electrons that includes Lorentz transformations and explains the dependence of mass on velocity; and finally, Poincaré’s exploration of the relativity principle, electron stability, and gravitation while rejecting absolute motion (ether) and an electromagnetic origin of mass. Part III contains the 1904 article by H. A. Lorentz presenting his transformations.This book will be a fascinating read to graduate-level students, physicists, and science historians who are interested in the development of electrodynamics and the classical, relativistic theory of electrons at the beginning of the 20th century.
- About the authors
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Bruce D. Popp is an ATA-certified translator for French into English with a BA in physics from Cornell University and a PhD in astrophysics from Harvard University. He is the recipient of the 2017 S. Edmund Berger Prize for Excellence in Scientific and Technical Translation; he was awarded the prize for his first book, a translation from French into English of The Three-Body Problem and the Equations of Dynamics by Henri Poincaré (Springer 2017).
- Table of contents (14 chapters)
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The Measurement of Time
Pages 3-11
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Lorentz’s Theory and the Conservation of Momentum
Pages 13-36
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Three Letters to H. A. Lorentz
Pages 37-40
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Electricity – On the Dynamics of the Electron
Pages 41-44
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On the Dynamics of the Electron
Pages 45-102
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Table of contents (14 chapters)
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Bibliographic Information
- Bibliographic Information
-
- Book Title
- Henri Poincaré: Electrons to Special Relativity
- Book Subtitle
- Translation of Selected Papers and Discussion
- Authors
-
- Bruce D Popp
- Copyright
- 2020
- Publisher
- Springer International Publishing
- Copyright Holder
- Springer Nature Switzerland AG
- eBook ISBN
- 978-3-030-48039-4
- DOI
- 10.1007/978-3-030-48039-4
- Hardcover ISBN
- 978-3-030-48038-7
- Edition Number
- 1
- Number of Pages
- XVIII, 285
- Number of Illustrations
- 3 b/w illustrations, 4 illustrations in colour
- Topics