Brilliant Blunders: From Darwin to Einstein - Colossal Mistakes by Great Scientists That Changed Our Understanding of Life and the Universe (45 page)

“In 1926 it was possible”:
Hoyle 1986b, p. 446.

Dmitry Mendeleyev, a Russian chemist:
A number of other chemists came up with their own versions of the periodic table. The list included the French mineralogist Alexandre-Émile Béguyer de Chancourtois, John Newlands in England, and, in particular, Julius Lothar Meyer in Germany, who contributed similar tables (following some pioneering work by Robert Bunsen). Mendeleyev was the person, however, who managed to insert all sixty-two known elements into the table, and to not only predict elements awaiting discovery but also to even anticipate their densities and atomic weights. For a fascinating read on the periodic table, see Kean 2010.

the smallest reproduction of the periodic table:
You can watch this feat on YouTube at
www.geek.com/articles/geek-cetera/periodic-tablet-etched-on-a-single-hair-as-birthday-gift-20101230
. See also
Science
334, no. 7 (October 2011), p. 24.

the English chemist William Prout:
For a brief biography of Prout (1785–1850), see Rosenfeld 2003.

Eddington proposed in 1920:
Eddington 1920. At the time he still considered annihilation, too, as a possible source of energy. Eddington discussed the source of stellar energy in Eddington 1926.

the French physicist Jean-Baptiste Perrin:
Wesemael 2009 described nicely the contributions of Perrin (1870–1942), and of the American physical chemist William Draper Harkins (1873–1951). See also Shaviv 2009, chapter 4.

“go and find a hotter place”:
Eddington 1926, p. 301.

On one occasion, physicist Ludwik Silberstein:
The famous astrophysicist Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar heard this story directly from Eddington. It is described in Berenstein 1973, p. 192.

“Only the inertia of tradition”:
Eddington 1920. Quoted also in full in the 1988 edition of
The Internal Constitution of the Stars
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), in the foreword (by S. Chandrasekhar), p. x.

the strong, attractive nuclear force:
At distances that are very small
compared to the size of the nucleus, the nuclear force itself becomes repulsive, because particles such as protons (fermions) resist being crowded. This quantum effect is known as the Pauli exclusion principle.

Using this quantum mechanical effect:
The probability of penetrating the barrier created by the Coulomb force increases exponentially with increasing energy of the particles. At the same time, the distribution of the particles at a given temperature is such that at high energies the number of particles decreases exponentially. The product of these two factors results in a peak (known as the Gamow peak) at which the nuclear reaction is most likely to occur. These ideas were first published in the late 1920s.

In a remarkable paper published:
Bethe 1939.

the proton-proton (p-p) chain:
For those with some nuclear physics background, the two main channels contributing to the energy production in the Sun are the pp I branch: p + p → D + e
⁺
+ νe, D + p →
³
He + γ,
³
He +
³
He →
⁴
He + 2p, and the pp II branch:
³
He +
⁴
He →
⁷
Be + γ,
⁷
Be + e
^-
→
⁷
Li + νe,
⁷
Li + p → 2
⁴
He.

“There is no way in which nuclei”:
Bethe 1939, p. 446.

the results were published in the April 1:
Alpher, Bethe, and Gamow 1948. Gamow had already presented the idea of nucleosynthesis in the big bang in Gamow 1942 and Gamow 1946.

often referred to as the “alphabetical article”:
In his book
The Creation of the Universe
, Gamow jokes “There was, however, a rumor that later, when the α, β, γ theory went temporarily on the rocks, Dr. Bethe seriously considered changing his name to Zacharias” (Gamow 1961, p. 64).

“stubbornly refuses to change his name”:
Gamow 1961, p. 64.

Even the great physicist Enrico Fermi:
Fermi examined the problem together with physicist Anthony Turkevich, even though they never published their results. A good description of the work on the mass gap problem can be found in Kragh 1996, pp. 128–32.

was an epoch-making paper:
Hoyle 1946.

“I sat in the RAS auditorium”:
Hoyle made the presentation on November 8, 1946. Margaret Burbidge was at the time Margaret Peachey; she was to marry astronomer Geoffrey Burbidge in 1948. The quote is from a lecture Margaret Burbidge gave at St. John’s College, Cambridge, on April 16, 2002. An excellent popular description of Hoyle’s work on nucleosynthesis can be found in Mitton 2005, chapter 8.

that particular student decided to ditch:
The incident is described in Hoyle 1986b.

Ernst Öpik proposed in 1951:
Öpik 1951.

Salpeter examined the triple alpha process:
Salpeter 1952. (Also Bondi and Salpeter 1952.) Salpeter went on to have a distinguished career in astrophysics.

“Bad luck for poor old Ed”:
Hoyle 1982, p. 3.

“had to go a lot faster”:
Hoyle 1982, p. 3.

Hoyle calculated that for carbon production:
While there had been some earlier suggestions for resonances around 7.4 MeV or so, those had never been confirmed, and in any case, no resonant level had been suggested (before Hoyle’s prediction) above 7.5 MeV.

What happened at that meeting:
After many years, the participants had somewhat different recollections of the events. A good summary of the various versions can be found in Kragh 2010.

“Here was this funny little man”:
Interview by Charles Weiner, American Institute of Physics, in February 1973. Cited in Kragh 2010.

“To my surprise, Willy didn’t”:
Hoyle 1982, p. 3.

Ward Whaling and his colleagues:
Described also in Fowler’s Nobel lecture, “Experimental and Theoretical Nuclear Astrophysics; the Quest for the Origin of the Elements,” given on December 8, 1983.

In their just-over-one-page:
Dunbar, Pixley, Wenzel, and Whaling 1953. The paper and its significance is described also in Spear 2002.

Despite his amazingly successful prediction:
Given that life as we know it is carbon based, much has been made of the anthropic significance of the resonant level in carbon. This issue is beyond the scope of the discussion here. I should note that in 1989, I, along with colleagues, showed that even if that energy level had been at a slightly different value, stars still would have produced carbon (Livio et al. 1989). This conclusion was confirmed later by more detailed work by Heinz Oberhummer and colleagues (Schlattl et al. 2004). For a detailed review, see Kragh 2010.

more than a half year passed:
Hoyle et al. 1953.

“In a sense this was but a minor”:
Hoyle 1986b, p. 449.

“In the beginning God created”:
Gamow 1970, p. 127. Gamow really wanted to express his objections to the steady state theory (discussed in chapter 9) proposed by Hoyle, Bondi, and Gold, but he ended up nevertheless acknowledging Hoyle’s contribution.

“Perhaps his [Hoyle’s] most important”:
Crafoord Prize 1997 press release.

In this paper, published in 1954:
Hoyle 1954.

The 1957 landmark paper:
Burbidge, Burbidge, Fowler, and Hoyle 1957. A very lively, popular account of the history of the theory of nucleosynthesis is Chown 2001. Tyson and Goldsmith 2004 provide a clear, humorous, multidisciplinary tour of cosmic evolution, from cosmology to biology.

Both Fowler and Hoyle presented their results:
Hoyle 1958, p. 279; Fowler 1958, p. 269.

a summary of the entire meeting:
Hoyle 1958, p. 431.

felt that Hoyle should have also:
For an online discussion of the issue of Hoyle’s not winning the Nobel Prize, see, eg,
www.thelonggoodread.com/2010/10/08/fred-hoyle-the-scientist-whose-rudeness-cost-him-a-nobel-prize
.

“The theory of stellar nucleosynthesis”:
Burbidge 2008. Nuclear astrophysicist Donald Clayton also explained the enormous significance of Hoyle’s 1954 paper; Clayton 2007.

“I also discovered that I had”:
Cited in Burbidge 2003, p. 218.

and these collaborative exchanges:
Described beautifully in an interview with Tommy Gold by historian of science Spencer Weart. The interview took place on April 1, 1978, for the American Institute of Physics.

Hoyle suggested cosmology as the topic:
Described in a fascinating interview with Fred Hoyle, in Lightman and Brawer 1990, p. 55.

Chapter 9: The Same Throughout Eternity?

“not only the laws of nature”:
Milne 1933.

“In a sense, the steady-state”:
Hoyle 1990. In his excellent account of the history of the steady state theory, Kragh 1996 raised doubts about the authenticity of the film story. However, shortly after the
New York Times
reported (on May 24, 1952) on a lecture by the Astronomer Royal, Sir Harold Spencer Jones, Hoyle wrote him a letter in which he specifically mentioned the film story. The fact that this letter was written as early as 1952 gives this account more credibility.

“What happened was that there was”:
Weart 1978.

in a paper published in 1929:
Hubble 1929a.

the Russian mathematician Aleksandr Friedmann:
Friedmann 1922.

a passionate debate flared up:
A few of the articles about the credit for the discovery of cosmic expansion are Way and Nussbaumer 2011, Nussbaumer and Bieri 2011, Van den Bergh 2011, and Block 2011.

astronomer Vesto Slipher had measured:
Described, eg, in Van den Bergh 1997.

Arthur Eddington listed those:
Eddington 1923, p. 162.

Georges Lemaître published (in French) a remarkable paper:
Lemaître 1927.

from brightness measurements by Hubble:
Hubble 1926.

Edwin Hubble obtained a value:
Hubble 1929a.

Based solely on what I have described:
A brief summary of the events can be found in Livio 2011. See also Nussbaumer and Bieri 2009, Kragh and Smith 2003, and Trimble 2012 for more detailed descriptions.

The English translation of Lemaître’s:
Lemaître 1931a.

Canadian astronomer Sidney van den Bergh:
Van den Bergh 2011.

David Block went even somewhat further:
Block 2011.

First, I obtained a copy:
I am grateful to the Archives Georges Lemaître
in Louvain, Belgium, and to Mme. Liliane Moens for providing me with a copy.

any intent of extra editing:
Block thought that the “©©1–
n
” in the letter should be read as “©©1–72” because of the way the symbol “
n
” was written. He also interpreted the text as saying that Lemaître was given freedom to translate
only
the first seventy-two paragraphs of his paper. He further concluded that paragraph seventy-three was precisely Lemaître’s equation determining the value of the Hubble constant. None of these was convincing. (See Livio 2011 for a discussion.)

in the minutes of the council:
RAS 1931.

The second piece of evidence:
RAS, RAS correspondence 1931.

“The Expanding Universe”:
Lemaître 1931b.

“Dinner was a little late”:
Bondi 1990, p. 191.

Bondi and Gold proposed their Perfect Cosmological Principle:
Bondi and Gold 1948.

Hoyle embarked on a more mathematical:
Hoyle 1948a.

“causes unknown to science”:
Hoyle 1948a.

“Neutron creation appears to be the most likely”:
Hoyle 1948a.

“I shall not require of a scientific”:
Popper 2006, p. 18.

“Modern astrophysics appears to be”:
Hoyle 1948b, p. 216.

“Cosmology is one department of astronomy”:
Greaves 1948, p. 216.