Constructing Quarks: A Sociological History of Particle Physics by Andrew Pickering (PDF)

Description

Widely regarded as a classic in its field, Constructing Quarks recounts the history of the post-war conceptual development of elementary-particle physics. Inviting a reappraisal of the status of scientific knowledge, Andrew Pickering suggests that scientists are not mere passive observers and reporters of nature. Rather they are social beings as well as active constructors of natural phenomena who engage in both experimental and theoretical practice.”A prodigious piece of scholarship that I can heartily recommend.”—Michael Riordan, New Scientist”An admirable history. . . . Detailed and so accurate.”—Hugh N. Pendleton, Physics Today

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: About the Author Andrew Pickering is professor and chair of sociology at the University of Exeter. He is the author of several books, including Constructing Quarks: A Sociological History of Particle Physics and The Mangle of Practice: Time, Agency, and Science, both published by the University of Chicago Press.

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐I agree completely with Kevin Orrman-Rossiter’s review on GoodReads: Well-researched and documented history with an interpretation that is very biased towards sociological drives, as if reality is far less consequential than I find it. This book is very Kuhnian, which I find a drawback (because it strikes me that the only reason Kuhn was ever popular was because he treated science like a cocktail party, which people can relate to more easily than the way in which science actually works and why it works). Luckily the Pickering warns readers ahead of time before he starts with his interpretations, so it’s easy to avoid them if you want to avoid sermons. Again, it is an excellent history, and the majority of the book is devoted to this history.

⭐An amazing analysis of the professional and cultural changes which led to the development and acceptance of electroweak unification and the quark model. I would highly recommend this to anyone with an interest in the history of science, and especially to anyone who is interested in high-energy physics.

⭐An insider story about the discovery of the basic building blocks of our universe. Well written and perfectly documented.

⭐Great book

⭐Andrew Pickering is a sociologist, philosopher and historian of science at the University of Exeter; he was previously a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.He wrote in the Preface to this 1984 book, “Atomic physics, nuclear physics and even the early years of elementary-particle physics have all been subject to historical scrutiny, but the story of the latest cycle of atomism has yet to be told. Not content with regarding protons, neutrons and the like as truly elementary particles, in the 1960s and 1970s high-energy physicists became increasingly confident that they have plumbed a new stratum of matter: quarks. Gross matter was composed of atoms; within the atom was the nucleus; within the nucleus were protons and neutrons; and, finally, within protons and neutrons … were quarks. The aim of this book is to document and analyze this latest step into the heart of the material world. The analysis given here… is sociological. Rather than treat the quark view of matter as an abstract conceptual system, I seek to analyze its construction, elaboration and use in the context of the developing practice of the HEP [high-energy physics] community… The view taken here is that the reality of quarks was the upshot of particle physicists’ practice, and not the reverse.” (Pg. ix-x)Later, he adds, “Opportunism in context is the theme which runs through my historical account. I seek to explain the dynamics of practice in terms of the contexts within which researchers find themselves , and the resources which they have available for the exploitation of those contexts.” (Pg. 11)He recounts, “Writing in 1951… HEP theorist Robert Marshak … looked back upon a golden age of elementary particles: … ‘It appeared that the physical universe could be explained in terms of just three elementary particles—the electron, the proton, and the neutron… revolving around the nucleus like planets around a sun.’ In December 1951, Marshak counted 15 elementary particles—the list was already beginning to look untidy. As the years went by, the list grew longer, and this section traces out the principal early developments.” (Pg. 47)He observes, “It seems implausible that, without the sustaining interest of quark modellers, experimenters would have persisted in the painstaking exploration of the low-energy resonance regime. There would have been little point to such activity, and experimenters would have found other ways of exploiting the finite resources available for research.” (Pg. 103)He notes, “in both branches of neutrino physics—bubble chamber and electronic experiments—the pattern was the same. The 1960s order, in which a particular set of interpretative procedures pointed to the non-existence of the neutral current, was displaced in the 1970s by a new order, in which a new set of interpretative procedures made the neutral current manifest. Each set of procedures was in principle questionable, and yet the HEP community chose to accept the first one and then the other. Why did this transformation come about? The answer if obvious when one takes into account the dynamics of scientific practice, but it will be useful to spell it out.” (Pg. 193)He explains, “1974 was the year of the ‘November Revolution.’ Until November 1974 the new physics traditions of theory and experiment constituted only a minor aspect of HEP practice; the old physics remained dominant. In November 1974 . the discovery of the first of a series of highly unusual elementary particles was announced. This announcement … led within the space of five years to the eclipse of the old physics by the new.” (Pg. 231)He suggests, “Matched against the mighty traditions of HEP, the handful of atomic physicists at Washington and Oxford stood little chance. Their results… were returned to them by the HEP community as a problem for atomic physics. And of course, since atomic physicists around the world could not agree among themselves, there was little hope that they could mobilize sufficient resources to send the problem back whence it had originated—to particle physics. The standard model, a central pillar of the new orthodoxy, was established through a process that was AT ONCE conceptual and social: the two cannot be separated.” (Pg. 302)He says, “during the 1970s, the new-physics world-view penetrated every aspect of experimental life at CERN… the day-to-day practice of HEP experimenters became structured around the investigation of new-physics phenomena, using detectors which embodied the prejudices of gauge theory. The phenomena of the old physics were written out of existence… In word, deed and financial calculation HEP experimenters testified that they lived in the world of the new physics.” (Pg. 370)He comments, “By 1980, Bjorken’s gauge-theory ‘new orthodoxy’… had come to fill the universe and to command space and time… In their daily practice, and in their planning for the future, particle theorists and accelerator experimenters were joined by astrophysicists and searchers deep underground in testifying that their world was the world of gauge theory. They had built it, and it was impossible to imagine that they would surrender it.” (Pg. 396)He summarizes, “The aim of this history of HEP has been to analyze the establishment of the new-physics world-view. I have sought to explain how particle physicists came to believe that the world was built from quarks and leptons and that the interactions of these fundamental entities were described by gauge theory.” (Pg. 403) He continues, “The particle physicists of the late 1970s were themselves quite happy to abandon most of the phenomenal world and much of the explanatory framework which they had constructed in the previous decade. There is no reason for outsiders to show the present HEP world-view any more respect. In certain contexts, it may be profitable to pay close attention to contemporary scientific beliefs. In other contexts, to listen too closely to scientists may be simply to stifle the imagination. World-views are cultural products; there is no need to be intimidated by them.” (Pg. 413-414)This is a very interesting (and unusual!) account of the recent development of particle physics, and will be of great interest to those studying this subject.

⭐The first thing that made me sick was the author referring to Enrico Fermis beta decay Theory as sick.Does he understand who he is criticizing here.This is a very detailed book on the falsehoods of Particle Physics .When I understand already that modern science is wrong there is no reason to rehash in detail ad nauseum. To me it’s a complete waste of time to read something so detailed .I read The end of physics by David Lindley.This was a much better book.Written by an actual Scientist. We do not need such detail to describe falsehoods especially when there is still much information left out.There is a lot more behind corruption than this book can analyze.The book is great analysis .

⭐Use it to study physics.

⭐Eine sehr interessante und trotz ihres Alters von mehr als 30 Jahren immer noch sehr lesenswerte und detaillierte Entstehungsgeschichte der Quarks und des modernen Standardmodells der Elementarteilchenphysik. Kann man nur jedem Physiker, der am LHC in Genf oder an anderen Teilchenbeschleunigern in den USA oder Japan arbeitet, wärmstens empfehlen.

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⭐ピカリングのこの著作、「クォークは社会的構成物にすぎない」と戯言をぬかす本としてプロの科学者の間ではそうとう評判悪いみたいですし、科学論業界の中だけで見ても、科学史家ギャリソンが『実験はいかにして終わるか』において中性カレント実在の確定プロセスに関するピカリングの分析を批判しているように四面楚歌な状況。ですが、実際にはピカリングは、クォークにせよ中性カレントにせよ、その実在性の確立に実験は寄与していないなどと主張しているわけではなく、理論の実験的確証の追求というものは当の理論の価値相場が上昇してはじめて取り組まれるものであるということ、だから理論の提案→実験→理論の確立という直線的で一方通行的な流れは現実にはありえないというのが彼の言わんとすることであるように思われる。こうした研究実践の現場感覚を描き出すピカリングの歴史分析は正しく科学社会学的分析である。実験は理論を確証するのか、それとも反証しかしないのかといった類の問い方をする科学哲学者（およびポパー流の科学哲学こそが科学の現実に適合していると思いこんでいるプロの科学者の方々）には、実験はいつ行われ、その結果はどう解釈されるのかと問う科学社会学の問題意識はつかみにくいに違いない。素粒子物理のテクニカルな記述が数式抜きですがかなりねちっこく書かれていて、難しい英語ではないですが読みこなすのは門外漢には一苦労を超えてもはや不可能（笑）リオーダン『クォーク狩り』とクリース＆マン『素粒子物理学をつくったひとびと』あたりに目を通しておいてから本書に挑めば問題は解決すると思います。

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⭐Fuer mich einfach “Yet Another History Of The Standard Model” (YAHOTSM). Keine Ahnung, warum das bei Historikern und Wissenschafts-Philosophen so hoch gehandelt wird. Ja, es gibt ein paar Gedanken drin, dass die Geschichte der Teilchenphysik auch anders haette verlaufen koennen, wenn sie nicht vom Herdentrieb der Physiker getrieben worden waere, aber der Rest ist nicht wirklich neu. Und wem die sozialen Aspekte egal sind, sich also nur fuer die Geschichte des SM interessiert, dem empfehle ich das weit spannendere und meiner Meinung nach besser recherchierte Buch von Crease und Mann.

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