Book contents
- The Cambridge History of Modern European Thought
- The Cambridge History of Modern European Thought
- The Cambridge History of Modern European Thought
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Preface
- Introduction
- 1 Sociology and the Heroism of Modern Life
- 2 Psychoanalysis: Freud and Beyond
- 3 Modern Physics: From Crisis to Crisis
- 4 Varieties of Phenomenology
- 5 Existentialism and the Meanings of Transcendence
- 6 Philosophies of Life
- 7 The Many Faces of Analytic Philosophy
- 8 American Ideas in the European Imagination
- 9 Revolution from the Right: Against Equality
- 10 Western Marxism: Revolutions in Theory
- 11 Anti-imperialism and Interregnum
- 12 Late Modern Feminist Subversions: Sex, Subjectivity, and Embodiment
- 13 Modernist Theologies: The Many Paths between God and World
- 14 Modern Economic Thought and the “Good Society”
- 15 Conservatism and Its Discontents
- 16 Modernity and the Specter of Totalitarianism
- 17 Decolonization Terminable and Interminable
- 18 Structuralism and the Return of the Symbolic
- 19 Post-structuralism: From Deconstruction to the Genealogy of Power
- 20 Contesting the Public Sphere: Within and against Critical Theory
- 21 Restructuring Democracy and the Idea of Europe
- Index
3 - Modern Physics: From Crisis to Crisis
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 August 2019
- The Cambridge History of Modern European Thought
- The Cambridge History of Modern European Thought
- The Cambridge History of Modern European Thought
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Preface
- Introduction
- 1 Sociology and the Heroism of Modern Life
- 2 Psychoanalysis: Freud and Beyond
- 3 Modern Physics: From Crisis to Crisis
- 4 Varieties of Phenomenology
- 5 Existentialism and the Meanings of Transcendence
- 6 Philosophies of Life
- 7 The Many Faces of Analytic Philosophy
- 8 American Ideas in the European Imagination
- 9 Revolution from the Right: Against Equality
- 10 Western Marxism: Revolutions in Theory
- 11 Anti-imperialism and Interregnum
- 12 Late Modern Feminist Subversions: Sex, Subjectivity, and Embodiment
- 13 Modernist Theologies: The Many Paths between God and World
- 14 Modern Economic Thought and the “Good Society”
- 15 Conservatism and Its Discontents
- 16 Modernity and the Specter of Totalitarianism
- 17 Decolonization Terminable and Interminable
- 18 Structuralism and the Return of the Symbolic
- 19 Post-structuralism: From Deconstruction to the Genealogy of Power
- 20 Contesting the Public Sphere: Within and against Critical Theory
- 21 Restructuring Democracy and the Idea of Europe
- Index
Summary
The first decades of the twentieth century were marked by two revolutionary scientific accomplishments, the theory of relativity and quantum mechanics, with repercussions still felt today. Relativity theory and quantum mechanics became the two most important branches of “Modern Physics” that emerged as an alternative to “Classical Physics” (a term often used interchangeably with that of “Newtonian” or “Galilean” physics). No field of science (from astronomy to the life sciences), no field of knowledge (from philosophy to sociology), and no artistic practice (from architecture to the fine arts) was left untouched by these investigations into the nature of our physical universe.
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- The Cambridge History of Modern European Thought , pp. 72 - 101Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2019