Ernst Mach as teacher and thinker

JUN 01, 1967

A textbook especially for medical students, demonstration apparatus for mechanics and optics, and publications in psychology, physiology and the history and theory of inductive science were among the activities of this physicist who gave equal weight to teaching and research.

DOI: 10.1063/1.3034354

Otto Blüh

THE YEAR OF Ernst Mach’s hundredth birthday, 1938, was the first occasion for commemorating his work. At that time the difficult political situation in Central Europe made any such event unfeasible. The members of the so-called “Vienna School” of neopositivism, who at their beginning had assumed the name of “Ernst Mach Society,” had dispersed, and in Prague, where a program of lectures on Mach had been prepared, the celebrations had to be curtailed because of unrest in the spring of 1938. Spring of 1966 was the next opportunity for remembering Mach and his work, on the 50th anniversary of his death in 1916. In fact, the “Ernst‐Mach‐Institute” in Freiburg im Breisgau arranged an international conference on Mach, and last December the American Association for the Advancement of Science, with its Ernst Mach Symposium, also shared in honoring Mach’s personality and work.

References

1. F. Ratliff, Mach Bands, Quantitative Studies on Neural Networks in the Retina, Holden‐Day, San Francisco (1965).
2. K. D. Heller, Ernst Mach, Wegbereiter der modemen Physik, Springer‐Verlag, Berlin (1964).
3. J. Popper‐Lynkeus, p. 26 in Mein Leben und Wirken, Eine Selbstdarstellung, Carl Reissner (1924).
4. J. F. Herbart, The Science of Education (translation by H. M. Felkin, E. Felkin), D. C. Heath, Boston (1896).
5. E. Mach, Compendium der Physik für Mediziner, Wilhelm Braumüller (1863).
6. E. Mach, The Science of Mechanics: A Critical and Historical Account of Its Development (translation by T. J. McCormack, new introduction by K. Menger), Open Court, LaSalle, Ill. (1960).
7. E. Mach, p. 431 in Die Prinzipien der Wärmelehre. Historich‐kritisch dargestellt (4th ed.), J. A. Barth, Leipzig (1923).
8. E. Mach, The Principles of Physical Optics: An Historical and Philosophical Treatment (translation by J. S. Anderson, A. F. A. Young), Dover, New York (1953).
9. J. Mayerhöfer, “Ernst Mach as a Professor of the History of Science,” p. 337 in Proc. 10th Internat. Congress of History of Science, Ithaca, Vol. 2, Hermann, Paris (1962).
10. E. Mach, Erkenntnis und Irrtum (5th ed.), J. A. Barth, Leipzig (1926).
11. E. Mach, Leitfaden der Physik für Studierende (2nd ed.) Tempsky (1891);
Grundriss der Naturlehre, Tempsky (1891).
12. E. Mach, p. 285 in Popular Lectures (translated by T. J. McCormack) Open Court, La Salle, Ill. (1895).
13. E. Mach, p. 51 in History and Root of the Principle of the Conservation of Energy (translated and annotated by P. E. B. Jourdain), Open Court, La Salle, Ill. (1911).
14. M. Born, p. 207 in Natural Philosophy of Cause and Chance, Dover, New York (1948).
15. E. Mach, p. 299 in Die Analyse der Emfindungen und das Verhältnis des Physichen zum Psychischen, Gustav Fischer, Jena (1918).
(English translation by Dover, New York, 1959).
16. J. D. Bernal, p. 528 in Science in History, Watts (1954).
17. “Mach,” p. 527 in Meyers Neues Lexikon, Vol. 5, VEB Bibliog. Inst., Leipzig (1964).
18. A. Einstein, “Ernst Mach,” in Physikal. Zeitschr. 17, 104 (1916).
19. M. Arnold, p. 261 in Schools and Universities on the Continent, Macmillan, New York (1868).

More about the Authors

Otto Blüh. Vanderbilt.