Walter Weizel
Encyclopedia
Walter Friedrich Karl Weizel (1 August 1901 in Lauterecken Kreis Kusel – 6 August 1982) was a German
theoretical physicist and politician. As a result of his opposition to National Socialism in Germany, he was forced into early retirement for a short duration in 1933. He was a full professor at the University of Bonn, from 1936 to 1969. After World War II, he helped to establish the Jülich Research Center, and he was a state representative of the Social Democratic Party of Germany.
at Heidelberg, under Max Trautz. He switched form chemistry to physics to work on the quantum mechanics
of molecules as a fellow of the Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft
(NG; Emergency Association of German Science) at the Universität Rostock
. He completed his Habilitation
in 1929.
, Baden Aniline and Soda Factory) at Ludwigshafen. Then, during 1931, he had a Rockefeller fellowship to the University of Chicago
.
From late in 1931, Weizel was an ordentlicher Professor (ordinarius professor) of theoretical physics at the Technische Hochschule Karlsruhe (today, the University of Karlsruhe). After Adolf Hitler
came to power in 1933, Weizel was temporarily forced into retirement due to his opposition to National Socialism. In 1936, he was called from the Technische Hochschule Karlsruhe to an ordinarius professorship at the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn
.
On 1 December 1939, after more than four years of a selections process, due to academic and political differences between the Munich Faculty and both the Reichserziehungsministerium
(REM, Reich Education Ministry) and the supporters of deutsche Physik
, Wilhelm Carl Gottlieb Müller was selected to succeed Arnold Sommerfeld
in the chair for theoretical physics at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München. Müller was a supporter of deutsche Physik, which was anti-Semitic and had a bias against theoretical physics
, especially quantum mechanics
and the theory of relativity
. The appointment of Wilhelm Müller – who was not a theoretical physicist, had not published in a physics journal, and was not a member of the Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft
– as a replacement for Sommerfeld, was considered such a travesty and detrimental to educating a new generation of physicists that both Ludwig Prandtl, director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institut für Strömungsforschung ( Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Flow Research
), and Carl Ramsauer
, director of the research division of the Allgemeine Elektrizitäts-Gesellschaft
(General Electric Company) and president of the Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft
, made reference to this in their correspondence to officials in the Reich. In an attachment to Prandtl’s 28 April 1941 letter to Reich Marshal Hermann Göring
, Prandtl referred to the appointment as “sabotage” of necessary theoretical physics instruction. In an attachment to Ramsauer’s 20 January 1942 letter to Reich Minister Bernhard Rust
, Ramsauer concluded that the appointment amounted to the “destruction of the Munich theoretical physics tradition.” When Müller, as editor, published the document Jüdische und deutsche Physik, Weizel published a very critical review of the booklet pointing out its inconsistencies; his review had the support of the Faculty of Science and Mathematics at the University of Bonn.
After World War II
, Weizel focused his scientific research on the physics of electrical discharges in gases. He was involved in the establishment of the Forschungszentrum Jülich
(Jülich Research Center). Also after World War II, he was a representative of the Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands
(SPD, Social Democratic Party of Germany). From 1946 to 1954 he was a Bonn city delegate, and from 1948 to 1954 he was deputy SPD chairman of the Council of the City of Bonn. From 14 July 1954 to 12 July 1958, he was a member of the Landtag (State Diet) of North Rhine-Westphalia
. Weizel held his professorship at the University of Bonn until he reached emeritus status in 1969.
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
theoretical physicist and politician. As a result of his opposition to National Socialism in Germany, he was forced into early retirement for a short duration in 1933. He was a full professor at the University of Bonn, from 1936 to 1969. After World War II, he helped to establish the Jülich Research Center, and he was a state representative of the Social Democratic Party of Germany.
Education
From 1918 to 1925, Weizel studied chemistry at the Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, and the Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg. He received his doctorate in physical chemistryPhysical chemistry
Physical chemistry is the study of macroscopic, atomic, subatomic, and particulate phenomena in chemical systems in terms of physical laws and concepts...
at Heidelberg, under Max Trautz. He switched form chemistry to physics to work on the quantum mechanics
Quantum mechanics
Quantum mechanics, also known as quantum physics or quantum theory, is a branch of physics providing a mathematical description of much of the dual particle-like and wave-like behavior and interactions of energy and matter. It departs from classical mechanics primarily at the atomic and subatomic...
of molecules as a fellow of the Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft
Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft
Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft was founded on 30 October 1920 on the initiative of leading members of the Preußischen Akademie der Wissenschaften – Fritz Haber, Max Planck, and Ernst von Harnack – and the former Preußischen...
(NG; Emergency Association of German Science) at the Universität Rostock
University of Rostock
The University of Rostock is the university of the city Rostock, in the German state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.Founded in 1419, it is the oldest and largest university in continental northern Europe and the Baltic Sea area...
. He completed his Habilitation
Habilitation
Habilitation is the highest academic qualification a scholar can achieve by his or her own pursuit in several European and Asian countries. Earned after obtaining a research doctorate, such as a PhD, habilitation requires the candidate to write a professorial thesis based on independent...
in 1929.
Career
After Habilitation, Weizel worked briefly at Badische Anilin- und Sodafabrik (BASFBASF
BASF SE is the largest chemical company in the world and is headquartered in Germany. BASF originally stood for Badische Anilin- und Soda-Fabrik . Today, the four letters are a registered trademark and the company is listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, London Stock Exchange, and Zurich Stock...
, Baden Aniline and Soda Factory) at Ludwigshafen. Then, during 1931, he had a Rockefeller fellowship to the University of Chicago
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
.
From late in 1931, Weizel was an ordentlicher Professor (ordinarius professor) of theoretical physics at the Technische Hochschule Karlsruhe (today, the University of Karlsruhe). After Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
came to power in 1933, Weizel was temporarily forced into retirement due to his opposition to National Socialism. In 1936, he was called from the Technische Hochschule Karlsruhe to an ordinarius professorship at the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn
University of Bonn
The University of Bonn is a public research university located in Bonn, Germany. Founded in its present form in 1818, as the linear successor of earlier academic institutions, the University of Bonn is today one of the leading universities in Germany. The University of Bonn offers a large number...
.
On 1 December 1939, after more than four years of a selections process, due to academic and political differences between the Munich Faculty and both the Reichserziehungsministerium
Reichserziehungsministerium
The Reichserziehungsministerium was officially known as the Reichsministerium für Wissenschaft, Erziehung und Volksbildung .-Background:...
(REM, Reich Education Ministry) and the supporters of deutsche Physik
Deutsche Physik
Deutsche Physik or Aryan Physics was a nationalist movement in the German physics community in the early 1930s against the work of Albert Einstein, labeled "Jewish Physics"...
, Wilhelm Carl Gottlieb Müller was selected to succeed Arnold Sommerfeld
Arnold Sommerfeld
Arnold Johannes Wilhelm Sommerfeld was a German theoretical physicist who pioneered developments in atomic and quantum physics, and also educated and groomed a large number of students for the new era of theoretical physics...
in the chair for theoretical physics at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München. Müller was a supporter of deutsche Physik, which was anti-Semitic and had a bias against theoretical physics
Theoretical physics
Theoretical physics is a branch of physics which employs mathematical models and abstractions of physics to rationalize, explain and predict natural phenomena...
, especially quantum mechanics
Quantum mechanics
Quantum mechanics, also known as quantum physics or quantum theory, is a branch of physics providing a mathematical description of much of the dual particle-like and wave-like behavior and interactions of energy and matter. It departs from classical mechanics primarily at the atomic and subatomic...
and the theory of relativity
Theory of relativity
The theory of relativity, or simply relativity, encompasses two theories of Albert Einstein: special relativity and general relativity. However, the word relativity is sometimes used in reference to Galilean invariance....
. The appointment of Wilhelm Müller – who was not a theoretical physicist, had not published in a physics journal, and was not a member of the Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft
Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft
The Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft is the world's largest organization of physicists. The DPG's worldwide membership is cited as 60,000, as of 2011...
– as a replacement for Sommerfeld, was considered such a travesty and detrimental to educating a new generation of physicists that both Ludwig Prandtl, director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institut für Strömungsforschung ( Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Flow Research
Kaiser Wilhelm Institute
The Kaiser Wilhelm Society for the Advancement of Science was a German scientific institution established in 1911. It was implicated in Nazi science, and after the Second World War was wound up and its functions replaced by the Max Planck Society...
), and Carl Ramsauer
Carl Ramsauer
Carl Wilhelm Ramsauer was an internationally notable professor of physics and research physicist, famous for the discovery of the Ramsauer-Townsend effect...
, director of the research division of the Allgemeine Elektrizitäts-Gesellschaft
AEG
Allgemeine Elektricitäts-Gesellschaft was a German producer of electrical equipment founded in 1883 by Emil Rathenau....
(General Electric Company) and president of the Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft
Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft
The Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft is the world's largest organization of physicists. The DPG's worldwide membership is cited as 60,000, as of 2011...
, made reference to this in their correspondence to officials in the Reich. In an attachment to Prandtl’s 28 April 1941 letter to Reich Marshal Hermann Göring
Hermann Göring
Hermann Wilhelm Göring, was a German politician, military leader, and a leading member of the Nazi Party. He was a veteran of World War I as an ace fighter pilot, and a recipient of the coveted Pour le Mérite, also known as "The Blue Max"...
, Prandtl referred to the appointment as “sabotage” of necessary theoretical physics instruction. In an attachment to Ramsauer’s 20 January 1942 letter to Reich Minister Bernhard Rust
Bernhard Rust
Dr. Bernhard Rust was Minister of Science, Education and National Culture in Nazi Germany. A combination of school administrator and zealous Nazi, he issued decrees, often bizarre, at every level of the German educational system to immerse German youth in the National Socialist philosophy...
, Ramsauer concluded that the appointment amounted to the “destruction of the Munich theoretical physics tradition.” When Müller, as editor, published the document Jüdische und deutsche Physik, Weizel published a very critical review of the booklet pointing out its inconsistencies; his review had the support of the Faculty of Science and Mathematics at the University of Bonn.
After World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, Weizel focused his scientific research on the physics of electrical discharges in gases. He was involved in the establishment of the Forschungszentrum Jülich
Jülich Research Centre
Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH is a member of the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres and is one of the largest interdisciplinary research centres in Europe...
(Jülich Research Center). Also after World War II, he was a representative of the Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands
Social Democratic Party of Germany
The Social Democratic Party of Germany is a social-democratic political party in Germany...
(SPD, Social Democratic Party of Germany). From 1946 to 1954 he was a Bonn city delegate, and from 1948 to 1954 he was deputy SPD chairman of the Council of the City of Bonn. From 14 July 1954 to 12 July 1958, he was a member of the Landtag (State Diet) of North Rhine-Westphalia
Landtag of North Rhine-Westphalia
The Landtag of North Rhine-Westphalia is the state diet of the German federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia. It convenes in Düsseldorf and currently consists of 181 members of five Parties...
. Weizel held his professorship at the University of Bonn until he reached emeritus status in 1969.
Selected literature by Weizel
- W. Weizel Über die Banden des Lithiumhydrids und Lithiums, Zeitschrift für Physik Volume 60, Numbers 9-10, 599-602 (September, 1930). Received: 22 January 1930. Affiliation: Physikalisehen Institut der Universität Rostock.
- Walter Weizel The Broadening of the Resonance Atomic Line of Helium, Phys. Rev. Volume 38, 642 - 645 (1931). Received 12 June 1931. Institutional affiliation: Ryerson Physical Laboratory, University of Chicago. The author was cited as being a Fellow of the Rockfeller Foundation.
- W. FinkelnburgWolfgang FinkelnburgWolfgang Karl Ernst Finkelnburg was a German physicist who made contributions to spectroscopy, atomic physics, the structure of matter, and high-temperature arc discharges...
and W. Weizel Über das kontinuierliche Wasserstoffspektrum. Der Verlauf seiner Anregungsspannung und seine Deutung, Zeitschrift für Physik Volume 68, Numbers 9-10, 577-584 (September, 1931). Received: 23 February 1931. Affiliations: Finkelburg, Physikalisch-Chemischen Institut der Universität Berlin, Deutschland, and Weizel, Physikalischen Institut der Universität Rostock, Deutschland.
- W. Weizel and O. Beeck, Ionisierung und Anregung durch Ionenstoß, Zeitschrift für Physik Volume 76, Numbers 3-4, 250-257 (March, 1932). Received: 24 February 1932. Affiliations: Weizel, Karlsruhe, and Beeck, Pasadena.
- W. Weizel Über das Rotationsschwingungsspektrum des Wasserdampfes, Zeitschrift für Physik Volume 88, Numbers 3-4, 214-217 (March, 1934). Received: 23 January 1934. Affiliation: Karlsruhe.
- W. Weizel Hauptachsentransformation von Vierpolmatrizen und ihre Anwendung, Electrical Engineering (Archiv fur Elektrotechnik) Volume 33, Number 3, 196-201 (March, 1939). Received: 5 November 1938. Affiliation: Bonn.
- W. Weizel, R. Rompe, and M. Schön Zur Theorie der kathodischen Entladungsteile eines Lichtbogens, Zeitschrift für Physik Volume 115, Numbers 3-4, 179-201 (March, 1940). Received: 27 December 1939. Affiliations: Weizel, Institut für theoretische Physik, Bonn; Rompe and Schön, Studiengesellschaft für elektrische Beleuchtung, Berlin.
- Rompel and W. Weizel Über das Toeplersche Funkengesetz, Zeitschrift für Physik Volume 122, Numbers 9-12, 636-639 (September, 1944). Received: 24 January 1944. Affiliations: Rompe, Studiengesellschaft für elektrische Beleuchtung, Berlin; Weizel, Institut für theoretische Physik, Bonn.
- W. Weizel and R. Rompe Theorie des elektrischen Funkens, Annalen der Physik, Volume 436, Issue 6, 285-300 (1947)
- W. Thouret, W. Weizel, and P. Günther Lichtbögen mit Brennfleck und ohne Brennfleck, Zeitschrift für Physik Volume 130, Number 5, 621-631 (October, 1951). Received: 15 August 1951. Affiliations: Weizel, Physikalisches Institut der Universität, Bonn; Thouret and Günther, Quarzlampen G.m.b.H., Hanau.
- W. Weizel Ableitung der Quantentheorie aus einem klassischen, kausal determinierten Modell, Zeitschrift für Physik Volume 134, Number 3, 264-285 (June, 1953). Received: 17 October 1952. Affiliation: Institut für Theoretische Physik, Bonn.
- W. Weizel Ableitung der quantenmechanischen Wellengleichung des Mehrteilchensystems aus einem klassischen Modell, Zeitschrift für Physik Volume 136, Number 5, 582-604 (October, 1953). Received: 14 October 1953. Affiliation: Institut für Theoretische Physik der Universität, Bonn.
- G. Ecker and W. Weizel Zustandssumme und effektive Ionisierungsspannung eines Atoms im Inneren des Plasmas, Annalen der Physik, Volume 452, Issue 2, 126-140 (1955)
Books by Weizel
- Walter Weizel Einführung in die Physik, Band 1. Mechanik (Bibliographisches Institut, 1944, 1947, 1950, 1959)
- Walter Weizel Einführung in die Physik. Band 2. Elektrizität und Magnetismus (Bibliographisches Institut, 1944, 1947, 1950, 1951, 1958, 1959, 1971)
- Walter Weizel Einführung in die Physik Band 3: Optik, Atomphysik, Wärme (Bibliographisches Institut, 1944, 1947, 1951, 1958, 1959)
- Walter Weizel Elektronen Atome Molekule (Volk und Wissen, 1948, 1949, 1950)
- Walter Weizel Lehrbuch der Theoretischen Physik (Springer, 1949)
- Walter Weizel and Robert Rompe Theorie Elektrischer Lichtbögen und Funken (Barth, 1949)
- Walter Weizel Einführung in die Physik. Band 3. Optik und der Bau der Materie (Bibliographisches Institut, 1951, 1959)
- Walter Weizel Einführung in die Physik. Band 1. Mechanik und Wärme (Bibliographisches Institut, 1958)
- Walter Weizel Einführung in die Physik. Band 5. Optik und Atomphysik (Bibliographisches Institut, 1959)
- Walter Weizel Physikalische Formelsammlung. Band 1. Mechanik, Strömungslehre, Elektrodynamik (Bibliographisches Institut, 1962)
- Walter Weizel Physikalische Formelsammlung. Band 2: Optik, Thermodynamik, Reltivitätstheorie. (Bibliographisches Institut, 1964)
- Walter Weizel Physikalische Formelsammlung. Band 3. Quantentheorie (Bibliographisches Institut, 1960, 1966)