The extraordinary story of psychoanalyst Carl Jung and physicist Wolfgang Pauli and their struggle to quantify the unconscious. In 1932, the groundbreaking physicist Wolfgang Pauli met the famous psychoanalyst Carl Jung. Pauli was fascinated by the inner reaches of his own psyche and not afraid to dabble in the occult, while Jung looked to science for answers to the psychological questions that tormented him. Their rich friendship led them, in Jung’s words, into “the no-man’s land between physics and the psychology of the unconscious . . . the most fascinating yet the darkest hunting ground of our times.” Both were obsessed with the far-reaching significance of the number “137”—a primal number that seemed to hint at the origins of the universe itself. Their quest to solve its enigma led them on a lifelong journey into the ancient secrets of alchemy, the work of Johannes Kepler, and the Chinese Book of Changes. This is the captivating story of an extraordinary and fruitful collaboration between two of the greatest thinkers of the twentieth century.

"The history is fascinating, as are the insights into the personalities of these great thinkers." —New Scientist Is there a number at the root of the universe? A primal number that everything in the world hinges on? This question exercised many great minds of the twentieth century, among them the groundbreaking physicist Wolfgang Pauli and the famous psychoanalyst Carl Jung. Their obsession with the power of certain numbers—including 137, which describes the atom’s fine-structure constant and has great Kabbalistic significance—led them to develop an unlikely friendship and to embark on a joint mystical quest reaching deep into medieval alchemy, dream interpretation, and the Chinese Book of Changes. 137 explores the profound intersection of modern science with the occult, but above all it is the tale of an extraordinary, fruitful friendship between two of the greatest thinkers of our times. Originally published in hardcover as Deciphering the Cosmic Number.

Niels Bohr and the Quantum Atom gives a comprehensive account of the birth, development, and decline of Bohr's atomic theory. It presents the theory in a broad context which includes not only its technical aspects, but also its reception, dissemination, and applications in both physics and chemistry.

Wolfgang Pauli referred to him as 'my discovery,' Robert Oppenheimer described him as 'one of the most gifted theorists' and Niels Bohr found him enormously stimulating. Who was the man in question, Gunnar Källén (1926-1968)? His appearance in the physics sky was like a shooting star. His contributions to the scientific debate caused excitement among young and old. Similar to his friend and mentor, Wolfgang Pauli, he demanded honesty and rigor in physics - a distinct dividing line between fact and speculation. In his obituary, Arthur S. Wightman would write: 'Gunnar Källén was a proud continuer of the tradition in quantum field theory established by Wolfgang Pauli. His papers on quantum electrodynamics in the period 1950-1954 carried the non-perturbative approach to quantum electrodynamics forward to a point beyond which very little essential progress has been made up to the present day. At the time I was trying to puzzle out the grammar of the language of quantum field theory, and here was Källén already writing poetry in the language!'. In addition to being a remarkable scientist, Källén had a very interesting personality, well worth exploring. In her book, physicist Cecilia Jarlskog traces both the personal and scientific trajectory of this unsung hero of the early days of high-energy physics and quantum field theory. A number of invited contributions by members of the Källén family and distinguished researchers from the field, all of them personally acquainted with Källén, combine to form an authentic portrait of the researcher and the man. Last but not least, the reader will become acquainted with some aspects of the history of particle physics in those days, as related by Källén and those who corresponded with him. A commented selection of his most important and not easily accessible papers is included as an added bonus for specialists.

Mit dem Druck von Wolfgang Paulis Briefwechsel aus seinen letzten beiden Lebensjahren wird eine großangelegte Edition der gesamten wissenschaftlichen Korrespondenz eines der bedeutendsten theoretischen Physiker des 20. Jahrhunderts abgeschlossen, der an der Entwicklung der wichtigsten physikalischen Ideen und Theorien, insbesondere an der Relativitätstheorie und Quantentheorie sowie deren weiteren Ausbau zu einer Feld- und Elementarteilchentheorie, teilgenommen hat. Der vorliegende besonders umfangreiche Band mit 711 Briefen behandelt die durch Wu, Telegdi, Lederman u.a. bei den schwachen Wechselwirkungen beobachtete Paritätsverletzung, bei der das einst von Pauli postulierte Neutrino eine herausragende Rolle spielt und die in der Theorie der Elementarteilchen einen allgemeinen Umschwung einleitete. Neue Einblicke vermittelt der Briefwechsel in die enge Zusammenarbeit von Pauli und Heisenberg anlässlich einer damals entwickelten einheitlichen Feldtheorie der Elementarteilchen. This volume of the letters Wolfgang Pauli wrote during the final two years of his life completes the publication of the entire scientific correspondence of one of the most important theoretical physicists of the 20th century. Pauli played a vital role in the development of the most important physical ideas and theories of his time: relativity and quantum mechanics, in particular, and also in their extension to elementary particle field theory. This especially extensive volume covers more than 700 letters between Pauli and scientists such as Wu, Telegdi, Lederman and others, in which he discussed parity violation observed under the weak interaction in which the neutrino (first postulated by Pauli) plays a crucial role. The letters also provide new insights into the close cooperation between Pauli and Heisenberg on their work on the unified field theory of elementary particles, which was being developed at that time.