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Unification and the Quantum Hypothesis in 1900–1913

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Molly Kao
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Abstract

In this article, I consider some of the first appearances of a hypothesis of quantized energy between the years 1900 and 1913 and provide an analysis of the nature of the unificatory power of this hypothesis in a Bayesian framework. I argue that the best way to understand the unification here is in terms of informational relevance: on the assumption of the quantum hypothesis, phenomena that were previously thought to be unrelated turned out to yield information about one another on the basis of agreeing measurements of the numerical value of Planck’s constant.

Type
Quantum Physics
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 82 , Issue 5 , December 2015 , pp. 1200 - 1210
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

†

I am grateful to Wayne Myrvold, Chris Smeenk, Michael Cuffaro, and Christian Joas for comments on earlier versions of this article. I would also like to thank the audience members of the WIP series at the Munich Centre for Mathematical Philosophy and at the 2014 meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association. This research was supported in part by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

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