Assignments

As a HASS-CI (STS.042) and CI-M (8.225) Subject, there will be a heavy emphasis upon writing and oral communication. There will be three papers assigned for a total of 20-24 pages of writing over the course of the semester. The first paper (4-5 pp.) will be due in class in session #7. The second paper (6-7 pp.) will be due in class in session #14. Students will revise and resubmit their second papers, to give them an opportunity to work on specific writing skills before preparing the final paper; the paper 2 re-writes will be due in class in session #21. The final paper (10-12 pp.) will be due in class in session #26. Details of the paper assignments will be circulated in class. Students will also take turns making prepared oral presentations over the course of the semester. Presentations will involve a summary of assigned readings and presentation of study questions pertinent to that week's material. The student will then lead the ensuing class discussion, based on her or his opening presentation. In addition to these written and oral communication assignments, there will be an in-class midterm in session #12. No late papers will be accepted.

You may download a PDF file containing all of the assignments listed below.


Paper Assignment #1

Assignment: Discuss what was "classical" about "classical physics."
Due date: Session #7
Length: 4-5 double-spaced pages. You should use standard margins (1-inch to 1.25-inches on each side of the page) and a 12-point font.
Grade: Your grade on Paper 1 will contribute 20% of your final course grade.

For this brief paper, you should analyze what was "classical" about "classical physics," drawing on sources from the readings as well as from lectures. Classical physics of the 19th and early 20th centuries was more than simply "pre-modern"; it had its own approaches, goals, and values for what counted as good explanations. What were some of these goals and values? What were the objects or domains of study for these physicists? How did real physicists, like the British Maxwellians, or fictional composite figures, like Victor Jakob from Night Thoughts of a Classical Physicist, pursue their work? These characteristics were not exactly the same for all classical physicists — you might want to consider contrasts between the British and German cases. How was Albert Einstein’s work on special relativity transitional between classical and modern physics?

You should use specific examples from the readings and from lectures. When drawing on readings, use standard footnote conventions, giving full bibliographic information for all sources you cite. (Examples of appropriate footnote formats appear in the syllabus; if you have any questions, ask the course's writing tutor or me.)


Paper Assignment #2

Assignment: Discuss the relationship between physicists’ contexts (institutional, political, cultural) and the content of their research.
Due date: Session #14.
Length: 6-7 double-spaced pages. You should use standard margins (1-inch to 1.25-inches on each side of the page) and a 12-point font.
Grade: Your grade on Paper 2 will contribute 20% of your final course grade.

Do the contexts in which physicists work affect the research that they do? If so, how, in what ways, and to what extent? Do national styles or contexts play a role in physicists’ work? In analyzing these questions, you should draw on the readings and lectures from both the relativity and quantum-theory units of the course. Several historians we have been reading have made the case for various types of context-content interactions (including Gerald Holton, Andrew Warwick, Loren Graham, Paul Forman, and Alexi Assmus, among others). What are some common features of their work? What are some differences between the cases of British, German, Russian, and American physicists that these historians have studied, and how has this affected the physics done in each case? Do you agree with their analyses? How would you approach the issue? Your paper should have a clearly-articulated thesis or argument, and you should defend your position with specific examples from the readings and lectures. (There is no single correct answer to these questions; what matters is how clearly you articulate your thesis, and how well you defend your thesis with examples and evidence.)

Use standard footnote conventions, giving full bibliographic information for all sources you cite. Examples of appropriate footnote formats appear in the syllabus; if you have any questions, ask the course's writing tutor or me. Failure to use appropriate footnote formatting will lower your grade.

You are encouraged to go over outlines and/or drafts with Sandy Brown, the course’s writing tutor before the due date. You will also have the opportunity to revise your paper following its first grading, to incorporate feedback and work on overall improvements. The first version is due in class in session #14. The revised version is due in class in session #21.


Final Paper Assignment

Due date: Session #26, in class.
Length: 10-12 double-spaced pages. You should use standard margins (1-inch to 1.25-inches on each side of the page) and a 12-point font.
Grade: Your grade on Paper 3 will contribute 25% of your final course grade.

In this assignment you will be writing a 10-12 page paper that advances a specific historical argument and supports it by citing primary and secondary sources. In order to construct and present your argument, you will have to bring to bear all of the skills that you have been practicing this term. You should select one of the two topics listed on the back of this sheet. Your paper must draw on at least two primary sources, as well as at least four secondary sources. For the two topics listed below, we have compiled a list of references and made several materials available on the course website. If you would prefer to write about a different topic, you must discuss your topic ahead of time with either Prof. Kaiser or the course TA.

First, you have to do a close reading of your primary sources. What exactly do the authors say? How do they argue for the points that they make? What is taken for granted? What remains ambiguous or unclear at the end of your reading? What do the authors assume about their readership? Are there obvious ways that the text has been shaped by its social, cultural, intellectual, institutional, or political context?

Second, you have to read at least four secondary sources and try to figure out the various ways that the primary sources have been interpreted. Have historians generally understood these sources in the same the way that you do? What ideas do they think are important, and why? How do they position these sources in the flow of history? How do the historians agree or disagree amongst themselves about these sources? What historiographical points have been particularly interesting, or contentious, or murky? What are you adding to the historiographical literature by writing your paper?

As you are reading and rereading your sources, take detailed notes. You will need to know where you found a particularly interesting quote or idea so that you can cite the author properly. Proper footnote and bibliography citations are required.

When you start to compose your paper, think carefully about its structure. Do you have an introductory paragraph that sets up the problem, clearly states your thesis, and outlines your ensuing discussion? Do each of the points that you raise in the body of your paper support your thesis in a clear and compelling way? Do you have a concluding paragraph that wraps up your argument and gestures at its wider significance? Is your writing concise, precise and explicit? Is it lively? Is your TA going to fall to his knees and bless your name for putting such a thing of grace and beauty into his hands?

Topics for Final Paper Assignment

I. Discuss the interrelationships between physicists and politics in the United States after World War II.

Primary Sources

"The GAC Report of October 30, 1949." In The Advsiors: Oppenheimer, Teller, and the Superbomb. 2nd ed. Reprinted in Herbert York. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1989 [1976], pp. 153-162.

Allison, Samuel K. "The State of Physics; or, the Perils of Being Important." Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 6 (January 1950): 2-4, 26-27.

Seitz, Frederick. "Physicists and the Cold War." Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 6 (March 1950): 83-89.

In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer: The Security Clearance Hearing. Edited by Richard Polenberg. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2002, pp. 94-111.

Secondary Sources

Bernstein, Bart. "In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer." Historical Studies in the Physical Sciences 12 (1982): 195-252.

Wang, Jessica. "Science, Security, and the Cold War: The Case of E. U. Condon." Isis 83 (1992): 238-69.

Kaiser, David. "Nuclear Democracy: Political Engagement, Pedagogical Reform, and Particle Physics in Postwar America." Isis 93 (2002): 229-268.

Forman, Paul "Behind Quantum Electronics: National security as Basis for Physical Research in the United States, 1940-1960." Historical Studies in the Physical and Biological Sciences 18 (1987): 149-229.

Galison, Peter and Barton Bernstein. "In Any light': Scientists and the Decision to Build the Hydrogen Bomb." Historical Studies in the Physical and Biological Sciences 19 (1989): 267-347.

Kaiser, David. "Cold War Requisitions, Scientific Manpower, and the Production of American Physicists After World War II." Historical Studies in the Physical and Biological Sciences 33 (Fall 2002): 131-159.

II. Discuss the involvement of German physicists with atomic weapons research during World War II.

Primary Sources

Selections from Physics and National Socialism: An Anthology of Primary Sources. Edited by Klaus, and Ann Hentschel. Boston: Birkhauser, 1996, pp. 332-406. [This contains several separate primary sources; you need not draw on all of the sources included here.]

Farm Hall Transcripts. Edited by Charles Frank. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993, pp. 70-91.

Documents regarding the 1941 meeting in Copenhagen between Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg, available on-line at the Niels Bohr Archive website. Click on "Documents Released 6 February 2002."

Secondary Sources

Powers, Thomas. Heisenberg’s War: The Secret History of the German Bomb. Boston: Little, Brown, 1993, pp. 110-52, plus endnotes on pp. 506-16.

Walker, Mark. Nazi Science: Myth, Truth, and the German Atomic Bomb. New York: Plenum, 1995, pp. 183-268, plus endnotes on pp. 301-16.

Cassidy, David. Uncertainty: The Life and Science of Werner Heisenberg. San Francisco: W. H. Freeman, 1992, pp. 417-446, plus endnotes on pp. 621-6.

Carson, Cathryn. Particle Physics and Cultural Politics: Werner Heisenberg and the shaping of a role for the physicist in postwar West Germany. Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, 1995, pp. 250-334.