11 Unknown Facts about Erwin Schrödinger
“The scientist only imposes two things, namely truth and sincerity, imposes them upon himself and upon other scientists.”
— Erwin Schrödinger (1887–1961)
Erwin Schrödinger is considered to be one of the pioneers of modern quantum mechanics. His mathematical equation, known as Schrödinger’s equation and used to describe the behavior of a quantum system in the form of a wavefunction, laid the foundation of quantum theory. Schrödinger is also best known for his thought experiment known as Schrödinger’s cat which he originally proposed to oppose the Copenhagen Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics but rather did pretty much the opposite. In this story, I shall share ten unknown facts about the great Austrian physicist.
1. Schrödinger was born in 1887 to his father who was a catholic and his mother who was a Lutheran. Even though he was raised in a household where beliefs were governed by faith, he was an atheist. However, he had a strong interest in religion and used religious symbolism in his works.
2. Besides physics and mathematics he also had a keen interest in art and literature and was fascinated by the forms and flow of German poetry. Great minds need great words to think, what better than literature, and art.
3. Schrödinger entered the University of Vienna in 1906 for the Doctorate where he had an opportunity to study under the apprenticeship of Friedrich Hasenöhrl. The latter was an Austrian physicist and the successor of Ludwig Boltzmann as the HOD of theoretical Physics.
4. He was influenced by the writings of German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer which gravitated him towards color theory where he worked on a geometric approach to colorimetry.
5. As we all know 1914–1918 was the period of World War I. Schrödinger was drafted into the army under the Austrian fortress artillery and served as the commission officer throughout the war.
6. In 1927, Schrödinger succeeded Max Planck, the pioneer of quantum mechanics and physicist who discovered the quantum of action, now known as Planck’s constant, h, in 1900, at the University of Berlin as the professor of theoretical physics.
7. When Nazism slowly rose to power in Germany, Schrödinger was strongly opposed to it and thus ended up leaving the country. He migrated to the UK where he ended up at the University of Oxford.
8. He had the opportunity to work with another famous physicist Paul Dirac (famous for his relativistic quantum theory of the electron and his prediction of the existence of antiparticles) with whom he shared the Nobel prize in 1933 for the discovery of a new form of atomic theory.
9. Even though he was happily married, he Schrodinger had several mistresses including the very wife of his own assistant, Hilde March, and weird enough, his assistant, Arthur March was in no objection to it.
10. Knowing about the living conditions of Schrödinger (with his wife and his mistress), many universities didn’t approve of this situation and he ended up getting dismissed from the University of Oxford as well as later from Princeton University.
11. A lot of correspondence letters were found of Schrödinger which included the vast majority of his life. The University of Vienna and his daughter Ruth Braunizer fought for the right to acquire those letters and they eventually ended up being available to the general public for deep insights into Schrödinger’s life.
Factual research contributed by Rishab Karki and curated by the author.
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