Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft

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The Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft (DPG, German Physical Society) was founded in 1899 to succeed the Physikalische Gesellschaft zu Berlin (Physical Society of Berlin) established in 1845. Its worldwide membership is cited as 52,000 in 2007. The DPG holds an annual conference (Jahrestagung) and multiple spring conferences (Frühjahrstagungen), which are held at various locations and along topical subjects of given sections of the DPG.^{[1] [2]}

Contents 1 Under National Socialism 2 Reunification 3 Presidents 4 Publications 5 Awards and Prizes 6 Bibliography 7 External Links 8 Notes

[edit] Under National Socialism

The DPG was in opposition to National Socialism’s persecution of the Jews in general, and their promotion of Deutsche Physik, in particular. On 7 April 1933, barely two months after Adolf Hitler seized power on 30 January 1933, the Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service, was passed; under this law, Jewish civil servants and regime opponents were removed from their jobs. These policies had significant effects on physics in Germany^{[3] [4]} through significant qualitative and quantitative losses of physicists as a result of emigration and through political decisions overriding those based on academic and scientific considerations; 25% of the physicists holding academic positions in the period 1932-1933 were lost due to the policies.^[5] The opposition can be illustrated by just a few examples, such as the DPG not immediately dismissing Jews after passage of the Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service, Max von Laue’s address at the opening of the 1933 physics convention in Würzburg, opposition to Johannes Stark exercising the Führerprinzip in attempting to become the dictator of physics, and Carl Ramsauer’s opposition to the politicization of education:

• When the Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service was passed in 1933, the DPG dragged its feet in the dismissal of Jews for more than five years. It was not until the end of 1938, on the initiation of Herbert Stuart and Wilhelm Orthmann, that the DPG asked Jewish members to withdraw their membership.^{[6] [7]}

• Max von Laue, as chairman of the DPG, gave the opening address at the 1933 physics convention held in Würzburg. In it, he compared the persecution of Galileo and the oppression of his scientific views on the Solar theory of Copernicus to the then conflict and persecution over the theory of relativity by the proponents of Deutsche Physik, against Einstein’s theory of relativity, labeled as “Jewish physics.”^[8]

• Johannes Stark, a holder of the Nobel Prize in Physics, was a proponent of Deutsche Physik. Acting under the Führerprinzip, Stark attempted to become “dictator of physics.” These actions brought opposition from members of the DPG. For example, Max von Laue, in 1933, blocked Stark’s regular membership in the Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften.^[9]

• Carl Ramsauer, president of the DPG 1940 to 1945, and his deputy, Wolfgang Finkelnburg, steered a relatively independent course from the party line of the National Socialists and against Deutsche Physik. Ramsauer, on January 20, 1942, on Felix Klein’s initiative and with the support of Ludwig Prandtl, submitted a petition to the Reich Education Ministry (Reichserziehungsministerium) on the atrocious state of physics instruction in Germany, which Ramsauer concluded was the result of the politicization of education.^{[10] [11] [12]}

[edit] Reunification

After the conclusion of World War II, in 1946, von Laue initiated the founding of the Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft in only the British Zone, as the Allied Control Council would not initially allow organizations across occupation zone boundaries. The DPG was eventually also reinstituted individually in the American and French sectors. These individually established organizations were united in West Germany in 1950, only after the formation of the Deutsche Bundesrepublik on 23 May 1949. It was only after the fall of the Berlin Wall that the DPG again fully unified across Germany.^[13]

[edit] Presidents

Presidents of the DPG have included:^[14]

• 1905-1909 – Max Planck ^[15]

• 1917-1918 – Albert Einstein ^[16]

• 1918-1920 – Arnold Sommerfeld ^{[17] [18]}

• 1925-1927 – Friedrich Paschen

• 1931-1933 – Max von Laue

• 1933-1935 – Karl Mey

• 1935-1937 – Jonathan Zenneck

• 1937-1939 – Peter Debye

• 1939-1940 – Jonathan Zenneck

• 1940-1945 – Carl Ramsauer

• 1956-1957 – Walter Gerlach ^[19]

• 1966-1967 – Wolfgang Finkelnburg ^[20]

[edit] Publications

Publications of the DPG have included:^{[21] [22]}

• Berichte der Deutschen physikalischen Gesellschaft

• Verhandlungen der Deutschen physikalischen Gesellschaft

• Physikalische Blätter

• Fortschritte der Physik

• Zeitschrift für Physik, which was first published in 1920 and was the vehicle used by those with avant-garde views and the young generation of quantum physicists in the 1920s.^[23]

[edit] Awards and Prizes

The highest awards which are presented by the DPG are the Max-Planck medal for work in theoretical physics, first awarded in 1929, and the Stern-Gerlach medal for work in experimental physics, first awarded in 1933. There are also more ten prizes, the first of which was added in 1942.^[24]

[edit] Bibliography

• Bayerchen, Alan D. Scientists Under Hitler: Politics and the Physics Community in the Third Reich (Yale, 1977) ISBN 0-300-01830-4

• Heilbron, J. L. The Dilemmas of an Upright Man: Max Planck and the Fortunes of German Science (Harvard, 2000) ISBN 0-674-00439-6

• Hentschel, Klaus, editor and Ann M. Hentschel, editorial assistant and Translator Physics and National Socialism: An Anthology of Primary Sources (Birkhäuser, 1996) ISBN 0-8176-5312-0

• Jungnickel, Christa and Russell McCormmach. Intellectual Mastery of Nature. Theoretical Physics from Ohm to Einstein, Volume 2: The Now Mighty Theoretical Physics, 1870 to 1925. (University of Chicago Press, Paper cover, 1990) ISBN 0-226-41585-6

• Kragh, Helge Quantum Generations: A History of Physics in the Twentieth Century (Princeton, 1999) ISBN 0-691-09552-3

[edit] External Links

• DPG – Official Web site

• DPG – Medals and Prizes

• DPG – Membership 1938 vs. 1939

[edit] Notes

1. ^ DPG – Official Web site
2. ^ Circa 1918 its membership was about 750 and in the 1930s about 1400. See Hentschel, 1996, Appendix A.
3. ^ Beyerchen, 1977, pp. 40-50.
4. ^ Kragh, 1999, 230-256.
5. ^ Beyerchen, 1977, p. 200. The losses in the physics community were significantly higher than the losses in the other natural sciences.
6. ^ Hentschel, 1996, Appendix A; see the entry for the DPG.
7. ^ DPG – Membership 1938 vs. 1939
8. ^ Max von Laue My Development as a Physicist. Von Laue’s speech is printed in the appendix.
9. ^ Hentschel, 1996, Appendix F; see the entry for Max von Laue.
10. ^ Hentschel, 1966, Appendix A; see the entry for the DPG.
11. ^ Hentschel, 1966, Appendix F, see the entry for Carl Ramsauer.
12. ^ Beyerchen, 1977, pp. 184-186.
13. ^ Hentschel, 1996, Appendix A; see the entry on the DPG.
14. ^ Hentschel, 1996, Appendix A; see the entry for the DPG.
15. ^ See the Wikipedia: Max Planck.
16. ^ Heilbron, 2000, p. 84.
17. ^ Hentschel, 1996, Appendix F; see the entry for Arnold Sommerfeld.
18. ^ Beyerchen, 1977, p. 107.
19. ^ Hentschel, 1966, Appendix F, see the entry for Walter Gerlach.
20. ^ Hentschel, 1996, Appendix F; see the entry for Wolfgang Finkelnburg.
21. ^ Hentschel, 1996, Appendix A; see the entry for the DPG.
22. ^ Jungnickel, Volume 2, 1990, p. 421. See the listing for the German Physical Society.
23. ^ Kragh, 1999, pp. 150-151.
24. ^ DPG – Medals and Prizes