München 2019 – scientific programme

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GP: Fachverband Geschichte der Physik

GP 4: Open Topic

GP 4.1: Talk

Tuesday, March 19, 2019, 09:15–09:45, HS 9

Why Minkowski Led Physics Astray — •Alexander Unzicker — Pestalozzi-Gymnasium München

Since his legendary talk about space and time at the meeting of the Gesellschaft Deutscher Naturforscher und Ärzte in 1908, Herrman Minkowski is undoubtedly one of the most influential figures in mathematical physics. It is argued however that his key idea, amalgamating space and time to a four-dimensional spacetime, is at the origin of a long-term crisis in theoretical physics. Glossing over the phenomenological differences of space and time may be a subtle, but grave denial of reality.