Deutsche Physik

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Deutsche Physik (literally: "German Physics") or Aryan Physics was a nationalist movement in the German physics community in the early 1930s against the work of Albert Einstein and other modern theoretically based physics, labeled "Jewish Physics" (German: Jüdische Physik). The term was taken from the title of a 4-volume physics textbook by Philipp Lenard in the 1930s.


Philipp Lenard, one of the early architects of the Deutsche Physik movement

This movement began as an extension of a German nationalistic movement in the physics community which went back as far as World War I. On 25 August 1914, during the German invasion of Belgium, German troops used petrol to set fire to the library of the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven.[1][2][3][4] The incident of the burning of the library led to a protest note by British scientists, which was signed also by eight distinguished British scientists, namely William Bragg, William Crookes, Alexander Fleming, Horace Lamb, Oliver Lodge, William Ramsay, Baron Rayleigh and J.J. Thomson. In 1915 this led to a counter-reaction in the form of an "appeal" formulated by Wilhelm Wien and addressed to German physicists and scientific publishers, which was signed by sixteen German physicists, including Arnold Sommerfeld and Johannes Stark. They claimed that German character had been misinterpreted and that attempts made over many years to reach an understanding between the two countries had obviously failed, so that conclusions had now to be drawn, in regard to the use of the English language by German scientific authors, editors of books and translators.[5] A number of German physicists, including Max Planck and the especially passionate Philipp Lenard, a scientific rival of J.J. Thomson, had then signed further "declarations", so that gradually a "war of the minds"[6] broke out. On the German side it was suggested to avoid an unnecessary use of English language in scientific texts (concerning, e.g., the renaming of German-discovered phenomena with perceived English-derived names, such as "X-ray" instead of "Röntgen ray"). It was stressed, however, that this measure should not be misunderstood as a rejection of British scientific thought, ideas and stimulations.

After the war, the affronts of the Treaty of Versailles kept some of these nationalistic feelings running high, especially in Lenard, who in a small pamphlet[7] had already complained at the beginning of the war about England. When on January 26, 1920, an attempt had been made by the young soldier Oltwig von Hirschfelde to assassinate Matthias Erzberger, the German Chancellor, Lenard had sent a telegram of congratulation to Hirschfelde.[8] After the assassination, on June 24, 1922, of the politician Walther Rathenau, when the government had ordered the flying of flags at half mast on the day of his funeral, Lenard ignored the order at his institute in Heidelberg. Socialist students organized a demonstration against Lenard, who on the occasion was taken into protective custody by the Jewish prosecutor of state Hugo Marx.[9] This was not a sentiment unique to physics or physicists— this blend of nationalism and perceived affront from foreign and internal forces formed a key part of the popularity of the newly forming National Socialist Party (Nazis) in the late 1920s.

During the early years of the twentieth century, Albert Einstein's Theory of Relativity was met with much bitter controversy within the physics communities of the world. There were many physicists, especially the "old guard", who were suspicious of the intuitive meanings of Einstein's theories. The leading theoretician of the Deutsche Physik type of movement was Rudolf Tomaschek who had re-edited the famous physics textbook Grimsehl's Lehrbuch der Physik. In that book, which consists of several volumes, the Lorentz transformation was accepted as well as quantum theory. However, Einstein's interpretation of the Lorentz transformation was not mentioned, and also Einstein's name was completely ignored. Many of these classical physicists resented Einstein's dismissal of the notion of a luminiferous aether, which had been a mainstay of their work for the majority of their productive lives. They were not convinced by the empirical evidence for Relativity: the measurements of the perihelion of Mercury and the null result of the Michelson-Morley experiment might be explained in other ways, they thought, and the results of the Eddington eclipse experiment were experimentally problematic enough to be dismissed as meaningless by the more devoted doubters. Many of these doubters were very distinguished experimental physicists—Lenard was himself a Nobel laureate in Physics.

Further information: History of special relativity

Under the Third Reich[edit]

When the Nazis entered the political scene, Lenard quickly attempted to ally himself with them, joining the party at an early stage. With another physics Nobel laureate, Johannes Stark, Lenard began a core campaign to label Einstein's Relativity as Jewish Physics.

Lenard[10] and Stark enjoyed the Nazi support because it allowed them to undertake a professional coup for their preferred scientific theory. Under the rallying cry that physics should be more "German" and "Aryan," Lenard and Stark, with backing from the Nazi leadership, entered on a plan to pressure and replace physics positions at German universities with people teaching their preferred theories. By the late 1930s, there were no longer any Jewish physics professors in Germany, since under the Nuremberg Laws of 1935 Jews were not allowed to work in universities. Stark in particular was also trying to get himself installed as the authority of "German" physics—not an entirely fanciful goal, given the Gleichschaltung (literally, "coordination") principle applied to other professional disciplines, such as medicine, under the Nazi regime, whereby a strict linear hierarchy was created along ideological lines.

They met with moderate success, but the support from the Nazi party was not as great as Lenard and Stark would have preferred. After a long period of harassment of the quantum physicist Werner Heisenberg, including getting him labeled a "White Jew" in the July 15, 1937, issue of SS's weekly, Das Schwarze Korps (The Black Corps), they began to fall from influence. Heisenberg was not only a pre-eminent physicist whom even the Nazis realised they were better off with than without, however "Jewish" his theory might be in the eyes of Stark and Lenard, but Heisenberg had, as a young boy, attended school with SS chief Heinrich Himmler. In a historic moment, Heisenberg's mother rang Himmler's mother and asked her if she would please tell the SS to give "Werner" a break. After beginning a full character evaluation, which Heisenberg both instigated and passed, Himmler forbade further attack on the physicist. Heisenberg would later employ his "Jewish physics," in the German project to develop nuclear fission for the purposes of nuclear weapons or nuclear energy use. Himmler promised Heisenberg that after Germany won the war, the SS would finance a physics institute to be directed by Heisenberg.[11]

Lenard began to play less and less of a role, and soon Stark ran into even more difficulty, as other scientists and industrialists known for being exceptionally "Aryan" came to the defense of Relativity and quantum mechanics. As historian Mark Walker puts it, "despite his best efforts, in the end his science was not accepted, supported, or used by the Third Reich. Stark spent a great deal of his time during the Third Reich fighting with bureaucrats within the National Socialist state. Most of the National Socialist leadership either never supported Lenard and Stark, or abandoned them in the course of the Third Reich."

Effect on the German nuclear program[edit]

It is occasionally put forth[12] that there is a great irony in the Nazis' labeling modern physics as "Jewish science", since it was exactly modern physics—and the work of many European exiles—which was used to create the atomic bomb. Even if the German government had not embraced Lenard and Stark's ideas, the German antisemitic agenda was enough by itself to destroy the Jewish scientific community in Germany. Furthermore, the German nuclear energy project was never pursued with anywhere near the vigor of the Manhattan Project in the United States, and for that reason would likely not have succeeded in any case.[13] The movement did not actually go as far as preventing the nuclear energy scientists from using quantum mechanics and relativity,[14] but the education of young scientists and engineers suffered, not only from the loss of the Jewish scientists but also from political appointments and other interference. In 1938, Himmler wrote to Heisenberg that he could discuss modern physics but not mention Jewish scientists such as Bohr and Einstein in connection with it.[15]

See also[edit]


  4. ^ Theodore Wesley Koch. The University of Louvain and its library. J.M. Dent and Sons, London and Toronto, 1917. Pages 21-23. accessed 18th June 2013
  5. ^ For the full German text of Wilhelm Wien's appeal see: The Oxford Companion to the History of Modern Science (J. L. Heilbron, ed.), Oxford University Press, New York 2003, p. 419. The appeal states:
    "Because of the war the relations of scientific circles to the hostile foreign countries will experience a novel regulation. It will in particular concern our relation to England, after the anti-German declaration formulated without any understanding of German character by English scientists has been signed by eight well-known physicists too (Bragg, Crookes, Fleming, Lamb, Lodge, Ramsey, Rayleigh, J.J. Thomson).
    It is herewith proven that the attempts made over many years to reach a better mutual understanding with the English have failed and cannot be taken up again within a foreseeable future. The regards which we have taken in the interest of a greater familiarity of the scientific circles of both peoples are no longer justified. Therefore, it is advisable to remove again the unjustified English influence which has penetrated German physics.
    Of course, the purpose cannot be to reject English scientific ideas and stimulations. But the currently criticized predilection for things foreign has influenced also our science so much that it seems required to point this out.
    After this hint we constrain ourselves above all to propose that all physicists should ensure
    1. that the mentioning of literature of the English should not, as has currently been the case, find stronger consideration than that of our fellow country men;
    2. that German physicists publish their treatises no longer in English journals, with the exception of cases where replies are required;
    3. that publishers accept solely scientific works and translations written in German language, and only then if according to the judgment of scientific experts the literature is really outstanding;
    4. that public money is not spent in order to sponsor translations.
    E.Dorn. F. Exner. W. Hallwachs. F. Himstedt. W. König. E. Lecher. O. Lummer. G. Mie. F. Richarz. E. Rieke. E. v. Schweidler. A. Sommerfeld. J. Stark. M. Wien. W. Wien. O. Wiener."
  6. ^ Stephan L. Wolff: Physiker im Krieg der Geister, Zentrum für Wissenschafts- und Technikgeschichte, München 2001, [1].
  7. ^ Philipp Lenard, England und Deutschland zur Zeit des großen Krieges - Geschrieben Mitte August 1914, publiziert im Winter 1914, Heidelberg.
  8. ^ Heinz Eisgruber: Völkische und deutsch-nationale Führer, 1925.
  9. ^ Der Fall Philipp Lenard - Mensch und "Politiker", Physikalische Blätter 23, No. 6, 262 - 267 (1967).
  10. ^ Philipp Lenard: Ideelle Kontinentalsperre, München 1940.
  11. ^ Padfield, Peter Himmler New York:1990 Henry Holt
  12. ^ Einstein: His Life and Universe. Chapter 21: The Bomb
  13. ^ German Nuclear Weapons
  14. ^ Jeremy Bernstein, Hitler's Uranium Club, the Secret Recordings at Farm Hall, 2001, Springer-Verlag
  15. ^ Thomas Powers, Heisenberg's War, 1993, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.

Further literature[edit]

  • Beyerchen, Alan, Scientists under Hitler: Politics and the physics community in the Third Reich (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1977).
  • Hentschel, Klaus, ed. Physics and National Socialism: An anthology of primary sources (Basel: Birkhaeuser, 1996).
  • Walker, Mark, Nazi science: Myth, truth, and the German atomic bomb (New York: Harper Collins, 1995).
  • Philipp Lenard: Wissenschaftliche Abhandlungen Band IV. Herausgegeben und kritisch kommentiert von Charlotte Schönbeck. [Posthumously, German Language.] Berlin: GNT-Verlag, 2003. ISBN 978-3-928186-35-3. Introduction, Content.