The Present System of Theoretical Physics in Eight Lectures by Max Planck

The present book has for its object the presentation of the lectures which I delivered as foreign lecturer at Columbia University in the spring of the present year under the title: The Present System of Theoretical Physics. The points of view which influenced me in the selection and treatment of the material are given at the beginning of the first lecture. Essentially they represent the extension of a theoretical physical scheme the fundamental elements of which I developed in an address at Leyden entitled: The Unity of the Physical Concept of the Universe. Therefore I regard it as advantageous to consider again some of the topics of that lecture. The presentation will not and cannot of course claim to cover exhaustively in all directions the principles of theoretical physics. CONTENTSThe Origin and Development of the Quantum Theory 1First Lecture. 17Introduction: Reversibility and Irreversibility. 17Second Lecture.40Thermodynamic States of Equilibrium in Dilute Solutions.40Third Lecture. 67The Atomic Theory of Matter. 67Fourth Lecture. 87The Equation of State for a Monatomic Gas. 87Fifth Lecture. 103Heat Radiation. Electrodynamic Theory. 103Sixth Lecture. 125Heat Radiation. Statistical Theory. 125Seventh Lecture. 137General Dynamics. Principle of Least Action. 137Eighth Lecture. 156General Dynamics. Principle of Relativity. 156