Talk:Max Planck/Archive 1

Archive 1

Month Confirmation

"In April/May of 1946, Planck was succeded as president of the KWG by Otto Hahn."

Can someone confirm in which month Planck was succeded as president in? The original text stated that Planck was president till April, but it did not say whether his successor took the title of president in the same month, of one month later. Cosmos 03:18, September 2, 2005 (UTC)

It seems to be April 1st, 1946. Nullstein 8-IX 2005

The sound of one stream merging?

The text says:

Thanks to his initiative the society merged in 1898

Merged with what? The earlier context of this remark suggests that Planck was not at home in the existing society. Then it says that this society "merged," and finally it describes Planck becoming the leader of the "merged" society. I don't know the history, so I don't know whether the original society merged with another, competing, society, or whether the society split to form one group that went its original way and one society that was more congenial to Planck.

Whatever actually happened, the text cannot be permitted to remain as it is unless we add a "One hand clapping" category. ;-) P0M 20:47, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Before 1898 there was no "German Physical Society", but only a number of separate local societies, each limited to one city or university or possibly one political sub-unit of the German Empire. It were these societies who merged into a nation-wide society. Nullstein 15:15, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

h = 0 ... in what contest? E=hv?

The text has:

Even several years later, other physicists like Rayleigh, Jeans, and Lorentz set Planck's constant to zero in order to align with classical physics, but Planck knew well that this constant had a precise nonzero value.

The situations in which Raleigh et alia were setting h = 0 is not stated. The only use of h in a physics formula that the reader of this article may know is E=hv. If h = 0... P0M 20:59, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

You are right: h=0 in E=hv is exactly what a "classical physicist" would do. Then E=0, so there is no quantisation of energy. Since h was introduced as a new fundamental constant of Nature, setting it zero would not refer to a particular situation only, but to the whole foundation of physics.

I know that the article presents the details of this discussion in a highly simplified way, but this is only an article about Planck's life. A detailed presentation could go into some other more specialised article. Nullstein 15:15, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Text Dump

I am reverting the following text-dump, which removed the header on "Education" and placed a discussion of his research and the date of his death, inter alia, under "Childhood and Youth" where it clearly does not belong. I paste the reverted text here so we can recover anything useful.

---

begin text dump---=

He was elected to Foreign Membership of the Royal Society in 1926, being awarded the Society's Copley Medal in 1928.

Planck faced a troubled and tragic period in his life during the period of the Nazi government in Germany, when he felt it his duty to remain in his country but was openly opposed to some of the Government's policies, particularly as regards the persecuti on of the Jews. In the last weeks of the war he suffered great hardship after his home was destroyed by bombing.

He was revered by his colleagues not only for the importance of his discoveries but for his great personal qualities. He was also a gifted pianist and is said to have at one time considered music as a career.

Planck was twice married. Upon his appointment, in 1885, to Associate Professor in his native town Kiel he married a friend of his childhood, Marie Merck, who died in 1909. He remarried her cousin Marga von Hösslin. Three of his children died young, leaving him with two sons.

He suffered a personal tragedy when one of them was executed for his part in an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate Hitler in 1944.

He died at Göttingen on October 4, 1947.

From Nobel Lectures, Physics 1901-1921, Elsevier Publishing Company, Amsterdam, 1967

This autobiography/biography was written at the time of the award and later published in the book series Les Prix Nobel/Nobel Lectures. The information is sometimes updated with an addendum submitted by the Laureate. To cite this document, always state the source as shown above.

For more updated biographical information, see: Planck, Max, Scientific Autobiography and Other Papers. Philosophical Library, New York, 1949.

I re-added a chunk from the above dump. --Sadi Carnot 19:46, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Cultural depictions of Max Planck

I've started an approach that may apply to Wikipedia's Core Biography articles: creating a branching list page based on in popular culture information. I started that last year while I raised Joan of Arc to featured article when I created Cultural depictions of Joan of Arc, which has become a featured list. Recently I also created Cultural depictions of Alexander the Great out of material that had been deleted from the biography article. Since cultural references sometimes get deleted without discussion, I'd like to suggest this approach as a model for the editors here. Regards, Durova 15:50, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Religious view added

I believe I have an almost identical religious view to the one of Max Planck, so the section I wrote contains my interpretations, that I've tried to neutralize as much as possible, by adding "may" and other speculation indicators. Feel free to scrutinize and improve! Said: Rursus 08:21, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

I heard that this guy discovered some stuff that went against the 2nd law of thermodynamics

Is that true?

Definitely not. The only way known to me to suspend the 2nd law would be to reverse the direction of time - but this has not been achieved so far. Nullstein 4-VIII 2005

I believe that he actually violated the 2nd law of thermodynamics but was fined $20,000 by the international secret conspiracy of physicists-mechanists. I've heard so from a friend of mine, who had a friend that had a mother, that had a brother in law ... Said: Rursus 08:25, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

no, you are probably thinking of the 69th Law of theromromantics

Hermann Müller

Could someone fill in on when he lived, what family enviroment, how he got into physics, schools, achievements? I noted that the german version doesn't mention him at all. Electron9 20:19, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Revisionistic

I just removed the text: "[what does this mean? If the author makes subjective statements such as these, they should at least be explained. Stresemann worked to change the Versailles peace treaty, and this is not a negative position, as implied here. The Versailles structure is now accepted as having been severely flawed in conception and implementation, helping to propel the National Socialists to power]" from the article. It appeared just after the word "revisionistic". --Oz1sej (talk) 12:14, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Academic Advisor

I think von Jolly were'nt Planck's advisor. According Mathematics Genealogy Project advisor was Alexander von Brill213.186.252.107 (talk) 08:32, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

213.186.252.107 (talk) has replaced Philipp von Jolly with Alexander von Brill. Jolly is probably wrong (seemingly he taught MP for one year only); is there a reference for von Brill, please?--Old Moonraker (talk) 14:29, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

As I said info is from Mathematics Genalogy Project: Max Planck213.186.255.121 (talk) 10:59, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for giving us the link. --Old Moonraker (talk) 14:18, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Pronunciation of "Max Planck"

What is the correct way to pronounce "Max Planck"? "Max" as in the english "maximum" or as in someone who "mucks" around with things? "Planck" as in "plank" of wood or "plunk" goes the stone as it drops onto the water? Patiwat 20:58, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

The a in both names sounds like an ah rather like in "spa" (an open back unrounded vowel). Neither the normal English a or u sounds come anywhere close, putting the tongue way too far forward. — Laura Scudder ☎ 21:11, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

I would pronounce it exactly as "mucks plunk". Says a native German. --129.70.14.128 (talk) 18:05, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Black Body Radiation section

The section about black body radiation is far better than the pages on this site that are supposed to be specifically about the topic. How about creating a sub-section either on the black body or ultraviolet catastrophe pages with some of the info from this one? - Drrngrvy 01:15, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

David Darling, in 'Teleportation - The Impossible Leap' claims that:

One of the myths of physics [...] is that Planck’s blackbody formula had something to do with what’s called the “ultraviolet catastrophe.” It didn’t. [...] In June 1900, the eminent English physicist Lord Rayleigh pointed out that if you assume something known as the equipartition of energy, which has to do with how energy is distributed among a bunch of molecules, then classical mechanics blows up in the face of blackbody radiation. The amount of energy a blackbody emits just shoots off the scale at the high-frequency end—utterly in conflict with the experimental data. Five years later, Rayleigh and his fellow countryman James Jeans came up with a formula, afterward known as the Rayleigh-Jeans law, that shows exactly how blackbody energy is tied to frequency if you buy into the equipartition of energy. The name “ultraviolet catastrophe,” inspired by the hopelessly wrong prediction at high frequencies, wasn’t coined until 1911 by the Austrian physicist Paul Ehrenfest. None of this had any bearing on Planck’s blackbody work; Planck hadn’t heard of Rayleigh’s June 1900 comments when he came up with his new blackbody formula in October. In any case, it wouldn’t have mattered: Planck didn’t accept the equipartition theorem as fundamental. So the ultraviolet catastrophe, which sounds very dramatic and as if it were a turning point in physics, doesn’t really play a part in the revolution that Planck ignited.

So what really happened?

--Sunnym4 22:26, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

The best source on this (that I know of) is Thomas Kuhn's book Black-Body Theory and the Quantum Discontinuity. Planck basically built on the statistical thermodynamics approach of Ludwig Boltzmann to explain black-body radiation; the quantization aspect was more of a mathematical artifact than (in Planck's view at the time) than an intended theoretical/epistemological statement about the nature of energy. The ultraviolet catastrophe was indeed not one of Planck's concerns.--ragesoss 00:54, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

So, the current text is misleading as it states:

In 1894 Planck turned his attention to the problem of black-body radiation. [...] The question had been explored experimentally, but the Rayleigh-Jeans law, derived from classical physics, failed to explain the observed behaviour at high frequencies, where it predicted an unphysical divergence of the energy density towards infinity (the ultraviolet catastrophe).

This suggests the Rayleigh-Jeans law and 'ultraviolet catastroph' were known to Planck at the time - counter to what Kuhn says

--62.219.233.199 10:33, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. I've tried to fix some of that. --24.147.86.187 12:28, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

If you read Planck's original paper from 1900 it's clear that he had little knowledge of statistical methods. As Jeans [Jeans, J., Nature, 72, (1905), p.293] has pointed out, Planck gave no population from which a probability could be calculated so that W, as a probability, had no meaning. Torricelli01 (talk) 21:10, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

"traditional"

What the heck does this ever mean, and how is it sourced in this article? It always seems, to me, like stealth POV. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.164.148.45 (talk) 03:39, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Erwin Planck

Most credible sources state that Max Planck's brother, Erwin Planck, was "executed" not hanged.[1] [2] [3] Also see 20 July plot. Did find one source that specifically has the word "hanged", however this source appears to be relatively less credible.[4] What say you with respect to where Wikipedia should rest its reputation? Henry Delforn (talk) 20:02, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

That wasn't his brother Erwin who was hanged in January 1945. It was his son, also called Erwin. Valetude (talk) 03:18, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Planck's nationality might be Danmark.

My thinking is, Planck's nationality might be Danmark.

Because he was born in 1858. In 1858, Kiel belonged Danmark.

Are you guys sure that his nationality is Germany?

--OnionBulb (talk) 14:44, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Read the article. It says "Thus Kiel belonged to Germany, but it was ruled by the Danish king". --Bduke (Discussion) 21:53, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

After reading, I understand. Thank you. --OnionBulb (talk) 11:57, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Need updating for chinese translation

I'm glad that Max Planck's religious view is added in the English article. I wonder if someone could add this into the chinese translation. Thanks. 150.101.232.230 (talk) 07:17, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

religion

The section of religion is sourced only to a web site that I do not think can make claims for being authoritative. there should be better sources, and they must be used. DGG (talk)

"all-knowing, incomprehensible god" similarly uncited. Tagged {{cn}}. --Old Moonraker (talk) 09:05, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

I made the recent edits in the religion section, over the course of an hour and found myself still at work at 7pm, so I left the refs for the next week. I apologise for this, it was sloppy. The "all-knowing" part was not mine, though I did not remove it because I had not read all of the ref yet and didn't want to tamper. The incomprehensible part was from his lecture on "religion and knowledge of nature" lecture. There is a difficulty here in that it is in German. The part about the incomprehensible nature of god in Planck's view linked the comments he made about atheism with his conception of the importance of symbolism (though he did specifically state that god was incomprehensible). As the original edit stood it suggested he criticised atheism on the grounds that it obsessed about the symbols in religion, whereas he was commenting on the reasons why religion uses symbols- since god is not comprehensible. The symbols allow a transubstantiation (if you will) so that people may venerate a representation of god. Although it would take up too much space in this section, he went on to warn against the veneration of symbols without an understanding that they were mere conduits. The point that makes the elaboration of this difficult is that he next went on as an analogy to describe the value that people place in flags, when they are willing to die for them (which he described as a mistake). This gives a suggestion to some that the context of the lecture was very important- the rise of Nazis in the government of Germany, and how traditional symbols were being abused at the time. As such his religious expressions (at least the ones expressed in this lecture) might need to be viewed through this prism. This goes way too far into original research, as I have not been able to find any historian who explicitly suggests as much (who isn't obviously biased). Anyway, I will try to fix this up, and hopefully others might become interested in this as well. Ninahexan (talk) 14:26, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

(Moved this section to bottom of talk page.)

I have added another relevant paragraph, which somehow seems to contradict the first paragraph of the section, which is why I {{cn}}-tagged that one. Interesting. DVdm (talk) 18:38, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

That would seem to be the most direct evidence available to use when relating the character of his religious belief. I would imagine that the "devoted persistent adherent of Christianity" suggestion might need a strong reference for it to remain. The "almighty, all-knowing" thing can go too, I would think. Ninahexan (talk) 05:27, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

It looks like we can safely remove this: it is talking about Karl Planck—see [5] and [6] and all over the place. I have removed the stuff but kept the more plausible bits with tags added. DVdm (talk) 09:59, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

I think your edit clarified and expanded on the section, though you removed the small part that related to the form of god that he suggested he believed in, namely an incomprehensible god. He expressed this at the same time as he elaborated upon the importance of symbols in religion- which is necessitated because he felt that the nature of his god can not be comprehended- only by analogy and symbolism. I have been searching for a proper translation of his 1937 lecture, which is why I had not yet put in a reference. 124.168.27.240 (talk) 11:27, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Ok, but feel free to give the German source - there's nothing wrong with non-english sources when a translation is hard to find. We can easily verify whether the paraphrasing into English is acceptable. DVdm (talk) 11:40, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

I'll have another look for the translation, I know it is out there because I saw it not so long ago. Here is an interesting insight from Heisenberg, by the way. It incorporates Dirac's classic dissection of religion- http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/heisenberg07/heisenberg07_index.html 124.168.27.240 (talk) 12:01, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Sufficiently Interesting perhaps to draw a little "According to Werner Heisenberg, Planck thought that ..." - DVdm (talk) 12:32, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Acording to his revolutionary theory energy travel in a discountinous manner and it is composed of —Preceding unsigned comment added by 182.177.192.159 (talk) 04:21, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

copyright violation

the part "thermodynamics" was copied from http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1918/planck-bio.html i tried to delete it, but it came back — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.161.86.75 (talk) 00:57, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

the page link says that if you cite the document, to simply cite the source. couldn't one just add a citation? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.4.115.3 (talk) 19:08, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

adherents.com

This edit, in complete good faith, has linked to a page from Adherents.com as a source for an opinion on Planck's religious views. This appears to be a self published source and possibly outwith the project's source guidelines. Views? --Old Moonraker (talk) 08:16, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

ForMemRS

Why is the odd acronym (?) used to indicate that Planck was recognized by the Royal Society? Why is the information not given in the "Honors and Awards" section?P0M (talk) 20:08, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

It's the recognised postnom[7] and it's referenced. See WP:LEDE#Relative emphasis for the need (or otherwise) to have the material followed up later: "not everything in the lead must be repeated in the body of the text". --Old Moonraker (talk) 08:27, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Real name "Marx Planck"

Recent surprise discoveries in an official document from 1858 of the church library/archive in Kiel suggest that Max Planck was really baptised "Marx Planck" (Marx from the latin Marcus). This might have significant consequences e.g. for his biography and the Max Planck Society. Couldn't yet find an English source for this developing story. Here is one in German from the news magazine Der Spiegel http://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/mensch/0,1518,549404,00.html Norsktroll (talk) 14:09, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

It's wrong to push the "Marx Planck" theory in the introduction, note that the German WP hasn't changed his name in its introduction. He was never known to use that name, so this is more like trivia. It will certainly not have any impact for the Max Planck Society. It can be mentioned somewhere below that church records show his birth name as "Marx Planck", but these records are known to contain lots of errors and just because some priest in the Duchy of Holstein hand-wrote it in 1858 as "Marx Planck" it doesn't mean it's necessarily correct, and it's not sufficient to describe it as his "real" name. Clearly, he did not use that name himself, at least not as a public person, and that is what matters in an encyclopedia, after all. Also, him using Max Planck himself is a strong argument against the "Marx Planck" theory and indicates it's more likely a spelling mistake. Max Planck will of course always remain Max Planck and noone wil refer to him as anything else. UweBayern (talk) 18:00, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

The article doesn't say it's the "real" name. It reads: "baptised with the name", which is true. It's in chronological order in the "Biography" section, which naturally takes it close to top there. The fact he never used "Marx" is also noted. Just fixed the broken ref for all this. --Old Moonraker (talk) 18:17, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

The above comment was a response to version 289599344, where the name Marx was used in the opening sentence of the lead section, thus implying it was his established real name (more real than Max Planck). It's perfectly alright to mention it below in the biography section, but it doesn't belong in the lead section, even before the name Max Planck, for the reasons mentioned above. UweBayern (talk) 06:02, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

Er, it seems very unlikely that a a European - and especially a German - born in 1858 would be coincidentally (or even less "erroneously") given the legal name Karl Marx. I fully agree with the argument that the name by which he is universally known should be used throughout (except in the usual places where full/legal /birth names are given), but to go out on a limb and give an (uncited) assertion that it may be erroneous seems to indicate that the author is seeking to preemptively disclaim (again, without any evidence) the more obvious explanation for the name. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.17.180.234 (talk) 23:17, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Comments

The article's description of Planck's proof of the Wien-Planck law is at odds with a recent book by a Yale Professor of Applied Physics. He said that the proof used the Second Law. Can someone give me a reference to support the version in the article? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.102.57.32 (talk) 00:59, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

<The last paragraph under "Nazi dictatorship and Second World War" should be removed or integrated in. It pretty much just repeats the previous few paragraphs or something but not even as a good summary. 98.6.133.100 03:46, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Please fix the picture formating for this page!

• What's your issue with it? blankfaze | (беседа!) 04:06, 11 Jul 2004 (UTC)

There is a better picture on the German Wikipedia. Perhaps I should replace the current one with it? (I'll probably get to it in a day or two, unless someone objects.) novakyu 10:24, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

"After several happy years the Planck family was struck by a series of disasters: in October 1909 Marie Planck died, possibly from tuberculosis. In March 1911 Max Planck married his second wife, Marga von Hoesslin (1882-1948); in December his third son, Herrmann, was born." Wtf? --83.147.171.12 10:14, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Very interesting:Einstein and Planck are both considered the fathers of quantum physics, and, yet, the name "Einstein" is now worldwide consdiered synonymous to genius, texts on his life scrolls down to 15 pages, his biographies can be used as door stoppers everywhere, and discussion about him exceeds the limit on wikipedia; while Planck is left cold. Two lines argue over his picture and his entry is not shorter than Schroedinger. I don't get it. They are both Germans.

Max Planck was a genius and is covered in most universities' second year of physics study. Every prominent or budding physicist knows the name, and one could say that his theories will live forver, disproven or not. Your point is a valid one but the man maketh the name and not the other way around. (How many Schroedinger particles or measurements are you aware of, aswell?)

I think the difference is that Planck wasn't trying to rock the boat. In fact, his quantization to caluclate the black-body radiation was just considered a mathematical trick to make the problem tractable rather than something fundamental about the nature of light. In contrast, Einstein did rock the boat by saying that in order to explain the photoelectric effect light needed to be quantized.

Although both Planck and Einstein made many important discoveries that furthered quantum mechanics, Einstein was the one who actually made the conceptual leap out onto a limb by saying that quantization wasn't a simplifying mathematical trick, but that light was actually a particle. In other words, Planck is rather an accidental father of quantum mechanics, compared to Einstein who was the visionary one who spurred the creation of quantum mechanics (despite his distaste for it) and created a whole new field of physics (general relativity). That's why Einstein is widely called a genius and Planck is not. --Laura Scudder | Talk 16:30, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

--

Hi, I just wrote an improved article about Planck for the German Wikipedia, and it might surely be useful for extending this article (and correcting various incorrect details), but therefore I need to translate it first which will take time (pls have a look yourself) Nullstein 03:15, 2 May 2005 (UTC)

I translated a few sections of his biography, but did it rather literally without an eye for beautiful English. I might come back later and work moving a few other sections on his work over, because that's rather underrepresented here. I haven't played with the old text at all but just left it as sort of an intro, so it may repeat stuff. Not sure what the incorrect details are that you reference. --Laura Scudder | Talk 17:46, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

Very true. I was actually going to start a discussion about how Planck imo is the 2nd best physicist of the century behind Einstein. His opening paragraph deserves much more at least. Much lesser scientists have much more. Anyone up to it? Planck pops up everywhere in physics and I wouldn't even know where to begin.

Savagedjeff (talk) 01:47, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

please change "special theory of relativity" to "theory of special relativity"

I don't know if I would screw up the link if I edited this, but it should be "the theory of special relativity", and not "the special theory of relativity". The theory isn't special, the type of relativity is! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.6.36.44 (talk) 00:10, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

Planck: "an originator" or "the original discoverer" of quantum theory?

An IP editor has recently changed the lead section description of Planck's role in quantum theory from "an originator" to "the original discoverer": [8], [9], [10]. And in his/her edit summaries he/she has emphatically asserted that Planck "WAS the sole discoverer of the theory". I don't want to diminish Planck's actual role in the development of quantum theory, but to my understanding, it would be an over-implication to assert that Planck was the "original discoverer" or "sole original discoverer" -- this is my recollection from my undergraduate classes and it seems to be borne out by the content in the body of this article. In brief, my understanding is that Planck was, at first, trying to fit a curve to blackbody radiation data. He found that he could do it by postulating a phenomenological description in which photons came in discrete units of energy. This was, over time, understood to be an accurate description of reality, and it was also put on firm foundation with Einstein's description of the photo-electric effect, which also took a while to be recognized as real rather than a convenient description. The IP seems to think this is just "sophistry", but I think for something as important as quantum mechanics, we need to have an accurate description of the process by which scientists actually came to its recognition. Indeed, scientific discoveries rarely come out of the blue and in full form. Anyway, I'm happy to be corrected on the facts of this subject, but this is my understanding and my thoughts. Isambard Kingdom (talk) 00:52, 14 November 2016 (UTC)

 Done With no response, I've restored the previous content of the article regarding Planck's role. Isambard Kingdom (talk) 14:22, 17 November 2016 (UTC)

I do not have as much emotional energy as I used to deal with matters like this, but I think this is important enough to return to, both as a matter of scientific history, and for the fact the meaning of my comments has been distorted.

Of course scientific theory does not appear out of the blue, and that is not the issue.

The issue is whether or not a scientific insight may be said to have had one discoverer. Newton himself said he "stood on the shoulders of giants", but no one contests that he was the sole discoverer of gravitational theory. And yes I know that was superseded by General Relativity, and no, I do not think GR is sophistry, and I do not think subsequent developments of Planck's original insight (i.e photons and Quantum Mechanics) are either.

Your use of undergraduate classes as a citation do not conform to Wiki guidelines, but the Nobel Prize's own site does conform to those guidelines, and it clearly supports my view:

https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1918/ The 1918 prize was awarded to Planck QUOTE: "In recognition of the services he rendered by his discovery of energy quanta"

and see: https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1918/planck-facts.html

Now please leave my edits in place. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2602:306:CEAB:9930:D914:2D5B:6E53:E0F0 (talk) 19:52, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Your edit is for the lead. Please read the rest of the article, and you will find that your edit for "the" instead of "an" is not supported. Furthermore, as far as I can see, the Nobel citation is not about the "theory" per se. Thank you. Isambard Kingdom (talk) 21:14, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Nobel cite is about the discovery of the theory per se in plain English.

As for the rest of the article, here is the theory, which is really very simple, and which Planck was the sole discoverer of:

The central assumption behind his NEW (emphasis added) derivation, presented to the DPG on 14 December 1900, was the supposition, now known as the Planck postulate, that electromagnetic energy could be emitted only in quantized form, in other words, the energy could only be a multiple of an elementary unit:

I am reverting your edit and I request arbitration in the event of continued disagreement. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2602:306:CEAB:9930:D914:2D5B:6E53:E0F0 (talk) 02:30, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

One cannot 'discover' a theory which did not previously exist. I have amended the text to agree with the wording of the Nobel Prize Award. Apuldram (talk) 13:28, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Planck was never commissioned by an electric company

I'm pretty sure this claim about Planck is an urban legend:

"He had been commissioned by electric companies to create maximum light from lightbulbs with minimum energy."

He was a theorist whose primary motivation was to understand entropy, and to solve Kirchhoff's challenge of finding the universal radiation equation for black-body radiation.

He had no known connections with any energy companies, and no interest in lightbulbs--just black-body ovens. See, for instance, discussion of this here:

http://hsm.stackexchange.com/questions/5452/did-light-bulb-companies-commission-planck-to-study-black-body-radiation

Spoonless (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 06:14, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

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Ethnicity?

Why is there no mention of him being Jewish? Shroedinger is Jewish too.--2605:6000:3D10:8400:B8CF:A88E:E701:707 (talk) 02:38, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

Presumably because he wasn't Jewish. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 146.95.126.173 (talk) 15:38, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

The Planck postulate

This article states that the Planck postulate is that the electromagnetic radiation emitted by a black body is quantized. The article on the Planck postulate states that it is the energy of the internal oscillators in the black body that is quantized. Which is correct? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 47.72.42.131 (talk) 03:42, 12 April 2019 (UTC)

This is about the institute, isn't it?

becasue I am not sure I have internet or telecommunications to connect to them, right now, but still,

Because i made the calculations of the Einsteinian equasion and the bulgarian educational system, because you forbid my name of ****stein at the beginning of crisis, and I remained stein something..... but at the same time : не, само ти! ето това по цял ден (as a revange of theirs), you know it well, because you use it too,

and therefore

stein + only, or one, ein becomes

Einstein?

Smart, isnt it?

I just wanted to complain, otherwise, thanks for the name in physics, and now, again, no, only you, you go alone, haha, amazing. You only, you alone, all day like this. Mathsgtn2 (talk) 11:28, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Now they made the communications highest stronger, but I am excluded of these, since Einstein should not exist according this fascility /educational / coordinates 42°40′39″N 23°15′11″E, I don't know why they spontaniously desided so on me, hm. --Mathsgtn2 (talk) 11:33, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Karl Planck?

we have a red link Karl Planck. Per context, it should be another physicist. Wikidata gives no answer Estopedist1 (talk) 20:28, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Plank constant

15, 2023, 17:49 - «‎top: removing --again-- silly wp:EASTEREGG. "a Plank constant" is not an energy quantum.»

@DVdm: Your allegations on wp:EASTEREGG are false. Look thoroughly at what you're reverting. There is no wp:EASTEREGG in my link: it's direct link to Planck constant, not piped one. If you try further to enforce in-applicable WP:INFOPAGES how-to guide you may indeed end up banned. You basically reverted to the very wp:EASTEREGG you are fighting against. Regarding previous edits by the IP, refer to this thread: WP:ANI#62.121.132.130 by Alexander Davronov.

AXONOV (talk) ⚑ 18:02, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

@DVdm:

The Planck constant is a number that defines the amount of energy in those quanta and expresses how small things can be.

— "The Planck Constant". NIST. 2022-04-07.

As you can see Planck's constant reflects the smallest quantity of energy - quanta of energy.

Given that, I suggest you revert your revert back. AXONOV (talk) ⚑ 18:23, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

I have explained why the link is not appropriate. If you revert it once more, you will end up reported (and most likely blocked) at WP:AN/EW. - DVdm (talk) 18:34, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

I've explained your revert message was wrong and ultimately - false. Are you going to ignore given source and explanation? You object to add source to Planck constant and reinstate the link to it? I advise you to drop threats to "report" and "block". They never helped in discussions like this to anyone and make no sense. AXONOV (talk) ⚑ 18:38, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

If you don't understand that a Wikilink like "energy quanta (a Planck constant)", as you have been doing here already 4 times ([11], [12], [13], [14]) is inappropriate, then you have a severe lack of understanding English. That link suggests that an energy quantum is "a Planck constant". That is nonsense. I suggest that you restrict your editing to your own language variant and to stay away from the English version. - DVdm (talk) 18:52, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

You indeed don't understand what Planck was awarded for. I urge you to consult sources first lol. AXONOV (talk) ⚑ 18:56, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

I suggest we elaborate on the definition of the quanta and add Planck constant link. Here is the same source currently used in the introduction of the article: Max Planck Facts (See Works)

The intro should be fixed. The "discovery" is in fact man-made theory of quanta. Its specific quantity is determined by the said constant. These are interrelated. AXONOV (talk) ⚑ 19:19, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Hello, I'm here to give a 3O. This is a rather interesting case. :P I'm not a physicist but I know enough about it to weigh in here, I think, and I double-checked what I wrote against an undergraduate physics textbook to be sure.

So, Axonov, I'm sorry to say, I agree with DVdm. I don't think it's quite right to say "energy quanta (a Planck constant)", but I don't necessarily think it's a language issue exactly (although it's the Planck constant, or Planck's constant—there's only one, which does kinda gesture at the issue since "quanta" is plural). The reason I don't think it works is because Planck's constant is a specific physical quantity, 6.62607015×10⁻³⁴ J⋅Hz⁻¹, which expresses the relationship between the energy of a photon and its frequency. "Energy quanta," on the other hand, is a general concept, that of "smallest possible observable amounts of energy." Photons are the quanta of the electromagnetic field, and they do carry energy as Planck's constant suggests. So, there's a relationship between the idea of "Planck's constant" and the idea of "energy quanta," but they're not identical. For example, there are other fields at least as fundamental as the electromagnetic field, and they have their own quanta, such as the gluons of the gluon field which mediate the strong force. The strong force binds quarks to one another, and QCD predicts that it's impossible to obtain a single quark; accordingly no one has ever seen a single gluon and we don't have anything quite as precise as Planck's constant for the energy of a gluon. Maybe we'll figure out a way to measure it someday, though. 🍉◜⠢◞ↂ🄜𝚎sₒᶜa𝚛🅟ම𛱘‎🥑《 𔑪‎talk〗⇤ 22:13, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

I agree with DVdm. This dispute is about putting a link into the article of two related things. What do you agree with DVdm exactly on?

...I don't think it's quite right to say "energy quanta (a Planck constant)..."

The way the link I put is not correct, yes, but if you consider the sentence in the current intro:

...was a German theoretical physicist whose discovery of energy quanta won him the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1918...

It's obviously that the said quote is not entirely correct. Plack was awarded for both his now-old theory of quanta and calculating Planck constant - quantifying electromagnetic radiation. Therefore my point is to provide a link to a Planck constant into the intro. It's mentioned down below in the article and is related overall. See also MOS:INTRO.

"Energy quanta," on the other hand, is a general concept, Planck didn't attribute constant to anything else except of electromagnetic radiation of a black body AFAIK. The source you have cited () discusses the quanta theory proposed by Einstein for photons. It's an extension to the Old quantum theory. In the context of disputed intro it's not relevant. AXONOV (talk) ⚑ 18:39, 16 July 2023 (UTC)

I will quote the mentioned above source entirely over here:

When a black body is heated, electromagnetic radiation is emitted with a spectrum corresponding to the temperature of the body, and not to its composition. Calculating the form of the spectrum using then-known physical laws gave an unreasonable result; the radiation in the high-frequency area of the spectrum became infinite. Max Planck solved this problem in 1900 by introducing the theory of “quanta”, that is, that radiation consists of quanta with specific energies determined by a new fundamental constant, thereafter called Planck’s constant.

— Nobel prize: Work

The following source also reasonably argues that the Nobel prize was awarded to Planck for his entire work on quanta theory: Old quantum theory, Planck's law, and Planck constant, not just some vague "quanta". "Nobel Prize Winners in Physics By Arun Agarwal · 2008" AXONOV (talk) ⚑ 18:56, 16 July 2023 (UTC)

My understanding was that the dispute was over the phrasing "energy quanta (a Planck constant)", and that's all I was objecting to. It sounds like you're saying that you actually just want to pursue a different description in the lead of what Planck won the 1918 Nobel for than just "energy quanta"? Your "Nobel prize: Work" source does say right at the top, "Prize motivation: 'in recognition of the services he rendered to the advancement of Physics by his discovery of energy quanta'". I think that strongly supports the current phrasing in the lead. At the same time, the textbook I was citing says, "The credit for inventing the concept of quantization of energy levels goes to Planck, even though he didn’t believe it at first. He received the 1918 Nobel Prize in physics for his achievements." So, if you prefer, we could use "quantization of energy levels" instead; looking around online it seems like that phrase gets somewhat wider use these days. I don't think the lead needs to be any more verbose than that, though, because it's just a short summary (MOS:LEAD); the article discusses the work that led to his Nobel in detail in the section Black-body radiation. 🍉◜⠢◞ↂ🄜𝚎sₒᶜa𝚛🅟ම𛱘‎🥑《 𔑪‎talk〗⇤ 20:01, 16 July 2023 (UTC)

I think that strongly supports the current phrasing in the lead. It supports my suggestion as well.
"quantization of energy levels" This won't be correct and won't be supported by the sources. Not in this article. This was correct.
I don't think the lead needs to be any more verbose Short intro should reflect the content of the article per MOS:INTRO. Like it or not, but Planck constant should be mentioned, one way or another. I see no sane reason to object here. AXONOV (talk) ⚑ 16:06, 17 July 2023 (UTC)

The constant is mentioned and wikilinked in the body of the article. The reason why your additional link in the lead is removed, is that there seems to be no natural way to include it in the lead without creating an eastereggy link. If the article would have an entire section devoted to the constant, it could be mentioned in the lead in a separate sentence (like "He has a contant named for him, the Planck constant"), but that is not the case: it is just mentioned once in the article, so there is no place for it in the first sentence. Again, an energy quantum is not "a Planck constant", which is what your link would suggest. In my last removal ([15]) I have wikilinked the word quantum. That should be sufficient. To relate the person with the constant, we all can find references and quotations as much as we want, but wp:EASTEREGG has nothing to do with with content. It is just a matter of style. - DVdm (talk) 08:52, 18 July 2023 (UTC)

References