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E. P. Wigner

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   Eugene Paul Wigner (E. P. Wigner among physicists, his peers) (
   Hungarian Wigner Pál Jenő) ( November 17, 1902 – January 1, 1995) was a
   Hungarian physicist and mathematician who received the Nobel Prize in
   Physics in 1963 "for his contributions to the theory of the atomic
   nucleus and the elementary particles, particularly through the
   discovery and application of fundamental symmetry principles". Wigner
   was sometimes referred to as the Silent Genius as some of his
   contemporaries considered him the intellectual equal to Einstein,
   without the prominence. Wigner is famous for laying the foundation for
   the theory of symmetries in quantum mechanics as well as for his
   research into atomic nuclei, as well as for his several theorems.

Early life

   Wigner was born in Budapest, Austria-Hungary (now Hungary) to a Jewish
   middle-class family. At age 11, he was thought possibly to have
   contracted tuberculosis, and was sent for six weeks to a sanitarium in
   the Austrian mountains. In this period, he began to develop an interest
   in mathematical problems. From 1915 till 1919, concurrently with John
   von Neumann, he studied at the Lutheran Fasori Evangélikus Gimnázium
   where they both greatly benefited from encouragement by the legendary
   mathematics teacher László Rátz. In 1919, to escape the Bela Kun
   communist regime, the family briefly moved to Austria, returning after
   the downfall of the Kun government. Partly as a reaction to the
   prominent presence of Jews in the Kun regime, the family converted to
   Lutheranism. In 1921, Wigner studied chemical engineering at the
   Technische Hochschule in Berlin (today the Technische Universität
   Berlin). He also attended the Wednesday afternoon colloquia of the
   German Physical Society. These colloquia featured such luminaries as
   Max Planck, Max von Laue, Rudolf Ladenburg, Werner Heisenberg, Walther
   Nernst, Wolfgang Pauli and — most of all — Albert Einstein. Wigner met
   Leó Szilárd at the colloquium. Szilárd became at once Wigner's closest
   friend. A third experience in Berlin was formative. Wigner worked at
   the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute, and there met Michael Polanyi, who would
   become, after László Rátz, Wigner's greatest teacher.

Middle years

   In the late 1920s, Wigner explored deeply in the field of quantum
   mechanics. A period at Göttingen as an assistant to the great
   mathematician David Hilbert proved a disappointment, as Hilbert was no
   longer active in his works. Wigner nonetheless studied independently.
   He laid the foundation for the theory of symmetries in quantum
   mechanics and in 1927 introduced what is now known as the Wigner
   D-matrix. It is safe to state that he and Hermann Weyl carry the sole
   responsibility for the introduction of group theory into quantum
   mechanics (they spread the "Gruppenpest"). See Wigner's 1931 monograph
   for a survey of his work on group theory. In the late 1930s, he
   extended his research into atomic nuclei. He developed an important
   general theory of nuclear reactions (see for instance the Wigner-Eckart
   theorem). By 1929, his papers were drawing notice in the physics world.
   In 1930, Princeton University recruited Wigner and Von Neumann, which
   was timely as the Nazi Regime in Germany emerged. In Princeton in 1934
   Wigner introduced his sister Manci to the physicist Paul Dirac. They
   married, and the ties between Wigner and Dirac deepened.

   In 1936, Princeton did not rehire Wigner, and he moved to the
   University of Wisconsin-Madison. There he met his first wife, a physics
   student named Amelia Frank, but she died in 1937 leaving Wigner
   distraught. On January 8, 1937, Wigner became a naturalized citizen of
   the United States. Princeton University shortly invited Wigner back. He
   rejoined the Princeton faculty in the fall of 1938. Though a professed
   political amateur, in 1939 and 1940, Dr. Wigner played a major role in
   agitating for a Manhattan Project. However, he was by personal
   preference a pacifist. He would later contribute to civil defense in
   the US. In 1946, Wigner accepted a job as director of research and
   development at Clinton Laboratory (now Oak Ridge National Laboratory)
   in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. When this did not work out especially well,
   Wigner returned to Princeton.

   In appreciation of Professor Wigner, written 1987, Alvin M. Weinberg
   stated: "...this tract of Wigner’s [giving credit to his young
   collaborators] explains why so much, not only of reactor theory but of
   theoretical physics from 1930 to 1965 – though it may not bear Wigner’s
   name – actually has origin in a suggestion made or question asked by
   Professor Wigner."

Last years

   In 1960, Wigner gave a thought-provoking insight into the power of
   mathematics in his best-known essay outside physics, now a classic
   paper, The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural
   Sciences, in which he argued that biology and cognition could be the
   origin of physical concepts, as we humans perceive them, and that the
   happy coincidence that mathematics and physics were so well matched,
   seemed to be "unreasonable" and hard to explain, though he found
   resistance to this theory, notably by distinguished mathematician
   Andrew M. Gleason. In 1963, Wigner received the Nobel Prize in Physics.
   He professed never to have even considered the possibility that this
   might occur, and added: "I never expected to get my name in the
   newspapers without doing something wicked." He would later go on to win
   the Enrico Fermi award, and the National Medal of Science. In 1992, at
   the age of 90, he published a memoir, The Recollections of Eugene P.
   Wigner with Andrew Szanton. Wigner died three years later in Princeton.
   His most significant student was Abner Shimony.

   Near the end of his life his thought turned more philosophical. In his
   memoir, Wigner said: "The full meaning of life, the collective meaning
   of all human desires, is fundamentally a mystery beyond our grasp. As a
   young man, I chafed at this state of affairs. But by now I have made
   peace with it. I even feel a certain honour to be associated with such
   a mystery". He developed interest in the Vedanta philosophy of
   Hinduism, particularly with its ideas of the universe as an all
   pervading consciousness. In his collection of essays (Symmetries and
   Reflections- Scientific Essays), he commented "It was not possible to
   formulate the laws (of quantum theory) in a fully consistent way
   without reference to consciousness".

   Also in the realm of theoretics is the thought experiment, Wigner's
   friend paradox. It is often seen as an extension of the Schrödinger's
   cat thought experiment. The Wigner's friend experiment asks the
   question: at what stage does a "measurement" take place? Wigner
   designed the experiment to highlight how he believed consciousness is
   necessary to the quantum mechanical measurement process.
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