Summary

In the preface of Chapter 4, physicist Erwin Schrödinger presents his research at a conference in Munich; his work “[reins] in the chaos of the quantum world” by acknowledging that “elementary particles behaved in a manner similar to waves” (91). Werner Heisenberg, another physicist, interrupts Schrödinger’s presentation to argue for his own “exceptionally abstract” and “dreadfully complex” quantum theory (92). The angry audience removes Heisenberg.

A year before the conference, Heisenberg travels to the German island of Heligoland in order to escape his severe pollen allergy. He stays at a small hotel and considers the advice of his mentor, Niels Bohr, to abandon the tenets of classical physics when dealing with subatomic particles. Heisenberg, focusing only on the measurable aspects of these particles, creates a series of matrices that seek to explain subatomic behavior. Later, as he walks the island, a dense fog obscures...