MacTutor
Hendrik Lorentz
Times obituary
A GREAT PHYSICIST.
Professor Hendrik Antoon Lorentz, whose death at Haarlem on Saturday at the age of 74 is announced on another page, was famous for his research in mathematical physics. These researches covered many fields of investigation, but his chief work was concerned with the theory of electrons and the constitution of matter considered as an electrodynamic problem. Einstein, whose theory of relativity owed much to Lorentz, and who was latterly attached to Leyden as a part-time professor, kept in close touch with him and consulted him about his own researches.
Lorentz was born at Arnhem in Holland on July 18, 1853, and graduated at Leyden in September, 1875. His dissertation on "The Reflection and Refraction of Light" was of remarkable quality He was only 25 when he became Professor of Mathematical Physics at Leyden, and among his pupils was Professor Pieter Zeeman of Amsterdam, with whom he shared the Nobel Prize for physics in 1902. He held his chair with great brilliance and a growing reputation for some 45 years and then took up the direction of research at the Teyler Institute in Haarlem. He remained, however, as honorary professor at Leyden and continued to lecture there regularly. Professor Lorentz was well known in this country, where he lectured as late as 1923 and received the honorary degree of So.D. at Cambridge. He was a foreign member of the Royal Society, which awarded him the Rumford Medal in 1908 and the Copley Medal in 1918. It was the late Lord Rayleigh and subsequently Sir Oliver Lodge who were chiefly instrumental in making his earlier writings known in England. He spoke English, French, and German fluently and was an honorary or corresponding member of many academies and scientific societies. The jubilee of his doctorate in December 1900 was celebrated by the presentation of a Festschrift, to which eminent physicists from all countries contributed.
In an article contributed to Nature of January 6, 1923, Sir Joseph Larmor observed that a survey of Lorentz's activity was a liberal education in the history of physical science for the last half-century. In an early memoir, which became famous, Lorentz applied for the first time considerations relating to discrete molecules to electrical propagation in material bodies and incidentally arrived at a rational refraction equivalent for each substance, independent of its density. In 1884 he began to study the effect that magnetization exerts on the polarization of reflected light His "Théorie Electro-magnétique de Maxwell et son application aux Corps Mouvants" and his "Versuch einer Theorie der Elektrischen und Optischen Phänomenen in bewegten Körper" were published in 1892 and 1895 respectively. They embodied the first systematic appearance of the electro-dynamic principle of relativity, and in 1920 he brought out "The Einstein Theory of Relativity: A Concise Statement." In 1909 he published his "Theory of Electrons," based on a series of lectures at Columbia University, and in 1918 he published in French at Leipzig an account of statistical thermodynamic theories, based on lectures delivered at the Collège de France in 1912. An edition of his University lectures, entitled "Lessons on Theoretical Physics," began to appear, under his supervision, in 1919. He was also the author of a textbook on the differential and integral calculus; "Visible and Invisible Movements," 1901; and "Clerk Maxwell's Electromagnetic Theory," 1924. He contributed many memoirs to the "Proceedings" of the Amsterdam Academy, and in 1907 he began an edition of his collected papers. In all his work he showed, like his friend Lord Rayleigh, a keen interest in the historical aspect of physics as a part of the general evolution of human knowledge. He will be remembered as a great savant and also as a great teacher whose influence was worldwide.
A GREAT PHYSICIST.
Professor Hendrik Antoon Lorentz, whose death at Haarlem on Saturday at the age of 74 is announced on another page, was famous for his research in mathematical physics. These researches covered many fields of investigation, but his chief work was concerned with the theory of electrons and the constitution of matter considered as an electrodynamic problem. Einstein, whose theory of relativity owed much to Lorentz, and who was latterly attached to Leyden as a part-time professor, kept in close touch with him and consulted him about his own researches.
Lorentz was born at Arnhem in Holland on July 18, 1853, and graduated at Leyden in September, 1875. His dissertation on "The Reflection and Refraction of Light" was of remarkable quality He was only 25 when he became Professor of Mathematical Physics at Leyden, and among his pupils was Professor Pieter Zeeman of Amsterdam, with whom he shared the Nobel Prize for physics in 1902. He held his chair with great brilliance and a growing reputation for some 45 years and then took up the direction of research at the Teyler Institute in Haarlem. He remained, however, as honorary professor at Leyden and continued to lecture there regularly. Professor Lorentz was well known in this country, where he lectured as late as 1923 and received the honorary degree of So.D. at Cambridge. He was a foreign member of the Royal Society, which awarded him the Rumford Medal in 1908 and the Copley Medal in 1918. It was the late Lord Rayleigh and subsequently Sir Oliver Lodge who were chiefly instrumental in making his earlier writings known in England. He spoke English, French, and German fluently and was an honorary or corresponding member of many academies and scientific societies. The jubilee of his doctorate in December 1900 was celebrated by the presentation of a Festschrift, to which eminent physicists from all countries contributed.
In an article contributed to Nature of January 6, 1923, Sir Joseph Larmor observed that a survey of Lorentz's activity was a liberal education in the history of physical science for the last half-century. In an early memoir, which became famous, Lorentz applied for the first time considerations relating to discrete molecules to electrical propagation in material bodies and incidentally arrived at a rational refraction equivalent for each substance, independent of its density. In 1884 he began to study the effect that magnetization exerts on the polarization of reflected light His "Théorie Electro-magnétique de Maxwell et son application aux Corps Mouvants" and his "Versuch einer Theorie der Elektrischen und Optischen Phänomenen in bewegten Körper" were published in 1892 and 1895 respectively. They embodied the first systematic appearance of the electro-dynamic principle of relativity, and in 1920 he brought out "The Einstein Theory of Relativity: A Concise Statement." In 1909 he published his "Theory of Electrons," based on a series of lectures at Columbia University, and in 1918 he published in French at Leipzig an account of statistical thermodynamic theories, based on lectures delivered at the Collège de France in 1912. An edition of his University lectures, entitled "Lessons on Theoretical Physics," began to appear, under his supervision, in 1919. He was also the author of a textbook on the differential and integral calculus; "Visible and Invisible Movements," 1901; and "Clerk Maxwell's Electromagnetic Theory," 1924. He contributed many memoirs to the "Proceedings" of the Amsterdam Academy, and in 1907 he began an edition of his collected papers. In all his work he showed, like his friend Lord Rayleigh, a keen interest in the historical aspect of physics as a part of the general evolution of human knowledge. He will be remembered as a great savant and also as a great teacher whose influence was worldwide.
You can see the original newsprint at THIS LINK
