Werner Heisenberg and the Beginning of Nuclear Physics

Great advances in science alter our view of the world. Galileo Galilei's theory of motion, Albert Einstein's theory of special relativity and Werner Heisenberg's invention of quantum mechanics, with its subsequent interpretation by Niels Bohr and Heisenberg himself, spring immediately to mind (figure 1). In exploring these episodes we must recognize that historical narrative without investigation of conceptual transformation is just chronology.