Bibliography

S. A. Artsibyshev, Physics. A textbook for medical students. Fifth edition, State Publishing House of Medical Literature, 1950, 511 pp., print run 35,000.

The significance of physics in modern medicine makes understandable the attention with which we must regard the recently published, revised textbook by S. A. Artsibyshev.

The first edition of this textbook, which appeared in 1935, in a number of its sections differed only slightly from what is now studied in secondary school. With each subsequent edition the size of the textbook increased, as a result of which, however, it lost in its wholeness and unity.

The present edition is the most substantially revised and expanded. In it the author attempts to illuminate the fundamental principles of physics from the point of view of dialectical materialism, and also strives to outline the role of Russian and Soviet scientists in the development of physics. In these respects the new edition of Artsibyshev’s textbook compares favorably with a number of other physics textbooks.

The role of Russian scientists in the development of physics and their priority in a number of physical discoveries are, on the whole, correctly covered in the textbook. Brief biographical information about them, woven into the text of the book, enlivens the exposition. Unfortunately, the biographical information about one or another scientist does not always correctly show his place in the development of national science. Thus, the biography of M. V. Lomonosov (pp. 38–39) does not at all show him as the founder of national natural science, an ardent champion of public education, and a convinced fighter for the materialist worldview. Likewise, the biography of Lenz does not emphasize his significance in science as one of the creators of the law of conservation and transformation of energy (p. 190).

In the newly written introduction (pp. 5–13), Prof. Artsibyshev gives a characterization of the materialist theory and the dialectical method, attempting to apply it to physics; he defines the subject of physics and characterizes its significance for philosophy and other sciences, in particular biology and medicine. Here Prof. Artsibyshev unsuccessfully points out that physics “studies the concrete properties of matter (inertia, weight, atomic structure) and investigates the general laws of its development (motion)” (p. 5). If physics studies the general laws of development of matter, then how does it differ from philosophy; where is the boundary separating physics into a special science? It is understood that the laws of physics have a general character in the sense that the forms of motion of matter studied by physics are contained in all other forms of motion of nature, although in a subordinate form. Therefore, knowledge of the forms of motion studied by physics is the first task of every science (chemistry, biology, etc.). Unfortunately, the author

does not illuminate the question of which forms of the motion of matter physics studies.

It seems to us that the shortcoming of the introduction consists in the fact that Prof. Artsybushev did not show that physics is an arena of an acute ideological struggle, did not reveal the connection between physics and philosophy in general, and with dialectical materialism in particular.

In contrast to pre-Marxist philosophy, which set itself above the sciences, dialectical materialism is an instrument of scientific knowledge and of the transformation of the world, the method by which all the other sciences, including physics, must be guided. Therefore, in pointing out that physics became a separate science, differentiating itself from philosophy, it should have been emphasized that this was a progressive step that contributed to the development of science.

Some general propositions of the author hang in the air because in the introduction he does not give even a brief characterization of the fundamental materialist principles of physics: the principle of causality, the law of conservation of matter and energy, its development in modern physics, and the basic materialist concepts, such as atomism and field theory. If this had been done already in the introduction, the general methodological propositions would have been more convincing and would have introduced the reader at once to the essence of modern physics.

In the section “Mechanics,” Prof. Artsybushev on p. 22 defines mechanics as the science of the motion of bodies and of the causes that produce this motion. Of course, this is not a definition of mechanics. Mechanics studies one of the forms of motion—displacement, and not motion in general. On p. 23 the author speaks of the motion of matter in general, cites the corresponding proposition of Engels, and then imperceptibly passes over to mechanical motion, speaking of the relative motion of bodies.

Having considered Newton’s laws, the author defines one of the basic categories of physics—the concept of force. Defining force as “one of the manifestations of the eternal continuous motion inherent in matter,” the author does not use, unfortunately, Engels’s remarkable statements on the meaning of the category of force in mechanics (see Dialectics of Nature, ed. 1941, pp. 47, 48, 55, 56, etc., and also 227 and 229). The author does not show that force is a quantity characterizing the transfer of motion when forms of motion are transformed, and that therefore the range of application of the category of force is limited. For the three laws of Newton the author “traces” two laws of conservation in Lomonosov’s well-known formulation, interpreting Lomonosov’s law of conservation of motion as the law of conservation of mechanical energy, i.e., considerably narrowing it. The fundamental concept of modern physics, “energy,” does not receive a clear interpretation from Prof. Artsybushev: on the one hand, the author identifies energy and motion (see p. 47: “The magnitude of the work corresponds to the motion (energy) passing from one body to another, or to the motion (energy) transforming from one form into another”), while on the other hand he gives Engels’s formulation: “Energy is the measure of the motion of matter.”

With such formulations by the author, the difference between the two measures of the motion of matter disappears: \(mv\) and \(\frac{1}{2}mv^2\).

Chapters 4 (“On the Rotation of Bodies”) and 5 (“The Motion of Liquids and Gases”) are set out clearly and well and call forth no substantial objections. Here it is only surprising that the bar and technical atmosphere are indicated as units for measuring pressure without any mention of the physical atmosphere, which nevertheless appears in a number of problems.

In the section “Heat and Molecular Physics” it is stated (p. 93) that our subjective sensations are not suitable for measuring temperatures,

as they are conditional. This assertion about the “conditionality” of sensations is philosophically incorrect. On this same p. 93 an obsolete value is given for Avogadro’s number: \(6.06\cdot 10^{23}\). The same error is repeated on pp. 108 and 113, although on p. 218 and in the table at the end of the book, on p. 497, the author himself gives the currently accepted value of this number: \(6.023\cdot 10^{23}\). Equally careless, but impermissible in a textbook, is the fact that Planck’s constant \(h\) on pp. 330 and 437 is taken to be \(6.607\cdot 10^{-27}\) erg/sec, whereas in the numerical example on p. 391 it appears as \(6.55\cdot 10^{27}\). The dimension of this constant is also erroneously indicated: erg/sec instead of erg·sec.

On p. 101 the author asserts that in the equation of state of a gas “the further simplification is introduced by Clapeyron, who takes advantage of the circumstance that a gram-molecule of any gas at \(0^\circ\) and normal pressure has a volume of 22.41 liters.” This assertion is erroneous, since the indicated simplification was introduced by D. I. Mendeleev (see, for example, the journal Uspekhi khimii, No. 1, 1951, and also Uspekhi fizicheskikh nauk 45, issue 4, 1951). As a calorimeter for physiological investigations a rice calorimeter is added, cited in old editions of S. Ya. Tereshin’s physics course and omitted in the latest edition of this course (1948). In this respect Artsybyshev’s textbook is inferior even to Kroneberg’s physics textbook for secondary medical schools, where a wholly modern physiological calorimeter is described.

In the same section there are a number of inaccuracies testifying to the carelessness of the author and editor. Thus, for example, the reference in the text (p. 117) to the table at the end of the book (p. 492) does not correspond to what is in fact contained in this table; in § 10 of chapter 4 (p. 126) a reference is made to camphor, allegedly “mentioned in the preceding paragraph,” whereas that paragraph is devoted to a gas embolus and says not a word about camphor.

§ 8 of the chapter on the fundamental laws of thermodynamics, where a criticism is given of the “theory of the heat death of the universe,” must be regarded as unsuccessful.

The author has not been able to present convincing arguments for refuting the assertions of the idealists about the inevitability of the “heat death of the universe,” and has confined himself to a simple reference to the statistical interpretation of the second law of thermodynamics.

The general assertion about the illegality of extrapolating the second law to the entire universe and the indication that the second law is a “generalization of our earthly experience” (does this mean that it is inapplicable to processes occurring in the universe, i.e. on other celestial bodies?) does not dispel, as experience in teaching physics shows, the ideas naturally arising among students that the difficulty of the question is being not explained but evaded.

In the third section of the textbook, devoted to the study of electricity, Prof. Artsybyshev introduces such fundamental concepts of modern physics as the concepts of electrostatic, magnetic, and electromagnetic fields, also noting the existence of gravitational fields. In the paragraph on the energy of the electrostatic field the author correctly and convincingly reveals the material nature of the field: “Fields,” he writes, “are a really existing objective entity of our consciousness; consequently, from the point of view of dialectical materialism they must have a material nature” (p. 178). Later (pp. 240–241) he again returns to the problem of the field in connection with a criticism of the mechanical theory of the ether, pointing out that the rejection of the ether by no means signifies the recognition of absolute emptiness.

In elementary textbooks, which are in essence only introductions to one or another science, one should avoid introducing any new

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units and new, generally unaccepted terms. In particular, in the treatment of electricity the following could have been introduced without any harm: a new unit, the “large dyne,” equal to \(10^7\) dynes (p. 179). The introduction of this unit was apparently inspired by a well-known book by Pol, the strong influence of whose courses is also felt in a number of other sections of Artsibyshev’s textbook.

On p. 160 it is erroneously stated that the coulomb is equal to \(3 \cdot 10^{10}\) absolute electrostatic units. On p. 232 a mercury-arc lamp is described, of which it is said that it “has at present become very widespread in laboratories and clinics.” However, an arc of this type is at present no longer manufactured and has no distribution, having been completely displaced by arcs of the ARK and PRK type.

On p. 228 there is a paragraph entitled “Mass from the Point of View of the Theory of Relativity,” yet not a word is said about what the theory of relativity is, how it arose, and to what it reduces. Therefore both the named paragraph and the preceding one, devoted to the mass of the electron, may be understood and interpreted incorrectly.

One is surprised by the absence in the textbook, intended for medical institutions of higher education, of a description of the cathode oscillograph. The paragraphs devoted to electron tubes do not correspond to the importance of these tubes in modern medicine. In the chapter on “electrical oscillations,” instead of diagrams which, according to the author himself, are “mainly of historical interest” (p. 265), it would have been necessary to give diagrams, extremely important for physicians, of modern installations for diathermy and UHF therapy.

In the section devoted to optics there are quite elementary chapters written according to the secondary-school curriculum. For example, chapter 24 (pp. 310–321), devoted to the fundamentals of elementary information from geometrical optics, is written in this way; at the same time this chapter lacks descriptions of centered optical systems, with which one must become acquainted when studying physiology, and in the clinic of eye diseases. In this respect Artsibyshev’s textbook is inferior to the old textbooks of N. G. Egorov, S. Ya. Tereshin, and A. A. Dobiash.

In the section there are very many minor but annoying errors; obsolete terminology is used (Kronglas, Flintglas instead of crown, flint; Fraungofer instead of Fraunhofer, Slutsk instead of Pavlovsk (p. 375), etc.).

On p. 333 a reference is given to Fig. 367, and it is asserted that this figure shows a spectrograph (top view); however, Fig. 367 shows and is described in the corresponding place in the text not as a spectrograph, but as a spectrometer (goniometer).

There is an utterly impermissible carelessness in the textbook in the paragraph on the diffraction spectrum (p. 334), where we read: “A system of multicolored lines corresponding to images of the first order forms the so-called diffraction spectrum of the first order. Such spectra are shown in the color table attached at the end of the book.” However, it is enough to glance at this table to be convinced that it shows not diffraction spectra but prismatic spectra! That this is not an accidental slip is shown by the following page: “The spectra shown in our table were obtained with the aid of a grating of low resolving power and yield images of low brightness.” The term “specific dispersion” (p. 336) is not accepted in optics; the accepted terms are “total, mean, and partial dispersion,” and by total dispersion is meant not the product of “specific dispersion” by the refracting angle of a prism, as the author writes, uncritically following Grimsehl, but the difference of the refractive indices for the extreme lines of the visible spectrum, \(A'\) and \(h\).

Bibliography

The new term introduced by the author, “mean path” of light in a substance, is very unfortunate; by it he understands “the distance over which the luminous flux decreases, owing to absorption, to 63% of its initial value” (pp. 344–345). The paragraph in which this term is introduced was written on the basis of Pohl’s book Introduction to Optics. In the Russian translation of that book this distance is quite correctly called the “mean depth of penetration of light.” In the chapter on the polarization of light it is erroneously stated (p. 350) that if the optical axes of tourmaline plates are parallel, then “the brightness of the beam is almost unchanged in comparison with the brightness of a beam that has passed through one plate.”

In the paragraph on rotation of the plane of polarization (p. 356), a value is given for the specific rotation of sugar equal to 66.5°, and it is stated that the rotation of the plane of polarization is used “to determine sugar in various solutions, in particular in urine.” However, a specific rotation of 66.5° corresponds not to grape sugar but to cane sugar, which, as is known, is not found in urine. Moreover, this entire paragraph is written far too briefly. These questions for physicians are set out much better in the old textbook by Dobiasch.

The paragraph on the photometry of colored sources (p. 364) is very unsuccessful. As examples of heterochromatic methods of photometry, the author gives two of the four methods described in the above-mentioned book by Pohl, following Pohl exactly and even reproducing his figure (Fig. 405). One of these methods is based on the dependence of the speed of visual perception on brightness, and the other on the dependence of visual acuity on illumination.

Prof. Artsybyshev writes that both of the described methods give well-agreeing results. Both of these methods, however, are not used at all in modern photometry. Pohl, in addition to these methods, describes two more: the “limiting flicker frequency” and the “free alternation of fields,” arriving at the conclusion that all these four different methods of determining the equality of two illuminations “lead to data practically little different from one another.” This assertion of Pohl’s is erroneous. Only the last method gives sufficiently reliable data and is therefore used in the modern practice of visual photometry of colored sources. Uncritically following Pohl, Artsybyshev aggravates his error by saying nothing at all about this method, which is accepted in modern photometry.

There are substantial errors in the table of pairs of complementary colors on p. 368. The color complementary to red is not blue, as is stated in the table, but green-blue; and to orange it is not green-blue, but blue.

In the chapter on optical instruments (p. 377), it is incorrectly stated that “in a calm, unstrained state the crystalline lens has the smallest curvature” (p. 380), whereas in reality, in the unstrained state its curvature is maximal. In the paragraph on the resolving power of a telescope, in the formula expressing in angular seconds the smallest angle at which the objective gives separate images of points, and also in the numerical example, the factor 1.2 is omitted. In the paragraph on the microscope, the numerical aperture (aperture number) of the microscope, in the old manner, is called its aperture angle (p. 387). In addition, it is written that it is determined by the quantity \(2n\sin u\), whereas in reality the numerical aperture is simply \(n\sin u\).

Among the more successful sections of the textbook should be included the final large section, devoted to the structure of the atom (pp. 388–454). In this section the question of the focusing of electron rays and the principle of the electron microscope (pp. 450–454) are set out very simply and well; these paragraphs,

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devoted to the obtaining of intra-atomic energy (pp. 446–448), artificial radioactivity (441–445), etc. However, here too there are substantial methodological errors. These include the unsuccessful attempt to set forth the basic idea of quantum mechanics (§ 8 of Chapter 31 and § 8 of Chapter 34).

Prof. Artsibyshev asserts that quantum mechanics, having overcome the shortcomings of Bohr’s theory, “introduced the concept of the dual nature of material particles” (p. 406). This dual nature is said to consist in the fact that “each particle is accompanied by a wave with a definite frequency \(\nu\)” (ibid.).

The photon \(h\nu\) is a material particle to which there “corresponds, or ... which is accompanied by, a definite wave with frequency \(\nu\)” (p. 448). We read further that “the nature of any material particle has the same character; in other words, every particle with mass \(m\) must be accompanied by a certain wave with frequency \(\nu\)” (p. 448).

From these formulations it is clear that the author represents the physical essence of quantum mechanics quite incorrectly and makes gross errors in its interpretation. It is known that in modern quantum mechanics de Broglie waves are regarded not as real waves in space and time, but as waves of probability. Bourgeois physicists often use this interpretation for their idealistic conclusions.

On the other hand, the conception of the electron as a “particle” which is accompanied by a “wave” is untenable and metaphysical. Idealists (such as Heisenberg), in their criticism of the materialism of classical physics, time and again use the shortcomings and limitations of this metaphysical materialism, which tries to solve the question of the “dual nature” of the electron in the spirit of Prof. Artsibyshev: the electron is a “classical” particle; the wave is a “classical” wave; “dialectics” means that a wave accompanies the particle.

Heisenberg’s sophism consists precisely in the fact that, while criticizing the corpuscular and wave pictures, he draws the conclusion not that our mechanistic notions of the nature of elementary particles are inadequate, but that “classical” concepts of causality, of space and time, are inapplicable to elementary particles; that is, he denies the materialist interpretation of atomic processes.

Prof. Artsibyshev feels this too, indicating that certain basic propositions of quantum mechanics “give idealist physicists occasion to speak of the fundamental unknowability of certain phenomena of the microworld, of the indeterminacy of these phenomena, and even of the ‘free will’ of elementary particles” (p. 406).

From this he concludes: “For the time being we are forced to use modern quantum theory as an instrument that yields rich practical results” (p. 407). The author, consequently, regards quantum mechanics merely as a temporary recipe for calculations. One cannot, however, agree with such an assessment by the author. Soviet physics faces the task of giving a materialist interpretation of the basic propositions of quantum mechanics.

In the last paragraph of the book (pp. 454–458) there is a brief but, on the whole, substantial survey of the development of Soviet physics.

The present, fifth, edition of S. A. Artsibyshev’s course in “Physics,” although in a number of respects an improvement in comparison with the preceding editions, still has many serious shortcomings and needs substantial corrections.

N. G. Fedorov

A. A. Kvasov