Talk:Paul Dirac

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This article was reviewed by Nature (journal) on December 14, 2005.
Comments: It was found to have 9 errors.
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Internal links and syntax

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"Significant and influential work"

Under "Career" is the section "Significant and influential work". Wasn't his other work, the Dirac equation, magnetic monopoles, etc. also "Significant and influential"? Singling out one facet as "Significant and influential" makes his other work sound, well, insignificant. It was not. Call it "Other work" if you must, or "Other significant work".

Should Fermi-Dirac statistics have its own section? That describes how fermions (a term he coined) behave. I second the creation of a QED section. Charlie Faust (talk) 01:58, 16 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

As an alternative to "Other", consider lifting all of the work out of "Career" and into "Scientific work", giving new TOC entries for the parts of "Significant and influential work" that are significant and dropping anything that does not warrant a subheading. Then Fermi-Dirac gets a spot. You could rename "Career" to "Positions" to hold Cambridge/Florida etc.

QED should be moved out of Cambridge and into "Scientific work" as as subheading. As you may know Dirac role was a bit more of a "hey look over here" than a true founding as most of the work to bring it to fore was done by others. Johnjbarton (talk) 16:08, 16 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, the article should be reorganized. There's a template saying the lead is too long. I agree. It mentions Dirac as a pioneer of string theory. This is a stretch. Per his biographer, Graham Farmelo: "the mathematical form of Dirac's idea was completely different to that of the modern string theory" (409-410). String theory didn't really come into its own until after Dirac died. His work in that field is important but not (in my opinion) important enough to be in the lead. I like your ideas about reorganization. Charlie Faust (talk) 14:20, 17 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Per your suggestions, I made separate sections for "Scientific career" and "Academia". The former now has a section for Fermi-Dirac statistics.

If you haven't read Graham Farmelo's The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac, Mystic of the Atom, I recommend it. Charlie Faust (talk) 15:13, 17 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Death should probably be in Personal life.

Legacy is not a correct name for Praise+Honours. The Legacy content is spread out through the article. Maybe one sentence summary at the beginning of Legacy would cure these two issues. Johnjbarton (talk) 15:23, 17 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

How about "Death and Legacy"? "Death and "Tributes" One seems to lead into the other. But yes, odd that ""Death" should get its own section. Charlie Faust (talk) 15:30, 17 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Odd to me that there's nothing in the article about Dirac's friendship with Pyotr Kapitza, a major theme of Farmelo's book. Including that might illuminate the human side of Dirac. Charlie Faust (talk) 15:31, 17 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

"Death and tributes" would be more correct for the content. Legacy is usually about influence on other people. Johnjbarton (talk) 15:33, 17 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, yes, well there is overlap. But "Death and tributes" is better than "Death" I clarified that on logarithmic scale of physicists from 0 to 5, 0 is the highest and 5 the lowest. Charlie Faust (talk) 15:38, 17 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Two Giants

I love this picture of Dirac and Feynman at Jablonna in 1962. Here are two giants of physics. And, since Feynman worked on quantum electrodynamics and idolized Dirac, it's almost as though a torch is being passed.

I feel it would be worth adding to Dirac's page, and Feynman's. Why Feynman's? For symmetry. Charlie Faust (talk) 16:40, 20 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It's a nice image, but as a general rule images should be discussed in the text of the article. Images should not go out on a limb and have no mentions in the article.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 07:52, 21 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Under "Personality", there is a mention of the Dirac/Feynman exchange ("I have an equation".) That would be the place. Charlie Faust (talk) 13:59, 21 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I added it, under "Personality", near the Feynman story.

We read that the Dirac equation "is regarded by some physicists as the "real seed of modern physics".^[1] I think most historians of scientists would say that was in Planck's 1900 paper on quantum theory. Charlie Faust (talk) 14:21, 21 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That's why it says "some physicists" with the information stated in the given source. It's fine how it is, saying "most historians" doesn't contradict it when it already says "some". Reaper1945 (talk) 17:55, 21 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Fair enough. But my guess would be that most physicists (like most historians of science) would give it as 1900, the year of Planck's quantum paper, or 1905, the year of relativity. I don't think saying the Dirac equation (published 28 years after Planck) being the "real seed of modern physics" is a consensus view. But I'll leave that to others. Charlie Faust (talk) 23:05, 21 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Again, that's why it says "some physicists", it's not trying to be an overarching view that speaks for all physicists, the information is provided in the source itself. It's fine how it is and makes sense, nowhere is it stating that all physicists believe this or everyone agrees with it. Bringing up Planck's work doesn't contradict the information provided or how it's stated. Reaper1945 (talk) 00:51, 22 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

References

^ Zichichi, Antonino (2 March 2000). "Dirac, Einstein and physics". Physics World. Retrieved 22 October 2023.

Broken sentence

It connected special relativity and quantum mechanics and predicted the existence of antimatter, which is one of the most important equations in physics, and is regarded by some physicists as the "real seed of modern physics".

I would correct it myself, but I do not have permission to edit. 2A00:23C8:7B20:CC01:5198:1072:4371:5838 (talk) 22:11, 25 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I'm unsure what you think was broken, but I changed it. Johnjbarton (talk) 22:41, 25 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, I thought the problem would be obvious. The above sentence is faultily written, implying that antimatter is one of the most important equations in physics. 2A00:23C8:7B20:CC01:1DB0:4CD3:7133:139D (talk) 20:55, 26 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

yes it was a mess. Johnjbarton (talk) 21:11, 26 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

What is the purpose of the long Heisenberg quote about God?

Somebody has broken into this article in order to insert their own opinions disguised as something "Dirac might say"! This is why Wikipedia is a laughingstock. 47.232.145.208 (talk) 17:03, 27 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

[Zichichi-2000-1] Zichichi, Antonino (2 March 2000). "Dirac, Einstein and physics". Physics World. Retrieved 22 October 2023.

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