Abstract
During the late 1950s and 1960s, bubble chambers buried physicists. At first thousands, soon tens of thousands, then hundreds of thousands, and at last millions of photographs issued from the cameras at the massive chambers of the largest particle physics laboratories in the world: Lawrence Radiation Laboratory (LRL), Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), the Center for European Nuclear Research (CERN) along with a host of other laboratories including Dubna (in the Soviet Union), and Rutherford Laboratory (in the U.K.). Together, these sites produced data on new particles that transformed the discipline intellectually through a much-deepened understanding of symmetry principles and nuclear forces. It did so at a cost. Already inflated by construction outlays, the price of doing particle physics surged further as “armies” of technicians and scanners joined physicists in sorting through the endless stream of 70 mm negatives. But the burden of photographic plenitude was not simply economic: physicists struggled to define the right relation between scientist and data, between physicist and technician, and between human and machine. At stake, the physicists argued, was not simply a matter of new technologies — each solution to the picture problem was at one and the same time an argument about the boundary of what it meant to be a physicist, a scientist, and a human being.1
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Notes
On the history of bubble chambers themselves, see P. Galison, ‘Bubble Chambers and the Experimental Workplace,’ in P. Achinstein and O. Hannaway, eds., Observation, Experiment and Hypothesis in Modern Physical Science (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1985);
also see Armin Hermann, John Krige, Ulrike Mersits, Dominique Pestre and a contribution by Laura Weiss, History of CERN, Volume II: Building and Running the Laboratory, 1954–1965 (Amsterdam, Oxford, New York, Tokyo: North-Holland, 1990), especially chapters 6, 8, 9 - chapter 9 subsection 6 includes the best history of CERN’s efforts in track-chamber picture handling facilities. I have profited greatly from this and from Krige’s preliminary version in the preprint CERN History Series,CHS-20.
L. Alvarez, ‘The Bubble Chamber Program at UCRL.’ Stenciled typescript dated 18 April 1955, unpublished but widely circulated.
On the Franckenstein as integrated into the full analysis system, see Hugh Brandner, ‘Problems and Techniques in the Analysis of Bubble Chamber Photographs,’ UCRL-9104 (1960). Also, Jack Franck, interview with author, 4 September 1991.
J. Krige, ‘The Development of Techniques for the Analysis of Track-Chamber Pictures at CERN,’ CHS-20 (Geneva: CERN, 1987), introduction.
On women’s work in the analysis of star charts, see Pamela Mack, ‘Straying from Their Orbits,’ in G. Kass-Simon and P. Farnes, eds., Women of Science: Righting the Record (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1990), 72–116
Margaret Rossiter’s discussion of women’s work in her Women Scientists in America (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982), esp. chapter 3.
In nuclear physics, women often worked as the observers of scintillation screens. See Roger Stuewer, ‘Artificial Disintegration and the Cambridge-Vienna Controversy,’ in P. Achinstein and O. Hannaway, eds., Observation, Experiment, and Hypothesis in Modern Physical Science (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1985), 239–307.
L. Kowarski, ‘Concluding Remarks,’ in ’Informal Meeting on Track Data Processing,’ held at CERN, 19 July 1962 (CERN Yellow Report, CERN 62-37, Geneva: CERN 1962), 99.
L. Alvarez, ‘Round Table Discussion on Bubble Chambers’ in Proceedings of the 1966 International Conference on Instrumentation for High Energy Physics, SLAC September 9–10, 1966 (Springfield, Virginia: National Bureau of Standards, 1966), 271–295, on 276 (hereafter, ‘Round Table,’ SLAC 1966).
E.g., M. L. Stevenson, ‘The Elementary Particles as Seen in the Hydrogen Bubble Chamber,’ Lawrence Radiation Laboratory Physics Notes 327, 28 August 1961.
Ed Hoedemaker, ‘Alvarez Group Scanning Training Film,’ October 1968, Lawrence Radiation Laboratory (LRL) Physics Note 595, 11. For an earlier manual see M. L. Stevenson, ’The Elementary Particles as Seen in the Hydrogen Bubble Chamber,’ LRL Physics Note 327, 28 August 1961; and M. L. Stevenson, ‘Reaction Dynamics for Scanners,’ LRL Physics Note 300, 16 June 1961.
P. Hough and B. Powell, ‘A Method for Faster Analysis of Bubble Chamber Photographs,’ in Proceedings of an International Conference on Instrumentation for High Energy Physics, September 1960 (New York, London: Interscience, 1960), 245.
P. Hough and B. Powell, ‘A Method for Faster Analysis of Bubble Chamber Photographs,’ Nuovo Cimento 18 (1960), 1184–91, on 1186.
J. Calkin, ‘A Mathematician Looks at Bubble and Spark Chamber Data Processing,’ in J. Howie, S. McCarroll, B. Powell, and A. Wilson, eds., Programming for HPD and Other Flying Spot Devices, Collège de France, Paris, 21–23 August 1963, CERN Yellow Report (CERN 63-34), 193 (hereafter: ‘Mathematician,’ in Paris 1963), 191–200 or 193.
J. Calkin, ‘Mathematician,’ in Paris 1963 (ref. 23), 192.
L. Alvarez, ‘A Proposal for the Rapid Measurement of Bubble Chamber Film,’ LRL Physics Note 223, 8 November 1960, 4.
L. Alvarez, ‘A Proposal for the Rapid Measurement of Bubble Chamber Film,’ LRL Physics Note 223 (1960) (ref. 25), 24.
J. Snyder, ‘Some Remarks on a Data Analysis System Based Upon the Scanning-Measuring Projector (SMP),’ LRL Physics Note 326, 25 August 1961, 2–3.
J. Snyder, ‘Some Remarks on a Data Analysis System Based Upon the Scanning- Measurement Projector (SMP),’ LRL Physics Notes 326, August 1961, 4.
On Cyborgs, see Donna Haraway, e.g., Primate Visions: Gender, Race and Nature in the World of Modern Science (New York: Routledge, 1989).
L. Kowarski, ‘Via Introduction,’ in Proceedings of an International Conference on Instrumentation for High-Energy Physics, held at the Ernest O. Lawrence Radiation Laboratory, Berkeley, California, 12–14 September 1960 (New York and London: Interscience 1961), 223 (hereafter: ‘Introduction,’ in Berkeley 1960), 223–234 on 223.
L. Kowarski, ‘Introduction,’ in Paris 1963 (ref. 23), 2–3.
J. Snyder, R. Hulsizer, J. Munson, and H. Schneider, ‘Bubble Chamber Data Analysis Using a Scanning and Measuring Projector (SMP) On-Line to a Digital Computer,’ in K. Beckurts, W. Gläser, and G. Krüger, eds.. Conference on the Automatic Acquisition and Reduction of Nuclear Data, Proceedings of a Conference, Karlsruhe, 13–16 July 1964, (Karlsruhe: Gesellschaft für Kernforschung m. b. H. Karlsruhe, 1964), 239–248 on 243–44.
R. Hulsizer, J. Munson and J. Snyder, ‘A System for the Analysis of Bubble Chamber Film Based upon the Scanning and Measuring Projector (SMP),’ Methods in Computational Physics 5 (1966), 157–211 on 159.
A. Rosenfeld, ‘Current Performance of the Alvarez-Group Data Processing System,’ Nucl. Inst. and Meth. 20 (1963), 422–34, on 433.
Button et al., Phys. Rev 126 (1962), 1858–63, on 1863.
L. Alvarez, comment in Nucl. Inst. and Methods 20 (1963), 382.
L. Alvarez, ‘Round Table Discussion on Bubble Chambers,’ in Proceedings of the 1966 International Conference on Instrumentation for High Energy Physics (Springfield, Virginia: National Bureau of Standards, U.S. Department of Commerce, n.d.), 294 (hereafter: ‘Round Table,’ in SLAC 1966).
H. Bradner, ‘Capabilities and Limitations of Present Data-Reduction Systems,’ in Berkeley 1960, 225–228 on 225.
L. Alvarez, comment, Nucl. Inst. and Methods 20 (1963), 383.
L. Kowarski, ‘Introduction,’ in Berkeley 1960 (1961) (ref. 35), 224.
L. Kowarski, ‘General Survey: Automatic Data Handling in High Energy Physics,’ in Karlsruhe 1964 (Karlsruhe: Gesellschaft für Kernforschung m. b. H., 1964) 26–38 on 26 (Hereafter Karlsruhe 1964.)
L. Kowarski, ‘Concluding Remarks,’ in Paris 1963 (ref. 23), 241.
D. Pestre and J. Krige, ‘Some Thoughts on the History of CERN,’ in P. Galison and B. Hevly, eds., Big Science: The Growth of Large-Scale Research (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992).
L. Kowarski, ‘Concluding Remarks,’ in Paris 1963 (ref. 23), 238.
L. Kowarski, ‘General Survey: Automatic Data Handling in High Energy Physics,’ in Karlsruhe 1964 (ref. 47), 26–40 on 39–40.
L. Alvarez, ‘Round Table,’ in SLAC 1966 (ref. 43), 271–72.
K. Gottstein, ‘Introductory Remarks’, in B. Powell and P. Seyboth, eds., Programming for Flying Spot Devices, Conference held at the Max-Planck-Institut für Physik und Astrophysik, Munich, 18–20 January 1967 (Munich, 1967), 1–4 on 3.
L. Kowarski, ‘Concluding Remarks’, in W. Moorhead and B. Powell, eds., Programming for Flying Spot Devices (CERN Yellow Report 65-11, 26 March 1965). Proceedings of a Conference held at the Centro Nazionale Analisi Fotogrammi, I.N.F.N., Bologna, on 7–9 October 1964, 259–266 on 264–265 (hereafter: ‘Concluding Remarks,’ Bologna, 1964).
L. Kowarski, ‘Concluding Remarks’, in Bologna 1964 (ref. 60), 259–266 on 264.
L. Kowarski, ‘Concluding Remarks’, in Munich 1967 (ref. 59), 409–416 on 415.
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Galison, P. (1992). Fortran, Physics, and Human Nature. In: Nye, M.J., Richards, J.L., Stuewer, R.H. (eds) The Invention of Physical Science. Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol 139. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-2488-1_10
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