David Bohm
David Joseph Bohm FRS[1] (/boʊm/; 20 December 1917 – 27 October 1992) was an American–Brazilian–British scientist who has been described as one of the most significant theoretical physicists of the 20th century[2] and who contributed unorthodox ideas to quantum theory, neuropsychology and the philosophy of mind. Among his many contributions to physics is his causal and deterministic interpretation of quantum theory known as De Broglie–Bohm theory.
For the American bicycle framebuilder, see David Henry Bohm.
David Bohm
20 December 1917
27 October 1992 (aged 74)
American-Brazilian-British
- American
- Brazilian
- British
- Aharonov–Bohm effect
- De Broglie–Bohm theory
- Bohm criterion
- Bohm-diffusion
- Bohm dialogue
- Bohm's EPR experiment
- Bohm interpretation
- Bohm quantum potential
- Hidden variable theory
- Pilot wave theory
- Holographic paradigm
- Holomovement
- Holonomic brain theory
- Nonradiation condition
- Pilot wave
- Plasmon
- Implicate and explicate order
- Random phase approximation
- Quantum decoherence
- Quantum mind
Bohm advanced the view that quantum physics meant that the old Cartesian model of reality—that there are two kinds of substance, the mental and the physical, that somehow interact—was too limited. To complement it, he developed a mathematical and physical theory of "implicate" and "explicate" order.[3] He also believed that the brain, at the cellular level, works according to the mathematics of some quantum effects, and postulated that thought is distributed and non-localised just as quantum entities are.[4] Bohm's main concern was with understanding the nature of reality in general and of consciousness in particular as a coherent whole, which according to Bohm is never static or complete.[5]
Bohm warned of the dangers of rampant reason and technology, advocating instead the need for genuine supportive dialogue, which he claimed could bridge and unify conflicting and troublesome divisions in the social world. In this, his epistemology mirrored his ontology.[6]
Born in the United States, Bohm obtained his Ph.D. under J. Robert Oppenheimer at the University of California, Berkeley. Due to his Communist affiliations, he was the subject of a federal government investigation in 1949, prompting him to leave the U.S. He pursued his career in several countries, becoming first a Brazilian and then a British citizen. He abandoned Marxism in the wake of the Hungarian Uprising in 1956.[7][8]
Youth and college[edit]
Bohm was born in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, to a Hungarian Jewish immigrant father, Samuel Bohm,[9] and a Lithuanian Jewish mother. He was raised mainly by his father, a furniture-store owner and assistant of the local rabbi. Despite being raised in a Jewish family, he became an agnostic in his teenage years.[10] Bohm attended Pennsylvania State College (now Pennsylvania State University), graduating in 1939, and then the California Institute of Technology, for one year. He then transferred to the theoretical physics group directed by Robert Oppenheimer at the University of California, Berkeley Radiation Laboratory, where he obtained his doctorate.
Bohm lived in the same neighborhood as some of Oppenheimer's other graduate students (Giovanni Rossi Lomanitz, Joseph Weinberg, and Max Friedman) and with them became increasingly involved in radical politics. He was active in communist and communist-backed organizations, including the Young Communist League, the Campus Committee to Fight Conscription, and the Committee for Peace Mobilization. During his time at the Radiation Laboratory, Bohm was in a relationship with Betty Friedan and also helped to organize a local chapter of the Federation of Architects, Engineers, Chemists and Technicians, a small labor union affiliated to the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO).[11]
Later life[edit]
Bohm continued his work in quantum physics after his retirement, in 1987. His final work, the posthumously published The Undivided Universe: An Ontological Interpretation of Quantum Theory (1993), resulted from a decades-long collaboration with Basil Hiley. He also spoke to audiences across Europe and North America on the importance of dialogue as a form of sociotherapy, a concept he borrowed from London psychiatrist and practitioner of Group Analysis Patrick de Maré, and he had a series of meetings with the Dalai Lama. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1990.[1]
Near the end of his life, Bohm began to experience a recurrence of the depression that he had suffered earlier in life. He was admitted to the Maudsley Hospital in South London on 10 May 1991. His condition worsened and it was decided that the only treatment that might help him was electroconvulsive therapy. Bohm's wife consulted psychiatrist David Shainberg, Bohm's longtime friend and collaborator, who agreed that electroconvulsive treatments were probably his only option. Bohm showed improvement from the treatments and was released on 29 August, but his depression returned and was treated with medication.[48]
Bohm died after suffering a heart attack in Hendon, London, on 27 October 1992, aged 74.[49]
The film Infinite Potential is based on Bohm's life and studies; it adopts the same name as the biography by F. David Peat.[50]
Reception of causal theory[edit]
In the early 1950s, Bohm's causal quantum theory of hidden variables was mostly negatively received, with a widespread tendency among physicists to systematically ignore both Bohm personally and his ideas. There was a significant revival of interest in Bohm's ideas in the late 1950s and the early 1960s; the Ninth Symposium of the Colston Research Society in Bristol in 1957 was a key turning point toward greater tolerance of his ideas.[51]