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Ernst Mach
Ernst Mach was an Austrian physicist turned philosopher. He was born on February 18, 1838 and died on February 19, 1916 at the age of 78. He played a huge part in creating many of the beliefs that we know today. He was know for his skepticism of old physics and created many new laws and measurements that we use today. -
Mach’s Impact
Due to Mach’s frequent skepticism, he had a huge hand in what we know and believe today in modern science. His constant questioning in physics, philosophy, psychology, led him to not only creating new theories to be tested out, it also led him to be considered “The Founder of Philosophy of Science.” Question many other philosophers such as Newton and Einstein is what led him to have this tittle today. -
Accomplishments
There are many accomplishments made to science by Mach, and all of them are just as significant as the next. Some of these accomplishments included studying human balance on anatomy level, the “Doppler Effect”, atomic theory, measuring the speed of light, and so many more. Although he had many accomplishments, the most significant was being able to measure the speed of light. This is his most notable accomplishment to this day. -
Measuring the Speed of Light
Before Mach could even begin to start studying the relationship between light and sound, he had decided to study shock waves. With studying shock waves, he was able to get a basic understanding of how objects of certain sizes and weights can all have different effects on the shock waves that are produced. With him studying shock waves, he had abandoned the traditional beliefs of time and space as he believed in order to make sense of everything, he had to come up with new beliefs. -
Measuring the Speed of Light
After years of studying shock waves, Mach had finally understood how shock waves are determined not only based on an objects weight and size, but he also discovered how sound was related to different shock waves. With this understanding he then began to study how light and sound were related while incorporating his knowledge of shock waves. Through his experimenting and studying he had come up with a ratio to explain how the speed of light correlates to sound. -
Measuring the Speed of Light
The ratio Mach had come up with was comparing the flow of light to the speed of sound it took to create. The new creation would become revolutionary and he would be offered a chair at the University of Vienna for Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences. This new discovery had given him high credibility as a science philosopher and he would be known world wide for his way to measure the speed of light, something no other scientist were able to do. -
Measuring the Speed of Light
13 years after Mach’s death, a Swiss engineer by the name of Jakob Ackeret, was conducting his own experiment of seeing the difference in object weights and the amount it took for sound to be created. He proposed using Mach’s ratio and naming the different variables “Mach numbers” in honor of the scientist. To this day, the “Mach numbers” are still used when conducting experiments using the speed of light. -
Sources
Pojman, P. (2019, March 3). Ernst Mach. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ernst-mach/ Study.com (n.d.). https://study.com/learn/lesson/physicist-ernst-mach-biography-principle.html#:~:text=Ernst%20Mach%20was%20an%20Austrian,named%20in%20memory%20of%20Mach. Ernst Mach. Ernst Mach and Albert Einstein. (n.d.). http://www.fsmitha.com/h2/phil-einstein.htm