DVD: Quantum Mechanics

Quantum Mechanics: The Physics of the Microscopic World (DVD# 545-548)

by Dr. Benjamin Schumacher

The Teaching Company, Chantilly, Virginia, 2009    72 minutes

This DVD of 24 lectures is an introduction to the basic ideas of quantum physics. Each 30-min. lecture is taught by Dr. Benjamin Schumacher, an American theoretical physicist from Kenyon College. In his lectures Schumacher simplifies the ways of the quantum world, the world of very little things, microscopic in nature. He also tells a history of modern physics with the arguments and agreements of the physicists who make up this history. I found Dr. Schumacher easy to be with as he shares his wonder and love for this unseen quantum world.

What brought me to this dvd? I have become increasingly aware of my direct experience and less trusting of my own sense . . . what I experience seems nuts, yet it feels just right. What am I unable to see just because I decide it makes no sense to be there? Realizing more and more that the world I am part of is not anything like solid, what to do? I had an impulse to learn a bit of quantum physics, an area of study that is asking questions about the solid nature of our world, of how certain we can be in our knowing. I went to the Center library and explained to Jennifer what I wanted. She said, “Wait a minute!” and returned with a dvd and several books about quantum physics. Looking at the books, my stomach tightened. My mind said, “Don’t do it!”, and yet I gathered it all and left the library.

Did I tell you I had no background in physics? None. Quantum physics? Me? Hesitating again, I remembered back to my original impulse: to catch a sense of these big ideas . . . never mind understanding them. That would be enough for me . . . just absorb these ideas in my own way. I felt my original curiosity and lightness return.

So I began the lectures with Dr. Schumacher, a warm and engaging teacher. I enjoyed parts of some lessons. Other lessons left me in the dust! When that happened, I stopped, went to bed, and tried again the next day. Ideas got clearer. Sometimes I got in my own way by trying too hard to figure it out . . . forgetting that I wasn’t looking to understand these ideas; rather, just be with them and see what happens.

I completed the lectures and recommend them to you if you are curious or confused. My experience is more allowing. When I dedicate my daily practice, I may include words I have said before, but I feel their meanings are deeper and include possibilities of things I have yet to know.   

-- submitted by Barbara Goldberg

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