Scattershot-History-Review-of-Shifting-Standards-Experiments-in-Particle-Physics-in-the-Twentieth-Century-by-Allan-Franklin-University-of-Pittsburgh-P.pdf

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Book Review
Endeavour
Vol. 38 No. 3–4
Full text provided by
www.sciencedirect.com
ScienceDirect
Scattershot History: Review of Shifting Standards: Experiments in Particle Physics in the Twentieth Century by Allan Franklin, University of
Pittsburgh Press, 2013
Aaron Wright*
IHPST, Victoria College Rm 316, 91 Charles St West, Toronto, ON M5S 1K7, Canada
In
Shifting Standards,
Allan Franklin provides a scatter-
shot view of the history of experimental particle physics by
examining articles published in the American Physical
Society’s flagship journal
Physical Review
from 1894 to
2009. The book is presented as short chapters devoted to a
single experimental result, rich in technical detail, inter-
spersed with three more-analytical essays. The experimen-
tal chapters are bounded by an introduction and
conclusion, and there is a long prologue detailing the
changes in standards of statistical significance physicists
applied to their work. Franklin has not chosen a linking
structure to unite the individual cases, except to say that
they are all examples of what we now call experimental
particle physics, the field with which the author is most
familiar. (Though even this criterion is not held exclusive-
ly, as chapter 2 explicates a paper on the physics of falling
bodies.)
The prologue, sparked by conversation with Harry Col-
lins, helps to frame the entire book project. It is concerned
with when physicists, journal reviewers and editors decide
to claim that they have ‘‘observed’’ the existence of a
particle or effect, versus when they write they have only
found ‘‘evidence’’ for something. Franklin traces this his-
tory from the 1960s to the present day, and finds that the
scientific standard for observing phenomena was
expressed in terms of a statistical measure: standard
deviation. The number of standard deviations of statistical
significance required to claim an observation, however, has
changed over time (from roughly three to five). Franklin
casts this story as mostly about scientists’ desire for ‘‘an
objective and more stringent criterion for a scientific dis-
covery’’ (lii), though he also emphasizes the continued role
of scientific judgement. Calculation of standard deviation
was therefore never really standardized at all: ‘‘Crafts-
manship and judgement are clearly needed’’ (liii).
The scientific papers discussed are widely available and
Franklin’s most valuable contributions in these chapters
come when they treat of a subject he has written about
previously. There he provides more detail and context, for
example in the discussion of Joseph Weber’s work on the
‘‘Coherent Scattering of Neutrinos,’’ which is drawn from
Franklin’s 2010 paper in
Perspectives on Science.
Franklin’s primary conclusions concern the scale of
experimental practice, the role of statistics within experi-
mentation, and the role of experiment itself within physics.
It has often been remarked upon that experimental science
has transformed from a table-top activity performed by
*Tel.: +1 416 978 5397.
Available online 16 September 2014
www.sciencedirect.com
0160-9327/
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.endeavour.2014.07.006
singletons or small groups into an activity that takes place
in massive machines performed by multitudes of scientific
collaborators. Franklin concurs with this observation,
remarking that the size, scale, and complexity of particle
physics has grown enormously over the years of his study.
This change in scale is also visible at the level of data
analysis: whereas Robert Millikan analyzed fewer than
200 instances of falling oil drops in 1913 to establish the
mass-to-charge ratio of the electron, Franklin notes that
the Compact Muon Solenoid experiment involved
6.5
Â
10
9
K- mesons.
The role of statistics and the exclusion and selection of
data exhibit both continuity and change within Franklin’s
analysis. Statistics, especially standard deviations, are
explicit in recent experimental physics papers, and though
not every older paper used standard deviations, they were
effectively present. Each experiment excludes some data
from its analysis—perhaps because physicists believe
their apparatus was not working correctly. Franklin notes
that the earlier papers were more likely to be explicit
about this exclusion. And physicists have, of course, al-
ways selected what they thought was the best data to
analyze.
Franklin has much to say about the changing nature of
physics articles. He observes that both historical accounts
and evidence of personal style have decreased as time
passed. Furthermore, the role of experiment in physics
for Franklin is diverse—sometimes directly relating to
physical theory, other times not. This diversity he sees
as a historical constant. Franklin claims that the trend in
the twentieth century has been away from depictions of
actual experimental apparatuses and towards more ideal-
ized representations. This is perhaps an artefact of Frank-
lin’s focus on only publications in the
Physical Review.
While earlier, less complex, and smaller experiments could
be described in the same paper as the main results of an
experiment, this is no longer possible. Entire journals are
now devoted to the technology involved in particle physics,
such as
Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Re-
search.
The book is not a narrative history, nor a philosophical
exegesis or argument. This makes it difficult to pin down
its intended audience. The book would be improved by
strengthening the narrative links between chapters. The
overall feeling upon reading
Shifting Standards
is one of
encountering three essays framing a very detailed anno-
tated bibliography.

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