What papers should everyone read?

Question

Mathoverflow A single paper everyone should read?

CSTheory What papers should everyone read?

TheoreticalPhysics.SE

What papers should every physicist read?

NOTES:

• One paper per answer.
• Please provide at least a sentence what is inside and why you consider it so worth reading.
• Choose original papers of important basic results rather than large survey papers or "meta" paper suggestion by Gil Kalai

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Comments

Patrik, it is a nice soft question but consider providing the full description in the question (as there is in MO and CSTheory) as _What papers should everyone read?_ without further description is a bit vague IMHO.

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Just one publication per answer? Okay, I suppose I get to spam a few answers then.

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Answer 1

Scientist: Four golden lessons by S. Weinberg is a must-read for physicists. Regardless of area you study, the applicability of his advice is far-reaching. That's why every physicist, especially the young, should read it.

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Comments

OP specifically asks: "Please provide at least a sentence what is inside and why you consider it so worth reading."

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I added comments.

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There is a response to Weinberg http://www.cpom.org/people/jcrh/naturecorres2.pdf  "Sir — Steven Weinberg’s Concepts essay “Four golden lessons” (Nature 426, 389; 2003) is full of idealism, based on his experience, garnered “about a hundred years ago”.", though I don't like it.

Answer 2

This article is a must!

J.S. Bell On the Einstein Podolsky Rosen Paradox Physics Vol. 1, 3 195-200 (1964)

Because it is:

• a milestone in the history of physics,
• a simple argument that explain why Quantum Mechanics is different from classical intuition,
• only 5 pages and well written.

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Answer 3

Well, it's hard to choose just ONE, but if I had to, I thought this one was pretty amazing:

Kenneth G. Wilson, The renormalization group: Critical phenomena and the Kondo problem, Rev. Mod. Phys. 47, 773–840 (1975)

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Comments

Free pdf version: http://prl.aps.org/files/RevModPhys.47.773.pdf

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Answer 4

I will go with:

• P.W. Anderson, More is different, Science 4 August 1972: 393-396.

on the topic of emergence and complexity in systems with a macroscopic number of constituents.

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Comments

An interesting follow-up to this one would be [More Really is different](http://lanl.arxiv.org/abs/0809.0151), by Mile Gu, Christian Weedbrook, Alvaro Perales, and Michael Nielsen. They are much more concrete, and my opinion, more convincing.

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+1 Very nice choice!

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Answer 5

R. P. Feynman, Space-Time Approach to Non-Relativistic Quantum Mechanics, Rev. Mod. Phys. 20, 367–387 (1948)

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Answer 6

I like this paper because it's all of four pages long. Electroweak unification. Spontaneously broken symmetry. It's a thrilling paper to read!

Steven Weinberg, A Model of Leptons, Phys. Rev. Lett. 19, 1264–1266 (1967)

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Comments

Four pages is hardly unusual in physics.

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4 pages is hardly unusual in PRL. :)

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But this paper is three pages!

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@TsuyoshiIto: I must admit I didn't check the claim that it was 4 pages.

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Answer 7

Even tough it is not about physics, I suggest the following:

• J.A. Gallian, Advice on giving a good powerpoint presentation, Math Horizons, April. 2006:25-27

It is a short and concise list of DOs and DON'Ts when giving a talk or a lecture. And it is a pity that many scientists, despite years of frequent practice, make very simple mistakes on that issue.

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Comments

I suppose it's too much to hope that the first sentence in that document is "Use LaTeX" :-P

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Answer 8

How can one not have a desire to read some history:

Planck, Max (1901). "Ueber das Gesetz der Energieverteilung im Normalspectrum [On the Law of Distribution of Energy in the Normal Spectrum]" (in German) (pdf). Annalen der Physik 309 (3): 553–563. (1901). "On the Law of Distribution of Energy in the Normal Spectrum (in English)" (PDF). Annalen der Physik 4: 553 ff.

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Comments

What's the purpose behind reading these original papers?

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On occasion, it is presumptuous to believe we know more than the great masters. Generally though it is far more presumptuous to assume we haven't figured anything out for our own damn selves in the past 110 years...

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Answer 9

I would go for two of the Annus Mirabilis papers from Einstein: relativity and Brownian motion. Although the latter requires some knowledge of classical thermodynamics, it is a brilliant example of a clear mind explaining a subject.

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Answer 10

M. Gell-Mann, "The Eightfold Way: A Theory of Strong Interaction Symmetry"

It's the only one I can't get a hold of online, so it must be good.

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Comments

Does any one have a copy of this paper, which they can post online or should I ask Gell-Mann, myself?

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I spoke to soon:http://www.osti.gov/cgi-bin/rd_accomplishments/display_biblio.cgi?id=ACC0113&numPages=52&fp=N

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