Arrangement and Description of the Paul A.M. Dirac Collection

这个项目的目的是向科学史学家提供佛罗里达州立大学理论物理学家保罗·阿姆·狄拉克(1902-84年)论文的集合。为此，将在六个月的授权期结束时实现两个目标：由一名档案员安排所有物品，他也将采取适当的保存措施；以及创建一个在文件夹一级记录藏品内容的网上查找辅助工具。这具约有20,000件物品的遗体是由Margit Dirac夫人在没有特别限制的情况下捐赠给FSU的。在深度和广度上，它都无法与任何其他与狄拉克相关的材料相媲美，当布置完成时，它将占据至少87直线英尺的书架空间--其中只有27英尺是给狄拉克拥有的书籍的。包括：狄拉克的草稿、最后的手稿和出版作品的校样；讲座的笔记和打字稿；笔记本；数学计算的卷轴；与特定主题有关的各种文件组，如“战争工作”(原子弹研究)；他写的信件；以及更多重要的来函语料库，来自著名的同事，如玻尔、海森伯格、薛定谔和塔姆。值得注意的是狄拉克对他人手稿和校样的边缘评论，以及在他和其他人的文章的复印件中。与这些收藏相辅相成的是照片、会议议程、个人和职业纪念品，以及从19世纪80年代到80年代初的大量家庭文件。该项目的意义和潜在影响可以通过以下几个方面来衡量：首先，狄拉克作为本世纪“物理革命”的主要贡献者之一，其无可争议的重要性。其次，所讨论的档案资源是丰富的，不仅对于研究狄拉克的生活和思想的学生来说，而且对于专注于与他通信和面对面互动的同时代人的研究人员来说都是如此。这不仅是罗宾·莱德博士的证词，还有其他三位项目顾问的证词，他们也在1998年对材料进行了现场调查：彼得·L·加里森博士、大卫·卡西迪博士和约翰·奥尔布赖特博士。几乎可以肯定的是，狄拉克传记作家和科学史学家将在这些论文中找到合适的依据。衡量20世纪物理学家公布的物理现实新图像的长期后果的文化历史学家也将直接或间接受益于这一宏伟遗产的可获得性，这使得可能的研究成果在其他地方是无法获得的。

The purpose of this project is to make available to historians of science the Florida State University collection of the papers of theoretical physicist Paul A.M. Dirac (1902-84). To this end, two objectives will be reached by the close of the six-months grant period: the arrangement of all items by an archivist who will also take appropriate preservation measures; and the creation of a web-based finding aid documenting at the folder level the contents of the collection. This body of approximately 20,000 items was donated without special restrictions to FSU by Mrs. Margit Dirac. Unequaled in depth and breadth by any other assemblage of Dirac-related materials, it will, when the arrangement is completed, occupy at least 87 linear feet of shelf space -- only 27 of which are given to books owned by Dirac. Included are: Dirac's drafts, final manuscripts and proofs of published works; notes for and typescripts of lectures; notebooks; sheaves of mathematical calculations; groups of various kinds of documents related to particular subjects such as "War Work" (atomic bomb research); letters written by him; and a much more substantial corpus of incoming correspondence from distinguished colleagues such as Bohr, Heisenberg, Schrodinger, and Tamm. Noteworthy are Dirac's marginal comments on others' manuscripts and proofs, as well as in offprints of his and others' articles. Complementing the collection are photographs, conference programs, personal and professional memorabilia, and a large cache of family papers dating from the 1880s through the early 1980s. The significance and potential impact of the project may be gauged by, first, Dirac's undisputed importance as one of the major contributors to the "Physics Revolution" of this century. Second, the archival resource in question is a rich one not only for students of Dirac's life and thought but for researchers focusing on the contemporaries with whom he interacted in correspondence and in person. Such is the testimony of not only Dr. Robin Rider but of three other project consultants who also surveyed the materials on-site in 1998: Drs. Peter L. Galison, David Cassidy, and John Albright. It is a virtual certainty that Dirac biographers and historians of science will find grist for the mill in these papers. Cultural historians measuring the long-term consequences of the new images of physical reality promulgated by 20th-century physicists will also benefit, directly or indirectly, from the availability of this grand legacy making possible research findings unobtainable nowhere else.