J. R. Mayer:

(1814-78), full name Julius Robert von Mayer, German physician, chemist & physicist, a founder of thermodynamics, famous for his statements of the conservation of energy (1841), which came to be the first law of thermodynamics ("energy can be neither created nor destroyed”), erroneously first attributed to Joule.  He also described the vital chemical process (oxidation) as the primary source of energy for all living creatures (1842) & proposed that plants convert light into chemical energy.

 

J. B. Mayer (& mythic nature of Physics):

Mayer was a scientist but also found “mythic” truths in the bible & Christianity as evidenced in his correspondence with parents, friends & colleagues: his Christianity did not contradict Physics, it corroborated Physics.  In 1851 he wrote: “My early feeling that scientific truths are to the Christian religion much what brooks and rivers are to the ocean…”  In a letter to a friend upon the death of his mother he stated: "The firm conviction which I have — based on scientific facts and without any reference to Revelation — of personal immortality, and of a higher direction of human life, was my greatest consolation when I clasped the cold hand of my dying mother."  In a letter of 1869 writing to a scientific colleague he stated: "The planetary system, the whole stellar system in general, are ordinances of Divine wisdom."

 

Faraday:

see page 100

 

Faraday (& mythic nature of Physics):

Faraday was a devoutly religious man, a member of the Sandemanian church (a Church of Scotland break away), raised in the beliefs & practices of this church & an elder (1840-44 & 1860-64); for most of his adult life he met with his brethren in the meeting house in London.  Preaching was done by the elders on a rotating basis; as an elder he delivered sermons to the believers, 4 of which were recorded.  Much of his yearly income was given away to the church.  While declining titles & gifts, he preferred to visit some poor sister in trouble, assist her, take a cup of tea with her, read the Bible and pray.

 

Hertz:

(1857-94) German physicist, studied under von Helmholtz with whom he collaborated closely; was the first to prove the existence of electromagnetic waves (radio waves); between 1886-89 he conducted experiments which proved the existence of such waves, as predicted by Maxwell.  In 1892 Hertz began experimenting with cathode rays, demonstrating that they could penetrate very thin metal foil; he also helped establish the photoelectric effect (which was later explained by Albert Einstein) when he noticed that a charged object loses its charge more readily when illuminated by ultraviolet radiation (UV).

 

Hertz (& mythic nature of Physics):

Hertz was raised as a Lutheran but it is not his religion that Spengler is referring to but rather is mind set, which clearly has nuances of metaphysics.  Although thoroughly a scientist he once said: “One cannot escape the feeling that these mathematical formulas have an independent existence and an intelligence of their own, that they are wiser than we are, wiser even than their discoverers.”  And in another statement he said: ”Outside our consciousness there lies the cold and alien world of actual things.  Between the two stretches the narrow borderland of the senses.  No communication between the two worlds is possible excepting across the narrow strip.  For a proper understanding of ourselves and of the world, it is of the highest importance that this borderland should be thoroughly explored.”  Both of these statements suggest some affinity with the metaphysics of Kant’s transcendental idealism (his “things in themselves”).