Classical Mechanics, in spite of all of its impressive predictive power, fails to explain many microscopic behaviors. This led to the development of Quantum Mechanics, where electrons orbit nuclei in discrete energy levels, light can behave as a particle, and particles behave as waves. The location of microscopic particles can only be expressed in terms of probabilities. Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle is discussed and demonstrated.
This lecture is part of 8.01 Physics I: Classical Mechanics, as taught in Fall 1999 by Dr. Walter Lewin at MIT.
This video was formerly hosted on the YouTube channel MIT OpenCourseWare.