Louis de Broglie's wave-particle duality: from textbooks’ blackboxes to a chain of reference presentation

Abstract We discuss the proposition of wave-particle duality made by Louis de Broglie in the period of 1922-1924 as well as the narratives of undergraduate Physics textbooks that introduce this topic. After a brief discussion on the nature of scientific reality, we point out the main theories, assumptions and techniques adopted by de Broglie to achieve the relation between momentum and wavelength. We use these elements as analytical categories, observing which of them are still present in four popular undergraduate introductory textbooks. Our results show that none of the textbooks used de Broglie's original strategy (mathematical derivation), treating his ideas as postulates. Moreover, we show that only few elements of de Broglie's original presentation are still commented by textbooks, which treat de Broglie's ideas as purely speculative, reinforcing the “genius myth”. In the sequence, we propose a didactic alternative, which we call a “chain of reference presentation”. In this strategy, we highlight that all scientific knowledge is supported by previous theories and it works as the ground of future scientific improvements. With this perspective, we perform a didactic derivation of de Broglie's momentum-wavelength relation (based on the original papers and on the specialized literature) and we introduce empirical and theoretical works that may be studied from it.

摘要 本文探讨了路易·德布罗意（Louis de Broglie）于1922至1924年间提出的波粒二象性（wave-particle duality）命题，以及本科物理教材中对该主题的阐述内容。在简要探讨科学实在的本质之后，我们梳理了德布罗意用以推导动量（momentum）与波长（wavelength）之间关联的核心理论、假设与研究方法。我们以这些要素作为分析范畴，考察其中哪些仍被四本主流本科物理入门教材所沿用。研究结果表明，所有教材均未采用德布罗意的原始研究策略——数学推导（mathematical derivation），而是将其观点直接作为公设进行呈现。此外，我们发现仅有极少数德布罗意原始表述中的要素被教材提及，教材将其思想视为纯粹的思辨性构想，进而强化了"天才神话"这一认知。随后，我们提出了一种教学替代方案，将其命名为参照链呈现法（chain of reference presentation）。在此方案中，我们着重阐明：所有科学知识均依托于前人的理论成果，并成为后续科学进步的基础。基于这一视角，我们结合原始论文与专业文献，对德布罗意的动量-波长关联进行了教学式推导，并介绍了可依托该关联开展研究的实证（empirical）与理论工作。