Juan Queijo Olano

At the beginning of the new century in Uruguay, evidence can be found of some significant transformations in the study of Physics at Udelar. Firstly, the separation of the treatments of some physics problems, such as electricity, from those philosophical traditions that were part of the development of the discipline in the nineteenth century, is definitive. Secondly, it is not difficult to define the study of physics from a series of problems that characterized its own identity, which several professors began to take an interest in. Undoubtedly this coincides with those great milestones in the History of Physics, those related to the definition of thermodynamics, advances in knowledge of atomic structure, and of course, everything related to the theory of relativity.

To reconstruct the History of Physics in Uruguay, it is unavoidable to take as a reference the creation of the University of the Republic (Udelar), in 1849. This is important because this creation occurs almost parallel to the national construction of the Uruguayan state, in 1830. This leads the historical studies of science and knowledge in Uruguay to show the presence of its only university (this was the case until the end of the twentieth century) as the main space where the disciplinary development of the sciences took place. In the nineteenth century, certain attempts to insert a discipline such as physics—still not very autonomous in the world—constantly failed in the dispute to place the natural sciences at the very heart of the educational institution. This presents a double difficulty for this type of research: on the one hand, the difficult acceptance of the role that the natural sciences could play in the construction of a national ruling elite, since the first purpose of the Universidad Mayor de Montevideo was the formation of a ruling class for the nascent state (mainly this formation was thought in jurisprudence, which was the branch cultivated par excellence in the first century of existence of the University); and on the other hand, it becomes problematic to recognize the isolated attempts of certain actors who sought to convince and carry out some concrete experiences of scientific training.

The first ten years following the end of the Second World War marked significant economic growth for Uruguay. The economy, based on import substitution, allowed the country to continue, albeit in a much more modest tone, some of the reformist advances outlined at the beginning of the twentieth century, and during this period the industrialization process in Uruguay showed some progress. In the political context, the political division between the two historical parties was still maintained: a Colorado Party that traditionally summarized the forces of the capital; its traditional adversary being the National Party, historically representative of the forces of the countryside and the interior of the country. This dichotomy established between the two parties also characterized a duality in the country models they represented, a duality that had always found the Colorado Party victorious, but by 1958 showed a substantive shift not only in the governing forces, but in the general climate of the country. It was after the victory of a leader like Benito Nardone that the National Party managed to reach the Government, and with his arrival in power, a focus on traditionalist and neoliberal ideas was affirmed in the country that led, over the next decade, to a significant increase in state authoritarianism and violent civil response. The sixties were a decade in which Uruguay was not exempt from what was happening on the continent, where an increase, year after year, of social positions marked by radicalism manifested in constant confrontations and which would trigger the Coup d’Etat by the military forces in 1973.

From a comparative perspective, the creation of the Faculties of Medicine (1875) and Mathematics (1888), which will contemplate in their teaching some aspects of physics, may seem a path towards the autonomy of the discipline. In a way, the canonical bibliography on the history of Udelar seems to want to show that the reforms promoted by Alfredo Vázquez Acevedo led to transformations that, among other things, sought to adapt “to the scientific progress of the time.” On the other hand, Blanca Paris characterizes the same period using expressions from Eduardo Acevedo:In this way, it is often argued that Uruguay and its university would have entered a stage reigned by “scientism”, as material resources were provided to strengthen physics or chemistry courses, with appropriate equipment to accompany teaching. While this can be analyzed in a general and very simplistic way as a transformation of the university turned towards a better attention to scientific knowledge, such transformation does not enclose what essentially defines scientific universities. And the distinctive element is that, despite the resources poured, the ultimate concern was in the teaching of the student, and not in research. It is paradoxical to see how, in the same historical period, in Germany the concern was centered on the need for the state to allocate its resources towards laboratories and institutes so that, precisely, they do not limit themselves to the function of teaching. But while spaces dedicated to research in these new faculties created are not recognized, a closer look allows us to recognize academic trajectories where there is a different concern regarding the teaching function reduced to its pedagogical function.

This history of physics from Uruguay encourages two types of reflections, connected but not necessarily the same. The first one allows us to think about what we can and should understand under the label of Physics, within the set of knowledge, practices and possibilities that were established in this country and the region. The second reflection has to do with that more properly philosophical question, the one that underlies every deep analysis that is provoked from the philosophy of science: what is or should we understand by science? If we argue that both dimensions are intimately connected it is because we are guided by the thought that was reflected in the introduction, reduced in Goethe’s phrase: “the history of science is science itself”.

The theory of relativity has produced countless works of various magnitude, scope, and themes. The history of science and the philosophy of science of the twentieth century cannot ignore the impact of the Einsteinian theory, whether to praise its revolutionary character or to highlight its inconsistencies and problematic nuances. This chapter aims to show the context that awakens the reception of the theory in the different spheres of scientific and philosophical cultures. This type of studies, which have spread throughout the world, marks the different impacts that the theory had on various academic communities, mainly in the communities of engineers, mathematicians, biologists, and, of course, philosophers. In the Uruguayan case, it is intended to account, above all, for the immense complexity that it meant to assume, understand and work on the new Einsteinian physics, which posed a challenge in several dimensions. First, we can highlight the intrinsic complexity of the general theory, a work that sought to generalize the results obtained by Einstein in 1905, when he published his series of articles among which the theory of special relativity appears. This means something very simple, those who approach general relativity from its confirmation by the experiments carried out by Edington in 1919, generally ignore the entire history of development, finding themselves from one day to the next before a new possibility of explaining the principles of physics that is extremely abstruse. Secondly, the new Einsteinian theory required a series of knowledge that involved disciplines that, except in a few advanced spaces, remained separate. The construction of this general framework in which the theory resides, a framework built by Einstein’s genius, was difficult to incorporate within the academic traditions of the time. And this difficulty was increased in the situation of countries like Uruguay, where-as we saw-scientific development was almost nil. Thirdly, there have been everywhere a series of philosophical readings on what the new relativity proposed, which established dialogues and proposed readings that managed to settle in academic communities, despite not always being entirely correct or fully accurate in their interpretation. From the empiricism of Mach to a vitalist existentialism like that of Bergson, philosophy was a recognized interpreter in various contexts, especially in those where the scientific specialization required to understand the new great scientific milestone was not yet fully developed. This last form of reception, with a central role in philosophy, seems to have played an important role in Uruguay if we consider the role played by Carlos Vaz Ferreira during the visit of Einstein to Montevideo, one of the most prestigious intellectuals of the country.

As mentioned in the previous chapter, the institutional development of physics in the Faculty of Engineering and Related Branches is associated with the name of Walter S. Hill. From his entry as Head of Physics Laboratory, to the transformation of the laboratory into an Institute in 1941, his vision of physics was the vision that developed the Institute and the Udelar. As is made clear in another work, this conception of physics is very tied to the function of the laboratory as a space that went far beyond mere teaching. As an example, we can take the article he published in 1940 in the Anais da Academia Brasileira de Ciências, titled “Absorption of fluorescence light by the fluorescent liquid” (Hill 1940). The first works that could be developed in Uruguayan laboratories, with scarce instrumental and input capacities, aimed primarily at the pedagogical work in a very specific way: teaching from the replication of experiments. These first steps in the laboratory of the Faculty of Engineering, which brought together professors, assistants, and students in the challenge of verifying results obtained elsewhere, were the first form of connection with the international world of physics. These practices oriented towards the replication of experiments had a lot to do with the material possibilities at this initial stage, marked by the lack of resources but also with the expectation of scientific development in contact with some developments that were practiced in the world. Following the example taken from the referred article, the theme of the absorption of light in fluorescent environments coincides with the studies on cathode rays that at the time led the French chemist Jean Perrin to win the Nobel Prize. That is to say, even though the exercise was not of intellectual creation, using the laboratory for the experimental training of students was also a way to stay updated on the problems that arose and appeared in the international bibliography.

This book offers the hitherto unknown history of physics in Uruguay. To describe this history, it is necessary to take a broader view of the first Latin American attempts at research in physics. These first researchers dedicated to the understanding of physics received the "giants" achievements of the discipline from Europe or the United States, but all they could do was find ways to preserve most of this knowledge. Thus, instead of thinking of science as an international enterprise in which all members participate with the same goal of looking far ahead, this book reflects on the real circumstances of Uruguayan and Latin American scientists, who were willing to become part of the international communities, but did not have the proper training, resources and cultural support to do so. That's why the history contained in this book is mixed with some philosophical problems about the real nature of the practice of physics and science in general. The mainstream definitions of scientific activity, or the proper concept of science should be adapted to material conditions and different kinds of aims and proposals. This book explores, based on the history of physics in Uruguay and Latin America, new standards of "the scientific" itself, making it of great interest to historians and philosophers of science and those interested in the history of Latin America and Uruguay in particular.