physics
the discipline that studies fundamental matter, energy, and spacetime. historically unified under "natural philosophy," physics became its own institution in the 19th century when experiments outpaced armchair reasoning
in the crystal, physics is not a single domain — its phenomena are distributed across three:
quantum — particles, fields, quantum mechanics, relativity, electromagnetism
energo — thermodynamics, entropy, free energy, statistical mechanics
cosmo — Big Bang, galaxy, large-scale structure, spacetime
the bridges between these three domains are what physicists call "unified theories." the crystal makes those bridges explicit rather than hiding them inside one department
branches
classical mechanics → quantum (force, momentum, oscillation)
electrodynamics → quantum (fields, radiation, electromagnetism)
statistical mechanics → energo + quantum (Boltzmann, partition functions)
astrophysics → cosmo + quantum (stellar nucleosynthesis, compact objects)
condensed matter → quantum + chemo (materials, phases, semiconductors)
key figures
Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, Max Planck, Richard Feynman, Erwin Schrödinger, Ludwig Boltzmann, Nikola Tesla