March 2009
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Dyson disturbs
In school, Freeman Dyson became one of my heroes when I read his first memoir, Disturbing the Universe. It was an incredibly honor to meet him when he came to speak at my school — one of the advantages to growing up in New Jersey. He wrote and talked movingly of war, peace, science, books,…
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In the Beginning
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Last week, I participated in the Dana Centre‘s Big Ideas series, an evening called “In the Beginning“. Former Imperial postgrad Kate Land and I gave the standard cosmology spiel, philosopher of science Roman Frigg took his remit to discuss science and religion very seriously, and Chris Lintott acted as master of ceremonies (and took charge…
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Blogrolling
Thanks to The Telegraph‘s digital chief, Ian Douglas, for his pointer to me as one of “Five Great Physics Blogs“. Despite its usually, erm, detestable politics, The Telegraph has usually had excellent science and technology coverage, and I’m happy to be picked in such good company: the four other blogs are Peter Coles’ In the…
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Ada Lovelace Day — Henrietta Leavitt
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Today is Ada Lovelace Day, “an international day of blogging to draw attention to women excelling in technology.” I — along with more than a thousand other people — have pledged to write about a female role model in technology. Ada Lovelace was Byron’s daughter and worked with computer pioneer Charles Babbage on his “Computing…
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The Measurement Problem
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OK, this is going to be a very long post. About something I don’t pretend to be expert in. But it is science, at least. A couple of weeks ago, Radio 4’s highbrow “In Our Time” tackled the so-called “Measurement Problem”. That is: quantum mechanics predicts probabilities, not definite outcomes. And yet we see a…
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Infinite Jest
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It took me a few months, but I finally finished (the late) David Foster Wallace‘s Infinite Jest. I enjoyed the writing, and found the stories of the main characters — Gately and Hal — affecting and moving, studies of sinking into and struggling out of various addictions. This was a writer, it seemed, who saw…
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Doctor Atomic
I went to see and hear John Adams’ recent opera Doctor Atomic at the ENO last night. One of my physicist-companions was my friend, fellow blogger and cosmologist Peter Coles, and he has already applied his greater musical knowledge to the task, so I won’t attempt an overall review. In short, Doctor Atomic is the…
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