I’m currently in transit to a conference in Ascona (Switzerland) so I thought I’d leave you for a while with something from the wacky and whimsical, weird and wonderful world of Ivor Cutler:
Archive for July, 2009
Astronomy or Astrophysics?
Posted in The Universe and Stuff with tags astronomy, Astrophysics, Joseph von Fraunhofer, spectroscopy, William Huggins, William Hyde Wollaston on July 25, 2009 by telescoperA chance encounter with the parent of a prospective student the other day led eventually to the question What’s the difference between Astronomy and Astrophysics? This is something I’m asked quite often so I thought I’d comment on here for those who might stumble across it. I teach a first-year course module entitled “Astrophysical Concepts”. One of the things I try to do in the first lecture is explain that difference. The Oxford English Dictionary gives the following primary definition for astronomy:
The science which treats of the constitution, relative positions, and motions of the heavenly bodies; that is, of all the bodies in the material universe outside of the earth, as well as of the earth itself in its relations to them.
Astrophysics, on the other hand, is described as
That branch of astronomy which treats of the physical or chemical properties of the celestial bodies.
So astrophysics is regarded as a subset of astronomy which is primarily concerned with understanding the properties of stars and galaxies, rather than just measuring their positions and motions. It is possible to assign a fairly precise date when astrophysics first came into use in English because, at least in the early years of the subject, it was almost exclusively associated with astronomical spectroscopy. Indeed the OED gives the following text as the first occurence of astrophysics, in 1869:
As a subject for the investigations of the astro-physicist, the examination of the luminous spectras of the heavenly bodies has proved a remarkably fruitful one
The scientific analysis of astronomical spectra began with a paper William Hyde Wollaston in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society Vol. 102, p. 378, 1802. He was the first person to notice the presence of dark bands in the optical spectrum of the Sun. These bands were subsequently analysed in great detail by Joseph von Fraunhofer in a paper published in 1814 and are now usually known as Fraunhofer lines. Technical difficulties made it impossible to obtain spectra of stars other than the Sun for a considerable time, but William Huggins finally succeeded in 1864. A drawing of his pioneering spectroscope is shown below.
Meanwhile, fundamental work by Gustav Kirchoff and Robert Bunsen had been helping to establish an understanding the spectra produced by hot gases. The identification of features in the Sun’s spectrum with similar lines produced in laboratory experiments led to a breakthrough in our understanding of the Universe whose importance shouldn’t be underestimated. The Sun and stars were inaccessible to direct experimental test during the 19th Century (as they are now). But spectroscopy now made it possible to gather evidence about their chemical composition as well as physical properties. Most importantly, spectroscopy provided definitive evidence that the Sun wasn’t made of some kind of exotic unknowable celestial material, but of the same kind of stuff (mainly Hydrogen) that could be studied on Earth. This realization opened the possibility of applying the physical understanding gained from small-scale experiments to the largest scale phenomena that could be seen. The science of astrophysics was born. One of the leading journals in which professional astronomers and astrophysicists publish their research is called the Astrophysical Journal, which was founded in 1895 and is still going strong. The central importance of the (still) young field of spectroscopy can be appreciated from the subtitle given to the journal: 
Initially the branch of physics most important to astrophysics was atomic physics since the lines in optical spectra are produced by electrons jumping between different atomic energy levels. Spectroscopy of course remains a key weapon in the astrophysicist’s arsenal but nowadays the term is taken to mean any application of physical laws to astronomical objects. Over the years, astrophysics has gradually incorporated nuclear and particle physics as well as thermodynamics, relativity and just about every other branch of physics you can think of. I realise, however, that this isn’t really the answer to the question that potential students want to ask. What they (probably) want to know is what is the difference between undergraduate courses called Astronomy and those called Astrophysics? The answer to this one depends very much on where you want to study. Generally speaking the differences are in fact quite minimal. You probably do a bit more theory in an Astrophysics course than an Astronomy course, for example. Your final-year project might have to be observational or instrumental if you do Astronomy, but might be theoretical in Astrophysics. If you compare the complete list of modules to be taken, however, the difference will be very small.
Over the last twenty years or so, most Physics departments in the United Kingdom have acquired some form of research group in astronomy or astrophysics and have started to offer undergraduate degrees with some astronomical or astrophysical content. My only advice to prospective students wanting to find which course is for them is to look at the list of modules and projects likely to be offered. You’re unlikely to find the name of the course itself to be very helpful in making a choice. One of the things that drew me into astrophysics as a discipline (my current position is Professor of Theoretical Astrophysics) is that it involves such a wide range of techniques and applications, putting apparently esoteric things together in interesting ways to develop a theoretical understanding of a complicated phenomenon. I only had a very limited opportunity to study astrophysics during my first degree as I specialised in Theoretical Physics. This wasn’t just a feature of Cambridge. The attitude in most Universities in those days was that you had to learn all the physics before applying it to astronomy. Over the years this has changed, and most departments offer some astronomy right from Year 1. I think this change has been for the better because I think the astronomical setting provides a very exciting context to learn physics. If you want to understand, say, the structure of the Sun you have to include atomic physics, nuclear physics, gravity, thermodynamics, radiative transfer and hydrostatics all at the same time. This sort of thing makes astrophysics a good subject for developing synthetic skills while more traditional physics teaching focusses almost exclusively on analytical skills. Indeed, my first-year Astrophysical Concepts course is really a course about modelling and problem-solving in physics.
Follow @telescoperGoing Forward
Posted in Uncategorized with tags BBC, STFC, Times Higher, Wakeham Review on July 22, 2009 by telescoperSince I’ve recently been officially awarded the title of Grumpy Old Man, I now feel I have the necessary authorization to vent my spleen about anything and everything that really irritates me.
This morning I got my regular monthly credit card statement, something likely to put me in a bad mood at the best of times. However, at the end of the itemized list of payments, I found the following:
WE ARE PHASING OUT CREDIT CARD CHEQUES. GOING FORWARD WE WILL NO LONGER ISSUE ANY CREDIT CARD CHEQUES.
I don’t actually care about the credit card cheques – they’re a ridiculously bad way of paying for things anyway – but what on Earth is the phrase going forward doing in that sentence?
I’ve taken a swipe at this monster once before, when I blogged about the Wakeham Review of Physics. The example I found then was
The STFC’s governance structure must be representative of the community it serves in order to gain stakeholders’ confidence going forward.
Aaargggh!!
Going forward is one of those intensely annoying bits of office-speak that have spread like Swine ‘flu into the public domain. Pushing the envelope is another one. What does it mean? Why would anyone push an envelope?
Anyway, the worst problem with going forward is that it is now used almost universally in official documents instead of more suitable phrases, such as in future, or from now on. What particularly irritates me about it is that it is usually part of an attempt to present things in a positive light even when they clearly don’t involve any forward movement at all; often, in fact, quite the opposite. It is just one symptom of the insidious culture of spin that seems to be engulfing all aspects of public life, making it impossible to deliver even a simple message without wrapping it up in some pathetic bit of PR. Any kind of change – whether or not there’s any reason for it, and whether or not it improves anything – has to be portrayed as progress. It drives me nuts!
This sort of language is frequently lampooned by Laurie Taylor in his brilliant weekly column for the Times Higher. The Director of Corporate Affairs for the fictional Poppleton University, Mr Jamie Targett, contributes regularly to his column, always in meaningless business-oriented gibberish of this type. In fact, shortly after reading the Wakeham Review quoted above, I sent a letter to the Times Higher (which was published there) accusing Jamie Targett of moonlighting from his job at Poppleton to work on the Wakeham Report.
In the case of my credit card cheques, the implication is that the withdrawal of the service represents some sort of progress. In fact, it’s just to save money. A friend of mine who uses a local gym told me today that the gym had recently announced that
Going forward, members of the gym will no longer be supplied with free towels.
They went on to portray this as a great leap forward in caring for the environment, but in fact it is obviously just a way of saving their costs. Likewise with a sentence I found in a railway timetable recently:
Going forward the 8.15 train from Paddington will no longer call at Didcot Parkway
At least it’s still going to call at Didcot when it’s going backwards, which is the obvious implication of this sentence.
I’m glad I’m not alone in my disapproval of going forward. A year or so ago there was an article on the BBC website making much the same point. However, the amount of going forward has continued to increase. Robert Peston, the BBC business editor, once managed three going forwards in a four minute item on the Today programme.
The Science and Technology Facilities Council has obviously taken this phrase to heart. Their website is chock-a-block with going forward. Here’s an example (referring to a budget cut)
It will result in an approximately constant volume of project activity going forward ..
Obviously, once you start going forward there’s no going back, even if what lies in front of you is financial catastrophe…
PS. Feel free to add your own pet hates via the comments box going forward.
Cricketing Clerihews
Posted in Cricket with tags Clerihew on July 22, 2009 by telescoperUndaunted by the ructions caused by my previous attempt (now removed) to have a bit of fun by posting a few clerihews, I’ve decided to try again but this time the target is cricketers.
Please keep them polite, unless they’re about Australians. Bonus points to anyone who manages one about Ben Hilfenhaus. Here are a few to get you started:
If you see Nathan Hauritz
Starting to glower, it’s
Because a humdinger
Hit his right index finger
Andrew Flintoff
Was man-of-the-match by dint of
Some excellent bowling
Well worth extolling
Peter Siddle
Went for a piddle
And when he came back
He’d quite lost the knack
Alastair Cook
Likes to go for the hook
But when it’s more full
He goes for the pull
Andrew Strauss
May have raised a few doubts:
It was well worth a shout
But should have been “not out”..
Michael Clarke
Batted well in the dark
But looked like a chump
When he lost his off stump
Michael Hussey
Is not very fussy
Whether he edges or nicks
Or just wallops for six
Philip Hughes
Can never refuse
An offside dab
That the slips might just grab
Marcus North
Bravely marched forth
To face the England attack
But very soon marched back
Graham Onions
Bowls like he has bunions
But let there be – please –
A bowler called Cheese
In a Galaxy, Faraday…
Posted in The Universe and Stuff with tags Faraday Rotation, Galactic Magnetic Field, Milky Way, Orion Spur, Spiral Arms on July 21, 2009 by telescoperI was finishing off the draft of a paper the other day and remembered a little paper I did some time ago with a former PhD student of mine, Patrick Dineen. I thought it would be fun to put the pictures up here because it was one of those occasions when a little idea turns out much nicer than you expected…
What we had to start with was a collection of Faraday Rotation measurements of extragalactic radio sources dotted around the sky. Their distribution is fairly uniform but I hasten to add that it was not a controlled sample so it would be not possible to take the sources as representative of anything for statistical purposes.
Faraday rotation occurs because left and right-handed polarizations of electromagnetic radiation travel at different speeds along a magnetic field line. The effect of this is for the polarization vector to be rotated as light waves travel and the net rotation angle (which can be either positive or negative) is related to the line integral of the component of the magnetic field along the line of sight travelled by the waves. The picture below shows the distribution of sources, plotted in Galactic coordinates and coded black for negative and white for positive.
Some radio galaxies have enormously large Faraday rotation measures because light reaches us through regions of the source that have strong magnetic fields. However, for most sources in our sample the rotation measures are smaller and are thought to be determined largely by the propagation of light not through the emitting galaxy, near the start of its journey towards us, but through our own Galaxy, the Milky Way, which is near the end of its path.
If this is true then the distribution of rotation measures across the sky should contain information about the magnetic field distribution inside our own Galaxy. Looking at the above picture doesn’t give much of a hint of what this structure might be, however.
What Patrick and I decided to do was to try to make a map of the rotation measure distribution across the sky based only on the information given at the positions where we had radio sources. This is like looking at the sky through a mask full of little holes at the source positions. Using a nifty (but actually rather simple) trick of decomposing into spherical harmonics and transforming to a new set of functions that are orthogonal on the masked sky we obtained the following map:
(The technical details are in the paper, if you’re interested.) You probably think it looks a bit ropey but, as far as I’m concerned, this turned out stunningly well. The most obvious features are a big blue blob to the left and a big red blob to the right, both in the Galactic plane. What you’re seeing in those regions is almost certainly the local spur (sometimes called the Orion Spur; see below), which is a small piece of spiral arm in which the local Galactic magnetic field is confined. The blobs show the field coming towards the observer on one side and receding on the other. The structure seen is relatively local, i.e. within a kiloparsec or so of the observer.
I was very pleased to see this come out so clearly from an apparently unpromising data set, although we had to confine ourselves to large-scale features because of instabilities in the reconstruction of high-frequency components.
On the Third Day..
Posted in Cricket with tags Ashes, cricket, Lord's on July 19, 2009 by telescoperFollowing on from my previous posts (here and here) about the First Ashes Test in Cardiff, I can’t help adding a quick post about my visit to Lord’s yesterday (Saturday) to see the third day’s play at the Second Ashes Test.
The circumstances of the day’s play were a bit different to those at Cardiff, to say the least. On the first day England had batted first, starting in great style but then surrending some silly wickets. At the end of day 1 England were 364-6 with Strauss unbeaten on 161, the total score not being dissimilar to that on the first day at Cardiff. On day 2 Strauss was out almost immediately and it looked like it was going to be a disappointing day for England. But the last pair added 47 runs and England got to 425 all out. When the Austalians batted, however, England took control of the game, reducing them to 156-8 by the end of Day 2. I don’t know what got into the Ozzies on Friday but most of them lost their wickets to daft shots rather than good bowling. Perhaps it was nerves.
I arrived at Lord’s on Saturday morning, about 9.15. I have been to Lord’s a few times before but not recently and never as the guest of a member of the MCC (Anton). I joined the lengthy queue for member’s guests but made it into the ground in good time to find seats in the Warner Stand (next to the Pavilion) and then have a look around the cricket museum (where the Ashes themselves are on display).
It was a considerably posher occasion than Cardiff, with MCC ties, blazers and other paraphernalia on display. Picnic hampers were in evidence around the enclosure and champagne corks popped at regularly intervals. I contented myself, however, with lager and a bacon butty from the bar behind the stand.
Before the start of play the talk around the crowd was all about knocking over the last two Australian batsmen quickly and then enforcing the follow on. (If the team batting second doesn’t get within 200 runs of the team batting first then they can be required to bat again by the captain of the other team, which is called “following on”.) As it happened the tailenders clung on doggedly and it looked for a while they would close in on the 225 runs needed to avoid the follow-on. However, the last two wickets did eventually fall for a total of 215, leaving a deficit of 210 runs. England could have asked Australia to bat again but, to the consternation of most of the crowd, the England captain Andrew Strauss declined to enforce the follow-on.
There are pros and cons making a team follow on. One of the pros is that it maintains the momentum of the bowling performance. One of the cons is that the bowlers have already bowled an entire innings and have to do the same again almost immediately. They might be a bit tired, which could hand the advantage to the batting side if they can avoid losing early wickets. If the Australian batsmen had scored well after following on then England might also have needed to bat last on a pitch that may have started to break up. Batting last in a Test match is usually quite difficult.
I think Strauss is quite a cautious man and I think he decided that Australia’s strong batting display at Cardiff was enough evidence of ability for him not to want to risk them posting a huge second-innings score. England’s brittle second-innings batting performance at Cardiff provided further reason for not wanting to get into a run chase.
Strauss obviously wants to win the game but he also won’t want to lose it from this position. Test cricket isn’t just win-or-lose: there is also a third possibility, a draw (like at Cardiff). Often the biggest chance of winning a game is to give the side batting last a target that they might try to chase in risky fashion and get bowled out. However, if the batting side are good they might actually get the runs. Too big a target and they won’t be tempted to go for it, too small and they might well reach it. Maximizing the probability of winning does not miminize the probability of losing in this situation. If England simply didn’t want to lose they would bat out time, accumulate a huge total and give Australia insufficient time to make the runs. England might still win in such a strategy but a draw becomes much more probable.
It was clearly Strauss’ judgement was that England needed more runs but he wanted to get them quickly enough to declare and try to force a result in the two remaining days. The England batsmen came out just before lunch to try to push on to a huge lead. They started very brightly but unfortunately both openers Strauss and Cook were out shortly after lunch. There then followed a very turgid couple of hours when Pietersen and Bopara struggled to score runs. Pietersen, usually a prolific hitter, apeared to be struggling with his Achilles injury while Bopara is clearly out of touch at this level. Both batsmen scratched around unconvincingly for most of the session and then got themselves out.
At 174-4 it was looking like another collapse might be on the cards and the Australians might have to chase a total under about 400, which appeared to me to be eminently achievable with two full days play available after Saturday. However, Collingwood and (especially) Prior batted superbly well together taking the score to 260-5 and then Flintoff and Collingwood carried it onto 311 before Collingwood was out.
Many members of the crowd were screaming for a declaration now, but the weather intervened. It had been getting very dark for some time and finally started raining about 6.30. The umpires called off play for the day with England at 311-6, a lead of 521 with two days left to play, a good position to be in by any standards.
Unless the weather turns very bad over the next two days then it seems to me a draw is a very unlikely possibility now. If England declare overnight and Australia can bat for two days they will score enough runs to win the game, but in doing so they will have to surpass by some margin the highest ever total reached in the last innings to win a Test match. Frankly, if they can do that they deserve to win! On the other hand, England have plenty of time to bowl them out even if a bit is lost to the weather. I actually think Strauss’ decision to bat again was probably a good one and I think he should carry on batting tomorrow to get another 100 runs or so. There will still be time to bowl out the Ozzies, but the chance of them scoring enough to win the game is smaller.
I left the ground and walked to Paddington to get the train back to Cardiff and was home by 10pm. A very satisfactory day.
Postscript. I just looked at the scorecard of today’s play (Sunday) before posting this. England declared their innings closed on 311-6 and Australia went into bat this morning. At lunch they were 76-2. The odds are in favour of England winning, but Ponting is still in. It’s nicely poised.
Everyone’s Gone to the Moon
Posted in Uncategorized with tags Apollo 11, European Space Agency, Manned Space Exploration, Moon, NASA on July 16, 2009 by telescoper
Since the media have been banging on about it all week, as have various other bloggers, I suppose I should at least mention that today (16th July 2009) is the fortieth anniversary of the launch of NASA’s Apollo 11 mission which put the first man on the Moon. I’m reliably informed that the picture on the left shows the second man on the Moon, Buzz Aldrin, although I don’t think the costume gives much clue to the identity of the wearer.
My response to the media furore is muted because I’m decidedly ambivalent about the whole business of manned space exploration. I’m not going to be churlish and say that all the Apollo missions did was provide America with a much-needed propaganda victory during the Cold War. I think it’s true that putting a man on the Moon was a great achievement in terms of ingenuity and organization. It’s probably also true that it inspired many people to go into science who otherwise wouldn’t have done so. I’d even say that the sight of Earth from the Moon marked the beginning of a new age of awareness of the fragility of our own existence on our home planet and, perhaps even a step towards our coming-of-age as a species.
The reason I am ambivalent, however, is that the scientific returns from the Apollo missions were entirely negligible, at least in terms of value for money, partly because the Apollo missions weren’t really designed to do science in the first place and partly because the Moon just isn’t very interesting…
Mankind hasn’t returned to the Moon since the Apollo series came to an end. That’s not a matter for regret, just a reflection of the fact that there isn’t much to be found there. In those forty years astronomy and space science have moved on immeasurably through spaceborne observatories and unmanned probes. We have learned far more about the Universe those ways than could ever be achieved by sending a few people to collect rocks from a dull piece of rubble in our backyard. In the process, the Universe has grown in size relative to the scale possible to reach by human engineering projects. The last forty years has shown us that, in retrospect, going to the Moon wasn’t really all that impressive compared to what we can find out by remote means.
Unfortunately there appears to be an increasingly vocal lobby in favour of diverting funds from fundamental science into manned space exploration, much of it aimed at the goal of putting a person on Mars. This has not yet resulted in a commitment by the United Kingdom government to join in manned space exploration, but it is worrying that the Chief Executive of the Science & Technology Facilities Council is a failed astronaut who I fear sees this as an attractive option. Even more worryingly, Science Minister Lord Drayson seems to be keen too. It’s up to scientists to present the case to government for maintaining investment in fundamental science and against having the budget plundered to play Star Trek.
The European Space Agency‘s Aurora programme is intended to culminate with a manned trip to Mars, at an overall cost of over £30 billion. One of the arguments I hear over and over again in favour of this programme is that it will inspire young people to take up science, especially physics. Well, maybe. But people can’t become scientists unless they have the opportunity to learn science at School and there is a drastic shortage of physics teachers these days. What’s the point of being inspired if you can’t get the education anyway? You could train an awful lot of school teachers for a small fraction of the Aurora budget. And what’s the point of inspiring people to take up astronomy and space science when you’re also busy slashing the budget for research and ending the careers of those excellent scientists we’ve already got?
So by all means let’s celebrate the marvellous achievements of 1969, but let’s move on and not pretend that there is any good scientific reason for repeating them.
Oratorio
Posted in Biographical, The Universe and Stuff with tags Nobel Prize for Physics 1957, Tsung Dao Lee, University of Nottingham on July 16, 2009 by telescoper
Blogging about graduation ceremonies yesterday, I was reminded that a few years ago I had to deliver an oration on behalf of a very famous physicist who was awarded an honorary doctorate at the University of Nottingham. The recipient was TD Lee (shown left) who, together with CN Yang, won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1957 for his work on parity violation. I thought you might find it interesting to read the text of the oration, which I just found on my laptop this morning:
PROFESSOR TSUNG-DAO LEE
ORATION DELIVERED BY PROFESSOR PETER COLES
ON MONDAY 17 JULY 2006
Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, Ladies and Gentlemen, it is both a pleasure and a privilege to present Professor Tsung-Dao Lee for the award of an honorary degree. Professor Lee is a distinguished theoretical physicist whose work over many years has been characterized, in the words of Dr J Robert Oppenheimer, by “a remarkable freshness, versatility and style.”
Tsung-Dao Lee was born in Shanghai and educated at Suzhou University Middle School in Shanghai. Fleeing the Japanese invasion, he left Shanghai in 1941. His education was interrupted by war. In 1945 he entered the National Southwest University in Kunming as a sophomore. He was soon recognized as an outstanding young scientist and in 1946 was awarded a Chinese Government Scholarship enabling him to start a PhD in Physics under Professor Enrico Fermi at the University of Chicago. He gained his doctorate in physics in 1950 with a thesis on the Hydrogen Content of White Dwarf Stars, and subsequently served as a research associate at the Yerkes Astronomical Observatory of the University of Chicago in Williams Bay, Wisconsin.
Astronomy is a science that concerns the very large, but it was in the physics of the very small that Professor Lee was to do his most famous work. After one year as a research associate and lecturer at the University of California in Berkeley, he became a fellow of the Institute of Advanced Study in Princeton and, in 1953, he accepted an assistant professorship position at Columbia University in New York. Two and a half years later, he became the youngest full professor in the history of Columbia University. During this time he often collaborated with Chen Ning Yang whom he had known as a fellow student in Chicago. In 1956 they co-authored a paper whose impact was both immediate and profound. Only a year later, Lee and Yang were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics. Professor Lee was thirty-one at the time and was the second youngest scientist ever to receive this distinction. (The youngest was Sir Lawrence Bragg who shared the Physics Prize with his father in 1915, at the age of twenty-five.)
It is usually difficult to explain the ideas of theoretical physics to non-experts. The mathematical language is inaccessible to those without specialist training. But some of the greatest achievements in this field are so bold and so original that they appear, at least with hindsight, to be astonishingly simple. The work of Lee and Yang on parity violation in elementary particle interactions is an outstanding example.
Subatomic particles interact with each other in very complicated ways. In high energy collisions, particles can be scattered, destroyed or transformed into other particles. But governing these changes are universal rules involving things that never change. The existence of these conservation laws is a manifestation of the symmetries possessed by the mathematical theory of particle interactions.
Lee and Yang focussed on a particular attribute called parity, which relates to the “handedness” of a particle and symmetry with respect to mirror reflections. Physicists had previously assumed that the laws of nature do not distinguish between left- and right-handed states: a left-handed object when seen in a mirror should be indistinguishable from a right-handed one. This symmetry suggests that parity should be conserved in particle interactions, as it is in many other physical processes. Unfortunately this chain of thought led to a puzzling deadlock in our understanding of the so-called weak nuclear interaction. Lee and Yang made the revolutionary suggestion that parity is not conserved in weak interactions and consequently that the laws of nature must have a built-in handedness. A year later their theory was tested experimentally and found to be correct. Their penetrating insight led to a radical overhaul of the theory of weak interactions and to many further discoveries. Physicists around the world said “Of course! Why didn’t I think of that?”
This classic “Eureka moment” happened half a century ago, but Professor Lee has since made a host of equally distinguished contributions to fields as diverse as astrophysics, statistical mechanics, field theory and turbulence. He was made Enrico Fermi Professor at Columbia in 1964 and University Professor there in 1984. With typical energy and enthusiasm he took up the post of director of the RIKEN Research Center at Brookhaven National Laboratories in 1998. He has played a prominent role in the advancement of science in China, including roles as director of physics institutes in Beijing and Zhejiang.
Professor Lee has received numerous awards and honours from around the world, including the Albert Einstein Award in Science, the Bude Medal, the Galileo Galilei Medal, the Order of Merit, Grande Ufficiale of Italy, the Science for Peace Prize, the China National-International Cooperation Award, the New York City Science Award, the Pope Joannes Paulis Medal, Il Ministero dell’Interno Medal of the Government of Italy and the New York Academy of Sciences Award. His recognition even extends beyond this world, for in 1997 Small Planet 3443 was named in his honour.
Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, to you and to the whole congregation I present Professor Tsung-Dao Lee as eminently worthy to receive the degree of Doctor of Science, honoris causa.
Graduandi Graduati
Posted in Biographical with tags Cardiff University, Graduation, University of Nottingham, University of Sussex on July 15, 2009 by telescoperToday was the day of the graduation ceremony for Cardiff University‘s School of Physics & Astronomy, which took place in the fine surroundings of St David’s Hall. It’s a proud day for the students and their parents so, before anything else, let me offer my congratulations to all those who graduated today. Congratulations and well done to you all!
I put on my robes in the Green Room and was in the academic staff procession at the beginning and end of the ceremony. I also sat on stage during the conferment of degrees and the speech by the University’s President, Lord Kinnock. Some of the proceedings were conducted in Welsh – including the actual degree award – but it was comprehensible enough for all foreigners (even the English) to follow what was going on.
Graduation ceremonies are funny things. With all their costumes and weird traditions, they do seem a bit absurd. On the other hand, even in these modern times, we live with all kinds of rituals and I don’t see why we shouldn’t celebrate academic achievement in this way.
Graduation is a grammatical phenomenon too. The word “graduation” is derived from the latin word gradus meaning a step, from which was eventually made the mediaeval latin verb graduare, meaning to take a degree. The past participle of this is formed via the supine graduatus, hence the English noun “graduate” (i.e. one who has taken a degree). The word graduand, on the other hand, which is used before and during the ceremony to describe those about to graduate is from the gerundive form graduandus meaning “to be graduated”. What really happens, therefore, is that students swap their gerundives for participles, although I suspect most participants don’t think of it in quite those terms…
The academic procession is quite colourful because staff wear the gown appropriate to their highest degree. Colours and styles vary greatly from one University to another even within the United Kingdom, and there are even more variations on show when schools contain staff who got their degrees abroad. Since I got my doctorate from the University of Sussex, which was created in the 1960s, the academic garb I have to wear on these occasions is actually quite modern-looking. With its raised collar, red ribbons and capped shoulders it’s also more than a little bit camp. It often brings a few comments when I’m in the procession, but I usually reply by saying I bought the outfit at Ann Summers.
Graduation of course isn’t just about education. It’s also a rite of passage on the way to adulthood and independence, so the presence of the parents at the ceremony adds another emotional dimension to the goings-on. Although everyone is rightly proud of the achievement – either their own in the case of the graduands or that of others in the case of the guests – there’s also a bit of sadness to go with the goodbyes. The new graduates were invited back to the School for a reception after this morning’s ceremony, along with parents and friends. That provided a more informal opportunity to say goodbye. Some, of course, are continuing their studies either at Cardiff or elsewhere so I’ll be seeing at least some of them again.
Although this was my first attendance at the Cardiff University graduation, I’ve been to graduation ceremonies at several universities as a staff member. They differ in detail but largely follow the same basic format. Compared to others I’ve been at, the Cardiff version is very friendly and rather informal. For one thing, the Vice-Chancellor actually shakes hands with all the graduands as they cross the stage. At Nottingham University, for example, where I was before moving here, the V-C just sat there reading a book and occasionally nodded as they trooped across in front of him.
The venue for Cardiff’s graduation is also right in the city centre, so all day you can find students in their regalia wandering through the town (sometimes with their doting parents in tow). I like this a lot because it gives the University a much greater sense of belonging to the city than is the case when everything happens on a campus miles out of town.
The most remarkable thing I noticed in the ceremony was not to do with Physics & Astronomy, but with Cardiff’s School of Psychology which is much larger and in which at least 90% of the graduates were female. In our School the proportions aren’t exactly reversed but are about 75% male to 25% female.
I’ve also been through two graduations on the other side of the fence, as it were. My first degree came from Cambridge so I had to participate in the even more archaic ceremony for that institution. The whole thing is done in Latin there (or was when I graduated) and involves each graduand holding a finger held out by their College’s Praelector and then kneeling down in front of the presiding dignitary, who is either the Vice-Chancellor ot the Chancellor. I can’t remember which. It’s also worth mentioning that although I did Natural Sciences (specialising in Theoretical Physics), the degree I got was Bachelor of Arts. Other than that, and the fact that the graduands walk to the Senate House from their College through the streets of Cambridge, I don’t remember much about actual ceremony.
I was very nervous for my first graduation. The reason was that my parents had divorced some years before and my Mum had re-married. My Dad wouldn’t speak to her or her second husband. Immediately after the ceremony there was a garden party at my college, Magdalene, at which the two parts of my family occupied positions at opposite corners of the lawn and I scuttled between them trying to keep everyone happy. It was like that for the rest of the day and I have to say it was very stressful.
A few years later I got my doctorate (actually DPhil) from the University of Sussex. The ceremony in that case was in the Brighton Centre on the seafront. It was pretty much the same deal again with the warring factions, but I enjoyed the whole day a lot more that time. And I got the gown.
For the Cosmonauts
Posted in Poetry, The Universe and Stuff with tags Meirion Jordan, Moonrise on July 15, 2009 by telescoperLast week I bought a copy of Moonrise, a collection of poems by Meirion Jordan. He was born in Swansea and read Mathematics at Somerville College, Oxford. His poems, which often deal with themes inspired by science, are sometimes witty or satirical and sometimes simply a bit wild. They’re also beautifully composed, with a very natural structure and playful use of language.
I wanted to give his book a bit of a plug so here he is on Youtube reading For the Cosmonauts, which one of two pieces comprising the Epilogue to his book. This is the text
I, Yuri Gagarin, having not seen God,
wake now to the scrollwork of a body,
to my own white fibres leafing into the bone:
know that beyond this dome of rain there is
only the nothing where the soul sweers
out its parallax like a distant star and truth
brightens to X, to gamma, through a metal sail.
So I return to you, cramming your pockets
with the atmosphere and the evening news,
fumbling for gardens in the moon’s shadow,
in its waterfalls of silence. I wish for you
familiar towns, their piers and amusement arcades
unpeopled at dusk, the unicorn tumbling by
on china hooves behind the high walls
of parks, among congregating lamps.
May you find Earth rising there, between
your steepled hands. May your voyages
end. May you have a cold unfurling
of limbs each morning, when I am fallen
out of the world.
Here is the poet himself reading it
You can order the book directly from the publisher by clicking on the link above.
In the Dark 