My talk at “The Origins of the Expanding Universe”
You may recall that I gave a talk recently at a meeting called The Origins of the Expanding Universe in Flagstaff, Arizona. I put the slides up here. Well, the organizers have now put videos of the presentations online so you have the chance to see mine, warts and all.
I was relieved when I saw this on Youtube that the organizers were kind enough to edit out the embarrassing bit at the start when my laptop refused to talk to the data projector and I had to swap to another one. Sorting all that out seemed to take ages, which didn’t help my frame of mind and I was even more nervous than I would have been anyway given that this was my first public appearance after a rather difficult summer. Those are my excuses for what was, frankly, not a particularly good talk. But at least I survived. Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof.
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This entry was posted on October 9, 2012 at 2:35 pm and is filed under Books, Talks and Reviews, The Universe and Stuff with tags Albert Einstein, Arthur Stanley Eddington, Eclipse, Flagstaff, general relativity, Origins of the Expanding Universe, Vesto Slipher. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
In the Dark 
October 9, 2012 at 7:17 pm
I thought it was a really interesting talk. Seeing as Nobel prizes are in the news, is there a standard answer as to why Einstein never got a one for General Relativity?
If, as you say in this talk, the eclipse results were such a media sensation, it would seem like a natural time to award it.
October 10, 2012 at 7:59 am
There’s an article about just that question here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/across-the-universe/2012/oct/08/einstein-nobel-prize-relativity
although there’s no real evidence to back up the accusation of anti-semitism.
You also have to remember that in 1919 the result was still controversial. Later, better, eclipse measurements were needed to really settle the story.
October 10, 2012 at 12:16 pm
Others have since won two Nobels for their scientific research; Einstein should have. Or was it regarded as a once-a-lifetime thing early on but not later?
October 10, 2012 at 2:07 pm
http://almaz.com/nobel/double.html
Only Bardeen won the Physics prize twice.
I agree that it Einstein should have had it for GR, but perhaps not until radio measurements had made the light bending thing incontrovertible.
October 10, 2012 at 2:46 pm
Yes, I forgot that Einstein died in 1955. Accurate radio measurements were not made until the late 60s…
October 10, 2012 at 2:47 pm
Bragg (William and Lawrence) for Physics. At the same time. Bragg junior is the youngest-ever winner of the Physics Nobel Prize.
October 10, 2012 at 3:11 pm
Neils and Aage Bohr.
October 10, 2012 at 7:02 pm
JJ Thompson and his son George both won Nobel Prizes in physics. I remember reading in my physics text book that this was a bit of a paradox because JJ won it for showing that the electron is a particle and George won it for showing that the electron is a wave.
October 11, 2012 at 9:06 am
“the prize is (normally) not awarded posthumously.”
Has there been an exception Philip? If so, that would be interesting.
October 9, 2012 at 10:00 pm
>>> when my laptop refused to talk to the data projector and I had to swap to another one.
You didn’t swap to a Mac did you? I see a little glowing apple there!
October 9, 2012 at 10:51 pm
I was forced into it.
October 11, 2012 at 7:47 am
Brilliant talk, well done!