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Posts by: James Dacey
Research galore in Singapore
By James Dacey
The Helix Bridge in Singapore. (Courtesy: iStockphoto/TommL)
Despite its modest size, the city-state of Singapore is clearly an ambitious nation, boasting a leading financial centre and one of the world’s busiest ports. During a recent visit to Boston I met a man called Lim Tze Min who works for a government agency called Contact Singapore, which exists to try and attract skilled people to live and work in Singapore. I wanted to know why a physicist might consider relocating to the country. Listen to our conversation here.
Tze Min talks about research facilities including the Centre for Quantum Technologies (CQT), the founding director of which is the Polish-born physicist Artur Ekert, who is also affiliated with the University of Oxford in the UK. According to Tze Min, one of the major bonuses of being a researcher in Singapore is the small amount of bureaucracy invovled, which allows scientists to get on with just doing the science. Give it a listen and decide for yourself whether it sounds like a place where you could imagine yourself working.
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Hawking’s academic boycott divides opinion
By James Dacey
Do you agree with the principle of academic boycotts?
Yes
No
Have your say by taking part in this week’s Facebook poll. As always, please feel free to explain your answer by posting a comment on Facebook or below this article.
This question has arisen after it was revealed yesterday that Stephen Hawking will be boycotting a prominent conference in Jerusalem in protest against the policies of the Israeli government. The British cosmologist and science communicator had been set to talk at the Israeli Presidential Conference: Facing Tomorrow, which will take place in June and which will feature a string of high-profile speakers, including Bill Clinton and Tony Blair. But the University of Cambridge has confirmed that Hawking, who is director of research at its Centre for Theoretical Cosmology, has pulled out of the conference for political reasons. Physics World has spoken to a university spokesperson who confirmed that Hawking has sent a letter to the conference organizers to explain his decision not to take part. The UK newspaper the Guardian has today published what it says is the full text of this letter, dated 3 May.
“I accepted the invitation to the Presidential Conference with the intention that this would not only allow me to express my opinion on the prospects for a peace settlement but also because it would allow me to lecture on the West Bank. However, I have received a number of e-mails from Palestinian academics. They are unanimous that I should respect the boycott. In view of this, I must withdraw from the conference. Had I attended, I would have stated my opinion that the policy of the present Israeli government is likely to lead to disaster.”
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Stephen Hawking boycotts high-profile Israeli conference
By James Dacey
Stephen Hawking has decided to pull out of the fifth Israeli Presidential Conference: Facing Tomorrow 2013, which is taking place in June. The world-famous British cosmologist and science communicator was due to deliver a keynote speech at the conference in Jerusalem, which boasts other presenters including Tony Blair, Bill Clinton and Mikhail Gorbachev. But it appears that Hawking has made a late U-turn. That is according to a statement published by the British Committee for Universities for Palestine – an organization of UK-based academics, set up in response to the Palestinian call for an academic boycott of Israel.
We understand that Professor Stephen Hawking has declined his invitation to attend the Israeli Presidential Conference Facing Tomorrow 2013, due to take place in Jerusalem on 18–20 June. This is his independent decision to respect the boycott, based upon his knowledge of Palestine, and on the unanimous advice of his own academic contacts there.
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What are quantum wavefunctions?
By James Dacey
Seeking the meaning of psi. (Courtesy: Pasieka/Science Photo Library; Mat Ward)
In the May issue of Physics World, science writer Jon Cartwright explores some of the most profound questions about the nature of reality. His feature, “The life of psi”, engages with an apparently simple question: what are quantum wavefunctions? Of course, like many of the most interesting questions in physics, the answer to the question is far from elementary. In fact, it is a question that goes right to the heart of quantum mechanics and philosophy, and one that has puzzled some of the greatest minds for the best part of a century.
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What type of video would you like to see more of on physicsworld.com?
By James Dacey
Physics World film shoot at MIT Media Lab.
The proliferation of online video in recent years has triggered tidal waves of content across the globe. As well as all the dancing cats and piano-playing dogs, it has brought new opportunities for journalists to tell stories in more visual and personal ways.
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The LHC is coming to London
By James Dacey
It may have become a household name in recent years, but for many the Large Hadron Collider is still a mysterious behemoth lurking somewhere beneath Switzerland. Or is it France?
A new exhibition will seek to bring the technology and the sense of scientific discovery of the LHC to those who have not made the trip to the facility itself. Collider: step inside the world’s greatest experiment will open on 13 November at the Science Museum in London, and run for six months.
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What do you most hope the LHC will discover after it is switched back on in 2015?
By James Dacey
Admiring the insides of the CMS detector at CERN.
My colleague, Hamish Johnston, has just returned from a trip to CERN, where he was granted access to the insides of the Large Hadron Colider (LHC), which is currently being upgraded. He has shared some great photos from his trip on the Physics World Facebook page, including some snaps of the interior of the detector experiments.
What is the best way to measure a researcher’s contribution to science?
By James Dacey
Comparing apples and oranges. (Courtesy: iStockphoto/Raymond Gregory)
In an opinion article just published on this website, the historian and philosopher Robert Crease discusses the pitfalls when trying to measure the “value” of artefacts in culture and society. The article was inspired by an appearance Crease made at a group debate at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City. The panel were trying to identify ways to measure the museum’s impact on culture and the wider economy.
Crease refers to something known as Goodhart’s law, which he explains as follows.
“Named after the British economist Charles Goodhart, who devised it in 1975, the law essentially says that once a measure is chosen for making policy decisions, it begins to lose value as a measure. Goodhart applied it to banking policy, but in other fields, too, measurement can distort not only the practice being measured, but also perception of the goal.”
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Listen to the sound of the Big Bang
By James Dacey
It sounds like a Kraftwerk track, but this is in fact an audio representation of the Big Bang based on scientific measurements. The physicist John Kramer has produced the sounds using the new data from the ESA’s Planck Mission analysis of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation.
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Should scientists speculate openly in the mainstream media about new science results?
By James Dacey
Read all about it! (Courtesy: iStockphoto/DNY59)
The first science results from the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) present a mixed bag for both scientists and journalists. On the one hand, they show that the machinery of this high-profile $1.5bn mission is actually working. And as my colleague Michael Banks reported earlier today, the excess of positrons, confirming previous measurements, represent an important step in the hunt for dark matter. But on the other hand, this was not a moment to break out the champagne at the celebration of new physics. In reality, it was an important step in testing the precision of the instrument, as well as a reminder that we all need to be patient while we wait for more data.
Given the scale and scope of the AMS mission, it is not surprising that the scientists involved in analysing these first results are keen to share their excitement with the general public. One way they have been doing this is by talking to the media and speculating about the significance of the findings. I find it really interesting to look at how the results have been covered in the headlines of the mainstream media. The BBC ran with “Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer zeroes in on dark matter”. Over the pond, the New York Times went for “Tantalizing New Clues Into the Mysteries of Dark Matter”, adopting the classic science-writing metaphor of a detective story. Both parties presented these early results as an exciting development in a gripping plot to uncover one of the long-standing mysteries of the cosmos.
