We have been talking about how Feynman influenced our learning of science and towards our scientific imagination – with the help of a mathematical abstract view, Julius Sumner Miller’s exciting science demonstrations … I felt I should continue this stream of thoughts by adding some observations on the pursuit of science. (These are my compilations from the wonderful book “Truth and Beauty” by Professor S. Chandrashekhar, Penguin Books Ltd (1991) – don’t miss to read this book if you happen to come across). I am aware that I am not offering here any concrete thinking on the “pursuit of science” -- but surely it helps to put things in their places, and it invites deeper thinking on this issue.
“The pursuit of science: its motivations” is a difficult topic because of the variety and the range of the motives of the individual scientists; they are as varied as the tastes, the temperaments, and the attitudes of the scientists themselves. Besides, their motivations are subject to substantial changes during the life-times of the scientists. Indeed it is difficult to discern a common denominator! We may consider some examples to get some better ideas on this. Let us think of Albert Michelson: His main preoccupation throughout his life was to measure the velocity of light with increasing precision. His interest came about almost by accident, when the commander of the United states Naval Academy asked him – he was then an instructor at the Academy – to prepare some lecture demonstrations of the velocity of light. That was in 1878 and it had led to Michelson’s first determination of the velocity of light in 1880. On 7th May 1931, i.e., fifty years later and two days before he died he dictated the opening sentences of a paper, posthumously published, which gave the results of his last measurement! Michelson’s efforts resulted in an improvement in our knowledge of the velocity of light from one part in 3,000 to 1 part in 30,000 – i.e., by a factor of 10. But by 1973, the accuracy had been improved to 1 part in 100000000000 -- a measurement that made obsolete, beforehand, all earlier measurements! Were Michelson’s efforts over fifty years in vain? Leaving that question aside, one must record that, during his long career, Michelson made great discoveries derived from his delight in “light waves and their uses”. Thus, his development of interferometry, leading to the first direct determination of the diameter of a star, is breathtaking. And who does not know the Michelson-Morley experiment, which -- through Einstein’s formulation of the special and the general theory of relativity -- changes irrevocably our formulation of the nature of space and time? It is a curious fact that Michelson himself was never happy with the outcome of his experiment!! Indeed, it is recorded that when Einstein visited Michelson in April 1931, Mrs. Michelson felt it necessary to warn Einstein in a whisper when he arrived: “Please don’t get him started on the subject of the ether”!
When Michelson was asked towards the end of his life, why he had devoted such a large fraction of the time to the measurement of the velocity of light, he is said to have replied “It was so much of fun”! There is no denying that “fun” does play a role in the pursuit of science. What are the other factors? Difficult to say! I leave it open to your own jurisdiction now.
Here are a few remarks on the attitudes of the scientists on their discoveries:
ReplyDeleteRutherford was a happy warrior in the pursuit of science. Someone who attended the presentation of one of Rutherford’s great discoveries made a remark: “Professor Rutherford, you are always on the crest of the wave”. Rutherford responded: “I made the wave. Didn’t I?” Somehow from the vantage point of view, everything he said seemed right. He appeared to have commented “I do not let my boys waste their time” -- when asked if he encouraged his students to study relativity.
A different aspect of the effect a great discovery can have on its creator is provided by Hideki Yukawa, in his autobiography, “The Traveler”, written when Yukawa was fifty. One would normally have expected that an autobiography entitled “The Traveller” by one -- whose life, at least as seen from outside -- had been rich and fruitful, would be an account of an entire life. But Yukawa’s “travel” ends with the publication of his paper of 1934 describing his great discovery with the somber note: “I do not want to write beyond this point, because those days when I studied relentlessly are nostalgic to me; and on the other hand, I am sad when I think how I have become increasingly preoccupied with matters other than study”.
While all of us can share the joy of the discoveries of the great scientists, we may be puzzled by what those many, very many, less perceptive and less fortunate are to cherish and remember! Should they console themselves with Milton’s thought: “They also serve who only stand and wait” ?