George Cowan
George Cowan | |
---|---|
Occupation(s) | Physical Chemist, Businessman |
Years active | 1951–1991 |
Known for | Manhattan Project |
Board member of | Founder of: Santa Fe Opera, Los Alamos National Bank, Santa Fe Institute |
Awards | Enrico Fermi Award, New Mexico Academy of Science Distinguished Scientist Award, Robert H. Goddard Award, E.O. Lawrence Award, Los Alamos National Laboratory Medal |
George Arthur Cowan (/kaʊən/; February 15, 1920 – April 20, 2012) was an American physical chemist, a businessman and philanthropist.[1]
Education
He conducted early research in the
Biography
Cowan was born in
Career
Following the end of the war and obtaining his PhD in physical chemistry from Carnegie Tech, Cowan returned to work for Los Alamos in 1950. Only weeks after his arrival, he directed the detection of radioactive fallout from samples collected near the Russian border indicating the Soviets were in possession of a nuclear bomb. He also participated for some years in the Bethe Panel, whose first chairman was Hans Bethe. One of his early participatory functions on the panel was to convince U.S. government officials that the radiochemistry of the samples proved that it was not the result of a peaceful nuclear reactor problem, but a Soviet bomb, which was dubbed "Joe-1" after Joseph Stalin.
In 1953, Cowan was a member of the group which founded the Santa Fe Opera. Another member of this group was Arthur Spiegel, of the
In 1982, Cowan accepted a seat on the White House Service Council. While serving in this capacity and facing problems involving interlinked aspects of science, policy, economics, environment and more, he realized that this demanded a broad range expertise above the current reductionist approach and fragmentation of the sciences. He believed that our educational culture was enforcing intellectual fragmentation through conservative university programs that depended on specialized grants and funded work. It seemed that cross-disciplinary team efforts were discouraged by membership in traditional, isolated science and social science disciplines. He knew that beginning in the 1980s numerical experiments through computer simulations were capable of providing the tools to think about very complex problems in a more holistic fashion. He began to imagine a new and independent type of institute that would combine the charter of a university while sharing some of Los Alamos' personnel and computer power. This could be a place where senior researchers would have a place to work on very speculative ideas. Where one could educate a man starting in science, but that could deal with the real messy world, which is not elegant, which science doesn't really deal with. In 1983, Cowan assembled a group of senior scientists interested in researching complex, adaptive systems. One year later, this assembly became the
Later life
In 1988, Cowan became a senior fellow emeritus at Los Alamos, a member of a group of six longtime Los Alamos employees rewarded with research positions free from administrative chores that would also advise the laboratory director on policy issues. Cowan served as president of the Santa Fe Institute until his retirement in 1991.
Death
Cowan died on April 20, 2012, from complications of pneumonia in his Los Alamos home.
Bibliography
- George Cowan, Manhattan Project to the Santa Fe Institute: The Memoirs of George A.Cowan, 2010, ISBN 978-0-8263-4870-8
See also
References
- ^ "George Cowan". Telegraph. 5 Jun 2012. Retrieved 2012-06-06.
Sources
- Complexity, the Emerging Science at the Edge of Order and Chaos, M. Mitchell Waldrop, 1992, Touchstone, ISBN 0671767895
- Los Alamos National Labs Staff Biographies: George A. Cowan
- George Cowan Passes Away, Santa Fe Institute (April 20, 2012)
- Obituary in Huffington Post
External links
- 2006 Video Interview with George Cowan by Cynthia C. Kelly Voices of the Manhattan Project
- 1993 Audio Interview with George Cowan by Richard Rhodes Voices of the Manhattan Project