Steven Weinberg
Steven Weinberg | |
---|---|
Born | New York City, U.S. | May 3, 1933
Died | July 23, 2021 Austin, Texas, U.S. | (aged 88)
Resting place | Texas State Cemetery |
Education |
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Known for | |
Spouse | |
Children | 1 |
Awards |
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Scientific career | |
Fields | Theoretical physics |
Institutions | |
Thesis | The role of strong interactions in decay processes (1957) |
Doctoral advisor | Sam Treiman[3] |
Doctoral students | Fernando Quevedo |
Website | web2 |
Steven Weinberg (
He held the Josey Regental Chair in Science at the
Weinberg's articles on various subjects occasionally appeared in
Early life
Steven Weinberg was born in 1933 in New York City.[6] His parents were Jewish[7] immigrants;[8] his father, Frederick, worked as a court stenographer, while his mother, Eva (Israel), was a housewife.[9][10] Becoming interested in science at age 16 through a chemistry set handed down by a cousin,[11][9] he graduated from Bronx High School of Science in 1950.[12] He was in the same graduating class as Sheldon Glashow,[10] whose research, independent of Weinberg's, resulted in their (and Abdus Salam's) sharing the 1979 Nobel in physics.[13]
Weinberg received his bachelor's degree from Cornell University in 1954. There he resided at the Telluride House. He then went to the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen, where he started his graduate studies and research. After one year, Weinberg moved to Princeton University, where he earned his Ph.D. in physics in 1957, completing his dissertation, "The role of strong interactions in decay processes", under the supervision of Sam Treiman.[3][14]
Career and research
After completing his Ph.D., Weinberg worked as a
In 1966, Weinberg left Berkeley and accepted a lecturer position at Harvard. In 1967 he was a visiting professor at MIT. It was in that year at MIT that Weinberg proposed his model of unification of electromagnetism and nuclear weak forces (such as those involved in
After his 1967 seminal work on the unification of weak and electromagnetic interactions, Weinberg continued his work in many aspects of particle physics, quantum field theory, gravity,
Weinberg became Eugene Higgins Professor of Physics at Harvard University in 1973, a post he held until 1983.[13] In 1979 he pioneered the modern view on the renormalization aspect of quantum field theory that considers all quantum field theories effective field theories and changed the viewpoint of previous work (including his own in his 1967 paper) that a sensible quantum field theory must be renormalizable.[24] This approach allowed the development of effective theory of quantum gravity,[25] low energy QCD, heavy quark effective field theory and other developments, and is a topic of considerable interest in current research.[26]
In 1979, some six years after the experimental discovery of the neutral currents—i.e. the discovery of the inferred existence of the
In 1982 Weinberg moved to the University of Texas at Austin as the Jack S. Josey-Welch Foundation Regents Chair in Science,[13] and started a theoretical physics group at the university that now has eight full professors and is one of the leading research groups in the field in the U.S.[9]
Weinberg is frequently listed among the top scientists with the highest research effect indices, such as the
Other contributions
Besides his scientific research, Weinberg was a public spokesman for science, testifying before Congress in support of the
Although still teaching physics, in later years he turned his hand to the history of science, efforts that culminated in To Explain the World: The Discovery of Modern Science (2015).
In 2016, Weinberg became a default leader for faculty and students opposed to a new law allowing the carrying of concealed guns in UT classrooms. He announced that he would prohibit guns in his classes, and said he would stand by his decision to violate university regulations in this matter even if faced with a lawsuit.[38] Weinberg never retired and taught at UT until his death.[9]
Personal life and archive
In 1954 Weinberg married legal scholar Louise Goldwasser and they had a daughter, Elizabeth.[12][39]
Weinberg died on July 23, 2021, at age 88 at a hospital in Austin, where he had been undergoing treatment for several weeks.[39][40]
Weinberg's papers were donated to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas.[41]
Worldview
Weinberg identified as a liberal.[42]
Views on religion
Weinberg was an atheist.
Views on Israel
Weinberg was known for his support of Israel, which he characterized as "the 'most exposed salient' in a war between liberal democracies and Muslim theocracies."[45] He wrote the 1997 essay "Zionism and Its Adversaries" on the issue.[46][42]
In the 2000s, Weinberg canceled trips to universities in the
Honors and awards
- Honorary Doctor of Science degrees from eleven institutions:
- American Academy of Arts and Sciences, elected 1968[48]
- Fellow of the American Physical Society, elected 1971[49]
- National Academy of Sciences, elected 1972[48]
- J. Robert Oppenheimer Memorial Prize, 1973[50][51][48]
- Richtmyer Memorial Award (1974)[48]
- Dannie Heineman Prize for Mathematical Physics, 1977[48]
- Steel Foundation Science Writing Award, 1977, for writing The First Three Minutes[48]
- Elliott Cresson Medal (Franklin Institute), 1979[48]
- Nobel Prize in Physics, 1979[12][52]
- Elected a
- Elected to American Philosophical Society (1982)[48]
- James Madison Medal of Princeton University, 1991[48]
- National Medal of Science, 1991[48]
- President of the Philosophical Society of Texas, 1992[53]
- Lewis Thomas Prize for Writing about Science, 1999[54]
- Humanist of the Year, American Humanist Association, 2002[55]
- Benjamin Franklin Medal for Distinguished Achievement in the Sciences, American Philosophical Society, 2004[56]
- James Joyce Award, University College Dublin, 2009[57]
- Breakthrough Prize, 2020[58][59]
Selected publications
A list of Weinberg's publications can be found on arXiv[60] and Scopus.[61]
Bibliography: books authored / coauthored
- Gravitation and Cosmology: Principles and Applications of the General Theory of Relativity (1972)
- ISBN 0-465-02437-8)
- The Discovery of Subatomic Particles (1983)
- Elementary Particles and the Laws of Physics: The 1986 Dirac Memorial Lectures (1987; with Richard Feynman)
- Dreams of a Final Theory: The Search for the Fundamental Laws of Nature (1993), ISBN 0-09-922391-0
- The Quantum Theory of Fields (three volumes: I Foundations 1995, II Modern Applications 1996, III Supersymmetry 2000,ISBN 0-521-66000-9)
- Facing Up: Science and Its Cultural Adversaries (2001, 2003, HUP)
- Glory and Terror: The Coming Nuclear Danger (2004, NYRB)
- Cosmology (2008, OUP)
- ISBN 0-674-03515-1.
- Lectures on Quantum Mechanics (2012, second edition 2015, CUP)
- To Explain the World: The Discovery of Modern Science (2015), Harper/HarperCollins Publishers, ISBN 978-0-06-234665-0
- ISBN 978-0-674-97532-3
- Lectures on Astrophysics (2019, ISBN 978-1-108-41507-1)
- Foundations of Modern Physics (2021, ISBN 978-1-108-84176-4)
Scholarly articles
- Weinberg, Steven (November 20, 1967). "A Model of Leptons". Physical Review Letters. 19 (21). American Physical Society (APS): 1264–1266. ISSN 0031-9007.
- Feinberg, G.; Weinberg, S. (April 1, 1961). "Law of Conservation of Muons". Physical Review Letters. 6 (7). American Physical Society (APS): 381–383. ISSN 0031-9007.
- Pais, Abraham; Weinberg, Steven; Quigg, Chris; Riordan, Michael; Panofsky, Wolfgang K.H.; Trimble, Virginia (April 1, 1997). 100 years of elementary particles [Beam Line, vol. 27, issue 1, Spring 1997] (Report). Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI). doi:10.2172/790903.
- Weinberg, S (2010). "Pions in Large N Quantum Chromodynamics". Phys. Rev. Lett. 105 (26): 261601. S2CID 46210811.
- Weinberg, S (2012). "Collapse of the State Vector". Phys. Rev. A. 85 (6): 062116. S2CID 119273840.
Popular articles
- A Designer Universe?, a refutation of attacks on the theories of evolution and cosmology (e.g., those conducted under the rubric of intelligent design) is based on a talk given in April 1999 at the Conference on Cosmic Design of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington, D.C. This and other works express Weinberg's strongly held position that scientists should be less passive in defending science against anti-science religiosity.
- Beautiful Theories, an article reprinted from Dreams of a Final Theory by Steven Weinberg in 1992 which focuses on the nature of beauty in physical theories.
- The Crisis of Big Science, May 10, 2012, New York Review of Books. Weinberg places the cancellation of the Superconducting Super Colliderin the context of a bigger national and global socio-economic crisis, including a general crisis in funding for science research and the provision of adequate education, healthcare, transportation, and communication infrastructure, and criminal justice and law enforcement.
See also
References
- ^ a b "Professor Steven Weinberg ForMemRS". London: Royal Society. Archived from the original on November 12, 2015.
- ^ a b "Fellowship of the Royal Society 1660–2015". London: Royal Society. Archived from the original on October 15, 2015.
- ^ a b Steven Weinberg at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
- ^ "Oral Histories". American Institute of Physics.
- ^ "Leslie, J, "Never-ending universe", a review in the Times Literary Supplement of Weinberg's 2015 book To explain the World". Archived from the original on April 30, 2016. Retrieved May 13, 2015.
- ^ "The Nobel Prize in Physics 1979". NobelPrize.org. Retrieved July 27, 2021.
- ^ "Three Scientists Win Nobel Prize". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. October 16, 1979.
- ^ "Muster Mark's Quarks". Archived from the original on July 25, 2014.
- ^ New York Times. Retrieved July 26, 2021.
- ^ a b "steven Weinberg 1933–". PBS. 1998. Retrieved July 26, 2021.
- ^ a b ghose, Tia (July 25, 2021). "Steven Weinberg, Nobel Prize-winning physicist, has died". Live Science. Retrieved July 26, 2021.
- ^ a b c "Steven Weinberg – Biographical". nobelprize.org. Retrieved January 25, 2016.
- ^ a b c d "Steven Weinberg". American Institute of Physics. Retrieved July 26, 2021.
- ^ Weinberg, Steven (June 16, 1957). The role of strong interactions in decay processes – via catalog.princeton.edu.
- ^ "From BCS to the LHC – CERN Courier". January 21, 2008.
- .
- .
- doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.19.1264. Archived from the original(PDF) on January 12, 2012.
- ^ Haidt, D. (2004). "The discovery of the weak neutral currents". CERN Courier.[1]
- ^ INSPIRE-HEP: Top Cited Articles of All Time (2015 edition)
- .
- .
- S2CID 17294645.
- .
- S2CID 14352660.
- ^ Hartmann, Stephan. "Effective Field Theories, Reductionism and Scientific Explanation" (PDF). Retrieved July 26, 2021.
- doi:10.1063/1.31766.
- ^ In 2006 Weinberg had the second-highest creativity index among physicists World's most creative physicist revealed. physicsworld.com (June 17, 2006).
- ^ Woit, Peter (July 24, 2021). "Steven Weinberg 1933–2021". Retrieved July 25, 2021.
- ^ Siegfried, Tom (July 24, 2021). "With Steven Weinberg's death, physics loses a titan". Retrieved July 26, 2021.
- ^ a b c Banks, Michael (July 26, 2021). "US Nobel-prize-winning physicist Steven Weinberg dies aged 88". Retrieved July 26, 2021.
- ^ Mekelburg, Madlin (September 11, 2020). "UT's Steven Weinberg wins $3M Special Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics". Austin American-Statesman. Retrieved July 26, 2020.
- ^ Articles by Steven Weinberg. The New York Review of Books. Nybooks.com. Retrieved on July 27, 2012.
- ^ a b Weinberg, Steven (2015). "Eye on the Present—The Whig History of Science". The New York Review of Books. 62 (20): 82, 84. Retrieved February 9, 2016.
- ^ Shapin, Stephen (February 13, 2015). "Why Scientists Shouldn't Write History". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved February 11, 2016.
- ^ Bouterse, Jeroen (May 31, 2015). "Weinberg, Whiggism, and the World in History of Science". Shells and Pebbles. Retrieved February 11, 2016.
- ^ Silverstein, Arthur; Weinberg, Steven (2016). "The Whig History of Science: An Exchange". The New York Review of Books. 63 (3). Retrieved February 11, 2016.
- ^ Mekelburg, Madlin (January 26, 2016). "Nobel Laureate Becomes Reluctant Anti-Gun Leader, by Madlin Mekelburg". The Texas Tribune. Retrieved February 9, 2016.
- ^ a b "UT Austin Mourns Death of World-Renowned Physicist Steven Weinberg". University of Texas at Austin. July 24, 2021. Retrieved July 24, 2021.
- ^ "Steven Weinberg 1933–2021". CERN Courier. July 26, 2021. Retrieved July 31, 2021.
- ^ 'Steven Weinberg: An Inventory of His Papers at the Harry Ransom Center' (Website UTexas)
- ^ ISBN 0-674-01120-1.
- ^ Weinberg, Steven (September 25, 2008). "Without God". The New York Review of Books. 55 (14).
- ISBN 978-1-351-15038-5.
- ^ Ronan McGreevy (February 12, 2009). "Nobel winner defends Israel's actions". The Irish Times.
- ^ The essay was first published in the "Zionism at 100" issue of The New Republic (September 8–15, 1997, pp. 22–23). It was later reprinted in his book of collected essays, Facing Up.
- Ynetnews. May 24, 2007. Retrieved June 1, 2007.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k "The Nobel Prize in Physics 1979". NobelPrize.org. July 25, 2021. Retrieved July 25, 2021.
- ^ "APS Fellow Archive". American Physical Society.
- ISBN 978-0-87196-386-4.
- .
- S2CID 236946383.
- ^ "Weinberg, Steven, 1933–". Niels Bohr Library & Archives. Retrieved July 25, 2021.
- ^ "UT Austin Mourns Death of World-Renowned Physicist Steven Weinberg". UT News. July 24, 2021. Retrieved July 25, 2021.
- ^ "Annual Humanist Awardees". American Humanist Association. September 17, 2020. Retrieved July 25, 2021.
- ^ "Benjamin Franklin Medal for Distinguished Achievement in the Sciences Recipients". American Philosophical Society. Retrieved November 26, 2011.
- ^ "Weinberg receives James Joyce Award". UT News. February 24, 2009. Retrieved July 25, 2021.
- ^ "UT professor wins $3 million Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics". KVUE. September 10, 2020.
- ^ "Breakthrough Prize – Fundamental Physics Breakthrough Prize Laureates – Steven Weinberg". Breakthrough Prize. Retrieved July 25, 2021.
- ^ "arXiv.org Search". arxiv.org.
- ^ Steven Weinberg's publications indexed by the Scopus bibliographic database. (subscription required)
- .
External links
- Steven Weinberg on Nobelprize.org including the Nobel Lecture, December 8, 1979, "Conceptual Foundations of the Unified Theory of Weak and Electromagnetic Interactions"
- Appearances on C-SPAN
- "Model physicist". CERN Courier. October 13, 2017.
- S2CID 237506142.
- "Steven Weinberg, Nobel laureate in physics and Bulletin board member, dies at 88". Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. July 27, 2021.