PIONEERING RESEARCHER ON PHYSICS, EXTRATERRESTRIALS VISITS CHICAGO
For years he hunted for evidence of intelligent life in outer space. He was also part of a groundbreaking research team attempting to build and send a manned spacecraft to Mars.
October 3rd, distinguished physicist and educator Freeman Dyson visited the campus of Illinois Institute of Technology as a guest lecturer, speaking to a capacity crowd of students and faculty at Wishnick Auditorium. IIT Pritzker Professor of Science and 1988 Nobel Prize winner, Dr. Leon Lederman, hosted Dyson’s visit to the IIT campus.
Dyson’s lecture focused on “Thought-Experiments: Exploring the Limits of Quantum Mechanics.” Quantum mechanics is a branch of mathematical physics that deals with atomic and subatomic systems. This phenomenon is so small-scale, it can’t be described in classical terms and is formulated entirely in terms of statistical probabilities.
Dyson first came to the United States from England in 1947, winning a two-year fellowship to study physics at Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. He returned to England in 1949 to become a research fellow at the University of Birmingham.
He returned to Cornell in 1951 where he was appointed a professor of physics. In 1953, he accepted a professorship of physics at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) in Princeton, N.J. Now retired, Dyson remains with IAS as professor emeritus. His most useful contribution to science is considered to be the unification of the three versions of quantum electrodynamics.
In the late 1950’s, Dyson joined the Orion Project, part of a research team attempting to build a manned spacecraft to Mars. A working model was successfully tested, but rejected by the U.S. government for technological and environmental reasons.
Dyson has also studied ways of searching for evidence of extraterrestrials, though he admits that too little is known about the universe for scientists to conclude whether the existence of intelligent life is probable.
Dyson is the author of several books, including Disturbing the Universe (1979), Weapons and Hope (1984), Origins of Life (1985) and Infinite in All Directions (1988).
Founded in 1890, IIT is a Ph.D.-granting technological university awarding degrees in the sciences, mathematics and engineering, as well as architecture, psychology, design, business and law. IIT’s interprofessional, technology-focused curriculum prepares the university’s 6,200 students for leadership roles in an increasingly complex and culturally diverse global workplace.
