Beyond Einstein
In Search of the Ultimate Explanation
Albert Einstein spent his last thirty years unsuccessfully searching for a 'unified theory' — a single master principle to describe everything in the universe, from tiny subatomic particles to immense clusters of galaxies. In the decades since, generations of researchers have continued working toward Einstein's dream.
Renowned physicists Leonard Susskind and Jim Gates, and prominent historian Peter Galison discussed what's been achieved and tackle pivotal questions. Would a unified theory reveal why there is a universe at all? Would it tell us why mathematics is adept at unraveling nature's mysteries? Might it imply we are one universe of many, and what would that mean for our sense of how we fit into the cosmos? Moderated by Nobel Laureate Paul Nurse.
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Peter Galison is a leading historian of science whose research explores the interaction of experimentation, instrumentation and theory in physics. An author, film producer and MacArthur Award-winner, he is the Joseph Pellegrino University Professor in the Department of the History of Science at Harvard University.
Sylvester James (Jim) Gates, Jr. is currently the John S. Toll Professor of Physics at the University of Maryland-College Park. In spring of 2009 he was appointed to serve on President Obama's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology and the Maryland State Board of Education.
Janna Levin researches the early universe, chaos and black holes. Her second book, a novel called A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines (Knopf 2006), won the PEN/Bingham Fellowship for Writers that honors debut fiction. She is also the author of the popular science book “How the Universe Got Its Spots: Diary of a Finite Time in a Finite Space.”
Paul Nurse is a Nobel Laureate and the President of Rockefeller University, where he continues to do research in cell biology. He is the former Chief Executive of Cancer Research, UK. In 1999 he was knighted in Great Britain for his contributions to cancer research.
Theoretical physicist Leonard Susskind is one of the discoverers of string theory, a candidate for a theory that unifies all laws of physics. An award-winning author, he is a proponent of the idea that our universe is one of an infinite number. Susskind is the Felix Bloch Professor of Theoretical Physics at Stanford University.This event made possible with the support of
as part of the Big Ideas Series
