Ashutosh (Ash) Jogalekar is a scientist and science writer based in Boston, USA. He has been blogging at the “Curious Wavefunction” blog for more than ten years, and in this capacity has written for several organizations including Scientific American, Nature and the Lindau Meeting of Nobel Laureates. His literary interests specifically lie in the history and philosophy of science. Email: [email protected]
by Ashutosh Jogalekar From 8th grade to 11th grade, I was taught mathematics by a teacher who was a tyrant. A brilliant man who left a lucrative engineering career to teach high school, he clearly was dedicated to teaching the subject. But his dedication took the form of catering to the brightest students in the…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar Two men walking in Princeton, New Jersey on a stuffy day. One shaggy-looking with unkempt hair, avuncular, wearing a hat and suspenders, looking like an old farmer. The other an elfin man, trim, owl-like, also wearing a fedora and a slim white suit, looking like a banker. The elfin man and the…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar ‘Areopagitica‘ was a famous speech delivered by the poet John Milton in the English Parliament in 1644, arguing for the unlicensed printing of books. It is one of the most famous speeches in favor of freedom of expression. Milton was arguing against a parliamentary ordinance requiring authors to get a license for…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar Grace Lindsay is a computational neuroscientist at University College London. She has just published a new book titled “Models of the Mind: How Physics, Engineering and Mathematics Have Shaped Our Understanding of the Brain“. Most books about the brain take either a biological or philosophical approach, but Grace’s book is rather unique…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar In many ways, the story of my life is the story of books that I have read and loved. Books haven’t just shaped and dictated what I know and think about the world but they have been an emotional anchor, as rock solid as a real ship’s anchor in stormy seas. As…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar Bill Gates’s book on climate change issues and solutions is exceptionally clear and simply written. Gates has an easy conversational style that makes the book a fun read, and he is clear-eyed about the problem and the solutions. He also stays away from politics, which makes the book a refreshingly apolitical read,…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar Religion has always had an uneasy relationship with money-making. A lot of religions, at least in principle, are about charity and self-improvement. Money does not directly figure in seeking either of these goals. Yet one has to contend with the stark fact that over the last 500 years or so, Europe and…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar I have been thinking a lot about change recently. 2020 seemed like a good year to do this, for several reasons. There was the political turmoil in the United States where I live. There was the global pandemic. There was the birth of our daughter. There were a few projects I worked…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar I shamelessly borrow the title of this essay from my mentor and friend Freeman Dyson’s marvelous talk on birds and frogs in mathematics. Birds are thinkers who look at the big picture and survey the landscape from a great height. Frogs are thinkers who love playing around in the mud of specific…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar During a wartime visit to England in early 1943, John von Neumann wrote a letter to his fellow mathematician Oswald Veblen at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, saying: “I think I have learned a great deal of experimental physics here, particularly of the gas dynamical variety, and that I shall…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar George Dyson is a historian of science and technology who has written books about topics ranging from the building of a native kayak (“Baidarka”) to the building of a spaceship powered by nuclear bombs (“Project Orion”). He is the author of the bestselling books “Turing’s Cathedral” and “Darwin Among the Machines” which…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar One of my favorite science fiction novels is “The Black Cloud” by Fred Hoyle. It describes an alien intelligence in the form of a cloud that approaches the earth and settles by the sun. Because of its proximity to the sun the cloud causes havoc with the climate and thwarts the attempts…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar Throughout history there have been prophets of doom and prophets of hope. The prophets of doom are often more visible; the prophets of hope are often more important. The Danish economist Bjorn Lomborg is a prophet of hope. For more than ten years he has been questioning the consensus associated with global…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar Progress in science often happens when two or more fields productively meet. Astrophysics got a huge boost when the tools of radio and radar met the age-old science of astronomy. From this fruitful marriage came things like the discovery of the radiation from the big bang. Another example was the union of…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar “All experience shows that even smaller technological changes than those now in the cards profoundly transform political and social relationships. Experience also shows that these transformations are not a priori predictable and that most contemporary “first guesses” concerning them are wrong.” – John von Neumann Is the coronavirus crisis political or technological?…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar What’s the universe made up of? Most people who have read popular science would probably say “Mostly hydrogen, along with some helium.” Even people with a passing interest in science usually know that the sun and stars are powered by nuclear reactions involving the conversion of hydrogen to helium. The dominance of…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar Neil Shubin’s “Some Assembly Required” is a delightful book whose thesis can be summarized in one word – “repurposing”. As Steve Jobs once put it, “Good artists create. Great artists steal”. By that reckoning Nature is undoubtedly the most magnificent thief and the greatest artist of all time. Repurposing in the history…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar On February 28th this year, the world lost a remarkable scientist, thinker, writer and humanist, and many of us also lost a beloved, generous mentor and friend. Freeman Dyson was one of the last greats from the age of Einstein and Dirac who shaped our understanding of the physical universe in the…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar On June 22, 1941, Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union in a typhoon of steel and firepower without precedent in history. In spite of telltale signs and repeated warnings, Joseph Stalin who had indulged in wishful thinking was caught completely off guard. He was so stunned that he became almost catatonic, shutting…
by Ashutosh Jogalekar In November 1918, a 17-year-student from Rome sat for the entrance examination of the Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa, Italy’s most prestigious science institution. Students applying to the institute had to write an essay on a topic that the examiners picked. The topics were usually quite general, so the students had considerable…