On a Physicist Who Understood the Human Side of Science

I dug into the MIT archives to learn more about late physics professor Victor Weisskopf. His apprenticeship with Niels Bohr taught him not just about quantum electrodynamics but also about the value of living in a frequently silly community that could approach problems from multiple angles. Read the story on Scope.

Notes on Conversations that Matter

This week we've seen people in the public square, notably Donald Trump, saying some poisonous things. At this point I think it would be a mistake to see him as someone who is not taking his role seriously. Instead we should interpret his lack of a filter as strategic and planned. And if the goal is to derail our efforts to talk productively about issues that matter, like the Syrian refugee situation, and draw folks toward his inscrutable brand of nationalism, he's doing pretty well.

So we need to take note of conversations which add rather than subtract. That's why I'm grateful that one of my roles this year is to write summaries of MIT's CommForum, which brings together panels of experts to have engaging and thoughtful discussions on the big issues. The first one I wrote up dealt with the legacy of Jim Crow and the future of the Black Lives Matter movement. Last week I summarized a conversation on women in politics, why we still don't have a woman president, and how likely we are to have one in 2016.

The summaries are highlight reels rather than transcripts. These are lengthy pieces (2500+ words) and, like real conversations, they have threads but not a driving plot. But you might consider skimming through them as some small antidote to the poison being dished out elsewhere in the public forum.