Welcome/Intro of Prof. Leon Cooper

Cooper Lecture

Barus and Holley 166

4:30 pm

It is a pleasure to be with you today to kick off this important series of lectures and to introduce our featured speaker. 

Martha Mitchell’s one-volume Encyclopedia Brunonia makes the point that physics has been part of the Brown curriculum since the University’s earliest days.  Known as “natural philosophy” in the 18^th century, physics fascinated the earliest Brown students, including one Solomon Drowne of the Class of 1773. Young Mr. Drowne recorded in his diary that on the morning of August 4, 1772…

…we go again to the apparatus.  We fill a globe with water, which is hung up in a darkened room with only a hole in the window shutter to let a ray shine upon the globe, which after a refraction and reflection or two, exhibits a rainbow.

Drowne’s lab section on the physics of light ended tragically – the water-filled globe came loose and crashed to the floor – but there is an unmistakable sense of discovery and excitement in his notes, which also mention the direct observation of Jupiter, three of its moons, and the peristaltic action of an insect’s body.

        Drowne wrote his diary during a time when the cultural awareness of educated Americans extended as much to “natural philosophy” as it did to literature, history, rhetoric and the arts.  C.P. Snow’s “two cultures” problem is of more recent vintage.

I am pleased for a number of reasons to be able to introduce Leon Cooper. Foremost among those is that he has the gift of exciting us about physics.

Of course, physics in general is not without its connections to popular culture and public understanding. Yet an increasing fraction of current concepts from physics – whether the interactions of subatomic particles or the behavior of galaxies – is beyond the reach of the general public. The World Year of Physics Web site prominently and rather bluntly says, “The general public's awareness of physics and its importance in our daily life is decreasing. The number of physics students has declined dramatically.”

That is both ironic and tragic. It is ironic because physics has no peer among disciplines when it comes to facilitating and explaining the technologies that are now commonplace in life and culture in the twenty-first century. Worse yet, the loss of the public’s connection to physics could mean less inspiration and incentive for the next generations of Solomon Drownes, Albert Einsteins and Madame Curies.

That is why these lectures – three this spring and three next fall – are such an important initiative in reacquainting us with the crucial role physics has played and must continue to play both in meeting global challenges to health and environment and in continuing humankind’s essential quest for new knowledge and understanding.

Dr. Leon Cooper certainly helps to bring that point home. His is one of the most impressive resumes in the long history of the Brown faculty and all of you are familiar with its many features.

Professor Cooper came to Brown in 1958 from the University of Ohio.  Since 1974, he has been the Thomas J. Watson Senior Professor of Science, specializing in theoretical physics, including low-temperature physics and he has also done theoretical work in modeling neural networks.

Perhaps best known for receiving the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1972 (with J. Bardeen and J.R. Schrieffer) for his studies on the theory of superconductivity – work completed while still in his 20’s – Professor Cooper has received many other recognitions over the years.  He was awarded the Comstock Prize by the National Academy of Science in 1968, the Descartes Medal by the Académie de Paris in 1977, and the Collège de France Medal in 2000.  He is a fellow of the American Physical Society, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Phi Beta Kappa, and Sigma XI.  In addition, he has been elected a member of the American Philosophical Society, the National Academy of Sciences, and the Society of Neuroscience.

It is not his medals and awards that are most impressive, however, but his natural affinity for large questions and his intellectual drive toward finding answers.

When he arrived at Brown in 1958, he was already interested in animal nervous systems and the human brain.  His interest was the catalyst for Brown’s Center for Neural Studies, which later became the Institute for Brain and Neural Systems – a center that Professor Cooper directs today.

The ease and eagerness with which Dr. Cooper has pursued his interest in neuroscience illustrates one of Brown’s great strengths: its ability to foster multidisciplinary work.  Dr. Cooper found and worked with colleagues across the cluster of departments and disciplines that participate in brain sciences.  His work as a researcher and teacher involved him with undergraduates, graduate students, post-docs and faculty colleagues.

“One of the wonderful things about Brown is the willingness to work together,” Dr. Cooper once said of his work on the brain.  “This problem just naturally crosses disciplines.”

He is tireless.  “It was nice to be reminded of things you’ve done,” he said of a 70^th birthday celebration.  “But I’m always thinking about what I still want to do…I can’t see myself as ever stopping work.  What would I do?  My best toy is what’s in my head.”

We are so fortunate to pay tribute to Albert Einstein and kick off our World Year of Physics celebration today with our own resident genius.  Colleagues and students, I am pleased to present the 1972 Nobel laureate in physics, the Thomas J. Watson Sr. Professor of Science and our own rock star, Dr. Leon Cooper.