The Mars Exploration Rovers: Following the Water
Mark T. Lemmon
Texas A&M University
Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen (EPR) provide us with deep questions concerning and insights into quantum mechanics. For example, when an object such as a photon or atom is observed, its behavior is radically altered. Nobel Laureate Eugene Wigner has connected this aspect of quantum weirdness with consciousness, i.e., the mind of the observer.
More recently we have asked whether the altered state of the photon or atom is further changed if the
memory of the observer is erased. The following quotes from Newsweek1 tell the story:
"Knowledge [of the photon path] is the reason why interference is lost. It is as if the photon knows it is being watched . . . But now we discover that: Erasing the knowledge of the photon path brings interference back."
In his recent book, The Fabric of the Cosmos , Brian Greene sums up beautifully the counterintuitive nature of these results, he says:
"These experiments are a magnificent affront to our conventional notions of space and time. Something that takes place long after and far away from something else nevertheless is vital to our description of that something else. By any classical-commonsense-reckoning, that's, well, crazy. Of course, that's the point: classical reckoning is the wrong kind of reckoning to use in a quantum universe . . . For a few days after I learned of these experiments, I remember feeling elated. I felt I'd been given a glimpse into a veiled side of reality. Common experience-mundane, ordinary, day-to-day activities-suddenly seemed part of a classical charade, hiding the true nature of our quantum world."In the present lecture, we will explain the way in which the "mere presence" of an observer changes the nature of the object being observed via EPR type correlations. Furthermore, erasing the knowledge acquired by the observer can change things back to their original, preobservation, condition! In the words of Newsweek: "No Wonder Einstein was confused."
Taking Einstein's Ethics Into the Twenty-First Century: 'Remember Your Humanity'
Dwight E. Neuenschwander
SPS/Sigma Pi Sigma Publications Editor, and
Department of Physics, Southern Nazarene University, Bethany, OK
With the observation in 1919 of his predicted deflection of starlight by the Sun, Albert Einstein became an international celebrity. He used his fame to speak out on thoughtfully, forcefully, and continuously on matters of justice and human dignity, including war and peace, arms control, religion, personalities, civil rights, life and death, moral trends, education, economics, international relations. Whether his views were popular or not was never Einstein's concern. In his life Einstein faced many ethical dilemmas, as when, for example, as a pacifist on the eve of war he was asked to solicit President Roosevelt's support for the development of nuclear weapons. In this century the familiar ethical dilemmas will be joined by new ones, such as genetic technologies that could make possible a posthuman future. What can Einstein's ethics tell us about wisely addressing the ethical dilemmas of the twenty-first century?
The Mars Exploration Rovers: Following the Water
Mark T. Lemmon
Texas A&M University
The big science question for the Mars Exploration Rovers is how past water activity on Mars has influenced the red planet's environment over time. While there is no liquid water on the surface of Mars today, the record of past water activity on Mars can be found in the rocks, minerals, and geologic landforms, particularly in those that can only form in the presence of water. That's why the rovers are specially equipped with tools to study a diverse collection of rocks and soils that may hold clues to past water activity on Mars.
The rovers will offer unique contributions in pursuit of the overall Mars science strategy to "Follow the Water." Understanding the history of water on Mars is important to meeting the four science goals of NASA's long-term Mars Exploration Program:
Both science and art explore the world of our senses and, aided by abstraction and imagination, the underlying, unseen structure, connections, and reasons for why things happen as they do. While many consider "the arts" and "the sciences" to be unrelated or even antagonistic cultures, history is quite rich in examples of constructive interplay between scientific and artistic vision, creative impulse, and genius. I will explore this theme with a focus on the intellectual revolution(s) of Einstein and Picasso. (*the creation of this talk was partially supported by The AAPT Bauder Fund)
Modern cosmology, one of the great showcases of Einstein's General Relativity, nevertheless stands to remind us that even a genius can slip. Perhaps the only one of the truly groundbreaking ideas that Einstein had within his grasp but did not seize is the expansion of the universe. We shall here report on where cosmology is heading these days.