REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE ANNUAL SPRING WEEKEND OF THE INSTITUTE OF PHYSICS IN IRELAND ‘
REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE ANNUAL SPRING WEEKEND OF THE INSTITUTE OF PHYSICS IN IRELAND WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT PHYSICS
Dia dhíbh a chairde, what a pleasure to be here with you on the occasion of the 40th Spring meeting of the Institute of Physics in Ireland and I’d like to thank Dr. Sheila Gilheany for her kind invitation to join you today. It’s a particular joy to be so close to home in the place where North and South meet along the shore of the lovely Carlingford Lough. It seems very appropriate for this gathering for the Institute of Physics in Ireland was a North-South body long before such terms became common. Passion for physics has always managed to trump the more divisive passion for politics it seems and for each one of you talking about physics is a particular passion, one you are very anxious to share not just with one another but with the general public.
Albert Einstein once said “it should be possible to explain the laws of physics to a barmaid.” He would be castigated today for a lack of gender balance but I think we get his drift – and the theme of this conference suggests you are on the same track of getting the message out that if you’ll pardon the pun, physics matters! The most cursory glance at local or world news that appears on our televisions and newspapers each day shows a science content that is pervasive – the earthquakes and tsunami in Japan, the problems with the nuclear reactor, the debate about future energy provision in Ireland, the latest computer technology, the shift from terrestrial to digital television. Without the public ever being fully aware of it, physics impacts colossally in everyday life transforming the world we live in, both the humdrum domestic micro-sphere to the universal impact of the geo-political sphere. Areas as diverse as communications, energy, space, medicine, architecture, ICT, transport and an endless list of others have felt the transformational impact of physics research and development – the list is endless from our tv sets to nuclear reactors, we would not have the sophisticated lifestyles and economies we enjoy without people who have made it their business, their vocation, to interrogate nature and how our universe behaves. The economic impact of physics in Ireland is impressive: the debt we owe to physicists is huge and yet rarely spoken of in such terms. That is why I am so pleased that the IOPI has chosen this spring weekend to focus on communicating physics, so that the message reaches our citizens that this is an area of huge importance, impact and opportunity and the message reaches our students that this is a vast subject well worth studying and worth making your life’s work.
We know the benefits that come from good collaboration and communication between physicists themselves and between physicists and other scientific disciplines. The lowering of professional boundary walls allows information to flow more freely, to access all areas instead of being hidden in cul-de-sacs. Sharing knowledge we know is not the same as sharing a bag of sweets – in fact the science of knowledge sharing is quite the opposite for the sweets will disappear as they are consumed but the knowledge will grow exponentially as it is absorbed and as each new audience brings its own genius to bear on it. We’ve even seen physics and literature collide with string theory and quantum physics central to the plot of Paul Murray’s much acclaimed novel Skippy Dies.
With the pervasiveness of the internet and the popularity of social networking sites, scientists can now directly reach and engage with a much wider audience and far more people are now able to follow and participate in leading research. The interest generated by the work of the CERN Large Hadron Collider or the enduring appeal of the Science Gallery in Trinity College tell us that there is a public fascination and abiding curiosity in physics that responds well to talk about physics that is audience-sensitive and empathetic, in other words, where the communication is good.
It is through good communication with the general public that interest in, and understanding of, science will grow. It is how the next generation of scientists will be inspired and the Rosse medal winners of the future will be encouraged to add their names to the litany of physics greats that Ireland has produced. Names such as William Hamilton, John Synge, John Tyndall and William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), our Nobel Laureate Ernest Walton whose work with John Cockcroft resulted in the splitting of the atom and ushered the nuclear age. Indeed Ireland will also always be associated with the great Erwin Schrodinger, Nobel Laureate, and first Director at the School of Theoretical Physics at the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies. Linking the generations, we have had a veritable army of physics teachers, professors and researchers who have communicated their love of physics to generation after generation so that today our country performs strongly in physics research, with significant investment in research producing world class research groups across a range of areas including especially nanotechnology and laser applications. Ours is a world full of problems and perplexities that often derive from the very nature of the world itself. We need problem solvers and it is to physicists that we turn to find answers to the big problems we face, whether it is developing sustainable green technologies, or tackling climate change, or a list so long and fascinating and unfinished that no physicist should face redundancy this millennium.
We are a small nation of innovative and scholarly people with a proven track record at home and abroad of the kind of intellectual curiosity that lets science flourish and grow. But it constantly needs new recruits, different perspectives and fresh brainpower. Thank you for all you are doing to talk about physics so that this great natural science puts more and more help and information at the service of the good of humanity.
Enjoy the weekend.