November 22, 2007

  • Harvard's Pauli

    Aspects of Symmetry

    For theoretical physicist
    Sidney Coleman,

    Sidney Coleman (photo from Harvard  home page)

    who died on Sunday
    (Nov. 18, 2007)

    A comment at Peter Woit's weblog today:

    T says
    (3:43 AM today)

    I
    still don’t quite understand what *EXACTLY* Sidney Coleman contributed
    that merits such deep reverence for him after his demise; was he like
    Weinberg - i.e. a very intuitive and thoughtful field theorist - or
    Feynman - a highly creative and original thinker; or simply a good
    teacher who taught at (world-famous) Harvard - and hence his stature?

    My reply (4:26 AM today, awaiting moderation):

    T: The following quotes may be of interest.

    "Sidney Coleman comes as
    close as any active physicist to assuming the mantle of Wolfgang Pauli
    as a trenchant critic of research and as an expositor of ongoing
    developments in theoretical physics." –Book review of Aspects of Symmetry

    "He
    has… played the role of Wolfgang Pauli of his generation; he liked to
    disprove ideas, and he was also a genius in explaining things to
    others." –Lubos Motl

    Related material:

    Faust in Copenhagen

    and

    Kernel of Eternity