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After surveying Martin Harwit's family background and early education, the interview concentrates on: his graduate education at Massachusetts Institute of Technology; his career in physics at Cambridge Unviersity as a NATO Fellow; his time at the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) as a National Science Foundation Fellow; and, principally, his work at Cornell as assistant and associate professor of astronomoy, professor, and chairman of the Physics department.  While discussing his childhood and education, Harwit addresses the antisemitism he and his family faced in German and in the United States.  This interview covers a broad range of his scientific interest: galaxy and star formations; comets; infrared optics, especially relating to detector technology; infrared astronomy; rocketry; history of philosophy in science; use of balloons in observation; and astronomy education.  Some affliliations discussed include:  John Decker, Herbert Friedman, Thomas Gold, and Fred Hoyle.

After surveying Martin Harwit's family background and early education, the interview concentrates on: his graduate education at Massachusetts Institute of Technology; his career in physics at Cambridge Unviersity as a NATO Fellow; his time at the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) as a National Science Foundation Fellow; and, principally, his work at Cornell as assistant and associate professor of astronomoy, professor, and chairman of the Physics department.  While discussing his childhood and education, Harwit addresses the antisemitism he and his family faced in German and in the United States.  This interview covers a broad range of his scientific interest: galaxy and star formations; comets; infrared optics, especially relating to detector technology; infrared astronomy; rocketry; history of philosophy in science; use of balloons in observation; and astronomy education.  Some affliliations discussed include:  John Decker, Herbert Friedman, Thomas Gold, and Fred Hoyle.

After surveying Martin Harwit's family background and early education, the interview concentrates on: his graduate education at Massachusetts Institute of Technology; his career in physics at Cambridge Unviersity as a NATO Fellow; his time at the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) as a National Science Foundation Fellow; and, principally, his work at Cornell as assistant and associate professor of astronomoy, professor, and chairman of the Physics department.  While discussing his childhood and education, Harwit addresses the antisemitism he and his family faced in German and in the United States.  This interview covers a broad range of his scientific interest: galaxy and star formations; comets; infrared optics, especially relating to detector technology; infrared astronomy; rocketry; history of philosophy in science; use of balloons in observation; and astronomy education.  Some affliliations discussed include:  John Decker, Herbert Friedman, Thomas Gold, and Fred Hoyle.

Marc Davis discusses his childhood in Canton Ohio and family background; early reading; education at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and at Princeton University; thesis work with Jim Peebles and discussion of Peebles; early work on the correlation function of galaxies; creation of the Center for Astrophysics (CFA) redshift survey in 1978; attitude toward the horizon problem; attitude toward the inflationary universe model; biasing, cold dark matter, and models of the formation of large-scale structure; attitude toward the flatness problem; attitude toward the CFA redshift surveys by de Lapparent, Geller, and Huchra; the question of whether the universe is homogeneous; relationship of theory and observation; important outstanding problems in cosmology: the Great Attractor, biasing, dark matter, galaxy formation; the ideal design of the universe; the question of whether the universe has a point.

In this interview, David Zierler, Oral Historian for AIP, interviews Edmund Bertschinger, professor of physics at MIT. Bertschinger recounts his childhood in California and he describes how his natural curiosities developed into academic talents in math and science. He describes his undergraduate work at Caltech where he became interested in radio astronomy. Bertschinger describes his decision to pursue a Ph.D. under the direction of Arno Penzias at Princeton, and he explains the formative influence of Steve Weinberg’s book The First Three Minutes. He describes how he came to work with Jerry Ostriker on galaxy formation. Bertschinger describes some of the administrative decisions that defined where cosmology and astrophysics were studied at Princeton. He explains how he developed his interest in social issues including nuclear disarmament, and why he initially pursued a career at the State Department. Bertschinger discusses his postdoctoral work at the University of Virginia with Roger Chevalier and his next postdoctoral position at Berkeley where he worked with Chris McKee. He explains the importance of charge-coupled device detectors as a key technology advance for astronomy, and he describes the circumstances leading to his decision to join the faculty at MIT. Bertschinger recounts how his social interests had became increasingly focused on gender issues and how, in his view, the toxic masculinity that pervaded cosmology pushed him further and further from the field. He describes his ongoing interest in nuclear and social issues, and at the end of the interview, Bertschinger explains that he has been fortunate to have been able to shift his current research interests while remaining within the physics department. 

Edwin Turner discusses his childhood experiences looking up at the stars; background of parents; encouragement and support of parents; early interest in science fiction and in history; childhood fascination with the scale of the universe; education at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); influence of Philip Morrison and Irwin Shapiro at MIT; preference for an open universe; dislike of missing mass that is invisible; scientific interests at MIT; graduate education at California Institute of Technology (Caltech); influence of Wallace Sargent; dislike of problem-set approach to education at Caltech; thesis work on dynamics of binary galaxies; influence of Ostriker-Peebles-Yahil work on dark matter and massive haloes in galaxies on Turner's observational thesis to measure masses of galaxies; interaction with Allan Sandage on philosophy of experimental science; Turner's surprise at finding dark matter in galaxies; community reaction to dark matter in 1975; continued belief in an open universe despite dark matter; history of N-body work on structure formation and correlation functions: influence of lecture by James Peebles, history of collaboration with Richard Gott and Sverre Aarseth; inability to measure omega by comparing N-body simulations with observations; reaction to inflationary universe model; reasons why the inflationary universe model has been so popular; Turner's reservations about the model; doing scientific projects because they can be done; introduction to and attitude toward the flatness problem; change in attitude after inflationary universe model; surprise at de Lapparent, Geller, and Huchra's results on large-scale inhomogeneities and its evidence for unknown processes: irrelevance of earlier work on correlation functions and lessening of Turner's expectations for what can be accomplished in cosmology; fear that cosmologists are heading in the wrong direction and underestimating the complexity of reality; use of imagery in science; interplay of theory and observation in cosmology and the divergence of the two; worry that we may have several untestable scenarios for the early universe; possible inability to reconstruct the history of the early universe; ideal design of the universe and desire for a rich and accessible universe; question of whether the universe has a point.

In this interview, Paul Schechter, the William A. M. Burden Professor of Astrophysics, Emeritus, at MIT discusses his time as an undergraduate student at Cornell University under the mentorship of Al Silverman and his involvement working on the Cornell synchrotron, as well as Silverman’s influence on his decision to attend Caltech for graduate school. Schechter discusses his collaboration with Bill Press on the issue of dark matter and the eventual creation of their model, the Extended Press-Schechter. He also details how studying the infall of galaxies toward the Virgo Cluster, and the subsequent paper he contributed to on the topic, were the most exciting part of his time working at the Kitt Peak National Observatory. Schechter describes his later interests in gravitational lensing and his efforts to create higher quality images for Magellan telescopes. Lastly, he discusses his desire to find the stellar mass fraction in galaxies.