|
|
How Advances in Science Are Made
科學的進展是如何達成的 |
How advances in science are made, and how they may come to benefit mankind at large are complex issues. The discoveries that most influence the way we think about nature seldom can be anticipated, and frequently the applications for new technologies developed to probe a specific characteristic of nature are also seldom clear, even to the inventors of these technologies.. One thing is most clear: Seldom are such advances made by individuals alone. Rather, they result from the progress of the scientific community; asking questions, developing new technologies to answer those questions, and sharing their results and their ideas with others. However, there are indeed research strategies that can substantially increase the probability of one's making a discovery, and the speaker will illustrate some of these strategies in the context of a number of well known discoveries, including the work he did as a graduate student, for which he shared the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1996.
科學的進展是如何達成的，以及科學又是如何廣泛地造福人類，是相當複雜的議題。那些深深影響我們對自然界的想法的重大發現，很少是可以預期的。有些為了探查自然界某種特性而發展出的新技術，到底能做多少應用，常常在起初時不是很明顯的，即連這些技術的發明者也不是很了然。有一件事情倒是十分清楚：這些科學和技術的進展很少是由個人獨力完成的；甚者，這些進展是來自於科研群體的成果，不斷提出問題，跟著為解答問題而發展出新科技，並且和他人分享研究成果和想法。不過，確實有某些研究策略，可以大大地增加研究者作出新發現的機率。我將在本演講中例舉一些著名的重大發現，來闡述這些研究策略，包括我個人在研究生時期所做的研究工作，其成果使我在1996年分享了諾貝爾物理獎的榮耀。
下載投影片
|
Richard Feynman's Life And His Broad Impact On Science
理查費曼的生活和他在科學上的廣泛影響 |
Richard Feynman is by his own account a 'Curious Character' whose personality at times has overshadowed his remarkable contributions to physics. In this talk I will attempt to trace his life from when he was an undergraduate at MIT to his death due to stomach cancer in 1988. His contributions to science include his own version of Quantum Electrodynamics, for which he shared the Nobel Prize in 1965, and his development of a third formalism of quantum mechanics based on the principle of least action (the path integral formalism which complements the Schroedinger and Dirac formalisms). Perhaps I must add his three volume set 'The Feynman Lectures on Physics', which remains an inspiration to both faculty and students of physics alike. Feynman is perhaps the only person to have declined membership in the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, and his contribution to the Challenger Space Shuttle Accident extended his fame to reach a broad spectrum of people interested in human space exploration, world wide.
理查費曼，按他自己的說法，是一位「科學頑童」，這種性格有時遮掩了他在物理學上的重大貢獻。在本演講中，我將試著追述他的生活過程，從他在麻省理工學院就讀大學起，一直到他在1988年罹患胃癌去世為止。他在科學上的貢獻包括了他對量子電動力學的表述法，其成就使他分享了1965年的諾貝爾物理獎，以及他從「最小作用量原理」的基礎上，所發展出的量子力學的第三種表述法（即路徑積分表述法，和薛丁格以及狄拉克的量子表述法相輔相成）。也許我必須加談他著作的三冊「費曼物理學講義」。這套書對物理教授和學生們至今仍然同樣具有啟發性。費曼可能是婉拒美國國家科學院院士名位的唯一科學家。另外他在調查挑戰者號太空梭失事事件上的貢獻，使他的名聲擴及全世界關注人類探索太空活動的廣大群眾。
下載投影片
|
|
