Shapiro Video Introduction

Video recording:
“On the Shoulders of Giants 2004”
Prof. Maurice Shapiro
• Some introductory remarks on the video
• Prof Shapiro was the alma mater (Latin for
Nourishing Mother) of the School.
• Choosing always the best for the students,
selecting outstanding people in Prof. Wefel and
Prof. Stanev to help him.
• Following his death, Prof. Wefel was appointed to
be the Director of the School
ISCRA is the 6th oldest School in Erice
•
•
Originally founded under the directorship of Bruno Rossi, but Prof. Shapiro soon
took over.
Prof. Wefel is now the Director of the School.
30 years at ISCRA
• Very comprehensive summary by Prof. Wefel
at:
• http://laspace.lsu.edu/ISCRA/ISCRA2008/Pres
entations/Wefel/Retrospective.pdf
• This brief talk is about some aspects of Prof.
Shapiro’s character and interests as an
introduction to the video.
• One of his interests was bringing more and
more people into science, the career that had
been the best he could imagine.
• He was particularly keen to attract more
women into science and there was plenty of
opportunity to increase the ratio of female to
male.
Solvay conference of 1911
Females at the Solvay conferences
99, 97, 77 years ago
1911 4.1%
( 1 in 24)
1913 3.3%
(1 in 30)
1933 6.5%
(3 in 46)
Marie Curie, Irene Joliot (daughter), Lise
Meitner
Marie Currie
Double Nobel Laureate
•1903 Physics with Pierre Curie, and Henri Becquerel
•1911 Chemistry
One of only two people to win a
Nobel prize in two fields.
Biography by her daughter Eve, well worth reading, once
incredibly popular easily found in second hand books stores,
now hardly read.
Alas little had changed in the 1990’s re
the female/male ratio since the 1930’s
% of Female Attendees at ISCRA
% Female
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
1985
1990
1995
2000
Year
2005
2010
2015
Dr. Kyoung Hye Moon
(ICRC Calgary 1993)
Prof. Shapiro invited Dr. Moon to attend his School of 1994. She had
been invited to the US from Seoul, Korea by Prof. Wefel and had worked
in his group at LSU but she had then moved to NASA Marshall working
with Tom Parnell
• Dr. Moon was strong and had just received a karate brown
belt. She was in perfect health, but then a terrible cancer
came.
• When Prof. Shapiro heard of Dr. Moon’s illness he was
distressed and asked to be kept informed.
• Dr. Moon flew home to Seoul to be with her family but
nothing could be done to help and the cancer cut her down.
• Prof. Shapiro was distressed by news as were all her friends
and colleagues at NASA Marshall in Huntsville Alabama.
• He later organised a memorial session for her at the 1994
school and collected money to support students in her
memory.
Before Dr. Moon’s loss there was another loss, mild
and insignificant compared to the potential that was
lost with Dr. Moon.
As we are a School for young scientists it is
appropriate to mention that experiments don’t always
go right, sometimes one doesn’t get the kind of
beautiful data that we have seen at the School.
Imagine if Fermi, Auger, Icecube, Icetop... etc were
there one moment, there for your job or your PhD
made better by all the blood sweat and tears that you
have put into them, Then suddenly no more...
1993 was a Annus horribilis.
Prof. Shapiro was very supportive to me,
both regarding Dr. Moon and the loss of
the BUGS-4 experiment, for which I was
the project manager.
It is in the remembrance of Dr. Moon and
of Prof. Shapiro’s kindness that I do the
secretarial work for the School.
But in science and in life it is not the failures,
the good tries, the nearly, that matter, it is the
successes, the achievements, the winners that
are important.
The successful inspire the young and are often
favoured by the folk who make things
possible: the funding agencies.
ISCRA has attracted many of the winners in
Cosmic Ray Science, something that was
always pleasing to Prof. Shapiro.
Awards for outstanding contributions
to Cosmic Ray Science
•
•
•
•
Shakti P. Duggal
Yodh Prize
O'Ceallaigh Medal
For those of you who leave science and go on to well
paid jobs in other areas there is always the
opportunity to give a little back to science for what it
gave you by supporting these prizes or this School.
• Data:
• http://www.iupap.org/commissions/c4/website.html
But nice as these prizes are there is
one golden one above all in science
Nobel Prize winners at ISCRA
General rule is that people come here and then get
awards and prizes.
Many of the winners came here, like the students of
2010, at the beginnings of their career usually in the
shadow of the giants of their time and then they went on
to great things.
If history be a guide...
So we take your photographs for that moment in the
future when you are recognised for what you have done
and we can say, look here is the winner when they were
at ISCRA.
Prof. Shapiro, some aspects of his
character
• Kind, helpful, considerate. When I needed a US patent
attorney he found me one and this got me the happy
moment when a notice of allowance came.
• But within the velvet glove there was steel. Every thing
I ever did for him had to be as he wanted, no “ifs” or
“buts”. Any lecturer not clear, especially if confusing
to the students was called to account the instant they
varied from his high standards.
• Great orators voice.
• Highly skilled in the ‘Horse Sense’ of managing people
and getting the very best out of them whether they were
high powered academics with huge egos or young
students, and of convincing wealthy individuals to
donate money to the School.
• He loved science, it was the best career he could
imaging for himself and he did everything he
could during his retirement until he left this life in
2008 (in his 93 rd year) to bring the best lecturers
for the young scientist, for people like you.
• His great delight was to have a student develop to
the point were they were good enough to return
and lecture at one of the Schools. He would
regularly challenge students with the statement
that if they advanced sufficiently and could speak
well he would invite them back as lecturers.
On the Shoulders of Giants
• Video was recorded here in 2004, in his 44th
year, to within an astrophysical factor of 2.
• He knew many of the giants of 20th century
science and here he gives a few anecdotes and
recollections.
• It begins with a typical Prof. Shapiro moment,
clarifying what the previous speaker said.
He then recalls:
Bohr
Beta
Feynman
Rossi
Auger
Sakarov
Apologies for the audio quality, my
fault, but hopefully you will get
something out of it and something of
the character of Prof. Shapiro.