Physicist and physics historian David Kaiser spoke to KSJ Fellows about how culture and politics altered the fate of Einstein’s theory of general relativity. When LIGO announced the detection of gravitational waves to the world in 2016, it was the discovery of a lifetime, hailed as the ultimate confirmation of a prediction made by Einstein’s […]
MIT Postdoc Edmond Awad, on the Moral Dilemmas of Self-Driving Cars
Awad and his MIT colleagues gave millions of people the self-driving-car trolley problem. In a recent visit to KSJ, he talked about what he learned. A self-driving car approaches a crosswalk and suddenly its brakes fail. It can avoid a person who’s crossing legally by swerving into the opposite lane, but then it will hit […]
Master of Ig Nobel Prize Ceremonies Talks Humor in Science
September 13th marked the 28th annual Ig Nobel Prizes, a ceremony that honors scientists for research into such delightfully unexpected questions as, “Can a cat be both a liquid and a solid?” and “Why do old men have big ears?” The prizes are awarded for “achievements that first make people laugh, then make them think.” […]
Nuclear Power Can Be Saved, an Innovator Tells the Fellows
Michael Short, head of an MIT lab that bears his name, visits the Knight Science Journalism program to talk about the problems besetting an industry that generates most of the U.S.’s clean power. They’re manageable, he says, if you break them into five-year chunks.
Book Ideas Wanted: A Visit From MIT Press
Three editors join 10 fellows (including some aspiring authors) for a lively two-hour conversation, ranging from what makes a best-seller to the most memorable book proposals to the future of the e-book publishing industry.
A Lively Discussion, Even for KSJ: Edmond Awad on His ‘Moral Machine’
The MIT Media Lab scholar describes a video game in which driverless cars develop a conscience. Knight Science fellows aren’t so sure about the rules.