Council Statement Focus on Missile Defense, Science Funding At its April meeting, the Council of the APS approved a statement on issues relating to the technical feasibility and deployment of the proposed National Missile Defense (NMD) program.
Re-"Creating Copenhagen" at CUNY Symposium Physicists, historians, theater professionals, and members of the general public alike crowded into the new Proshansky Auditorium for the free, day-long series of events, which included lectures on the science and history of the so-called "Copenhagen Interpretation" of quantum mechanics and the subsequent development of the atomic bomb.
Letters Explosive Arithmetic — Sympathy for Wen Ho Lee is Misplaced — Earth Science Not Given Its Due — Park Goes Off the Deep End — Newt Gingrich Corrected — Physics Can Lead to Divine Truth — "What Is Science" Statement Ignores Religious Element
Viewpoint Cultural differences: Alan Chodos yearns for the way it was.
The Back Page David Goodstein on where physics education ought to be headed.
Physics Chairs Meet at APS Headquarters
More than 120 physics department chairs spent two days in April at the American Center for Physics in College Park. With a conference emphasis on undergraduate physics education, presentations focused on the need for better teaching techniques, curricular issues, careers, responses to the new engineering accreditation requirements, and ways to improve the physics taught to prospective teachers. Rounding out the program were talks on NSF and DOE funding priorities by Bob Eisenstein, Assistant Director for Mathematical and Physical Sciences (NSF) and Pat Dehmer, Acting Deputy Director of the Office of Science (DOE), and an overview of the Washington science policy scene by Mike Lubell, APS Director of Public Affairs. In the photo above, Steering Committee co-chair Peter Collings of Swarthmore addresses the gathering. The conference was cosponsored by APS and AAPT.
