Nobel Laureate Dr. John C. Mather to present “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Understanding in the Age of Science”

Nobel Laureate Dr.
John C. Mather, senior astrophysicist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
in Greenbelt, MD, will present “Life,
Liberty, and the Pursuit of Understanding in the Age of Science” at  the first Ira Hamburg Memorial Lecture on
Sunday, October 13, at 12:30 pm at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Fairfax
(UUCF).  The project scientist for the
James Webb Space Telescope will describe the history of the universe, from the
beginning to the end – how does the expanding universe lead to life, and where
are "we" going?  The lecture is
free.

For the past seven years UUCF has hosted a larger community
forum entitled, “Science, Reason and Religion.” 
Past speakers have included Steve Dick, former historian for NASA, and
Connie Bertka who serves at the Carnegie Geophysical Laboratory and at the
Wesley Theological Seminary. 

“This year, in honor of Ira Hamburg, a longtime friend and
presenter to the Science, Reason and Reason Sunday Forum, the lecture has been
dedicated in his name as an inspiration for us to labor on well and do good,”
says lecture organizer Jerry Poje . “Ira was an inspiring father, grandfather
and friend to many at UUCF and beyond. 

“No one who interacted with Ira could walk away without
being reminded of Socrates.  He had the
same desire to find someone wiser than himself and the skills to probe deeply
and well, instructing all willing to learn. 
Better yet, he knew how to attract the best into his symposium,” adds
Jerry.

Dr. Mather, who received his Bachelor’s degree in physics at
Swarthmore College and his Ph.D. in physics at the University of California at
Berkeley, has been invited to discuss the exciting prospect of the James Webb telescope
and how its output will expand human knowledge about the universe in ways that
may challenge our current understanding of science and religion.  

As an NRC postdoctoral fellow at the Goddard Institute for
Space Studies (New York City), he led the proposal efforts for the Cosmic
Background Explorer (74-76), and came to GSFC to be the Study Scientist
(76-88), Project Scientist (88-98), and the Principal Investigator for the Far
IR Absolute Spectrophotometer (FIRAS) on COBE. 
He and his team showed that the cosmic microwave background radiation
has a blackbody spectrum within 50 parts per million, confirming the Big Bang
theory to extraordinary accuracy. 

The COBE team also discovered the cosmic anisotropy (hot and
cold spots in the background radiation), now believed to be the primordial
seeds that led to the structure of the universe today.  It was these findings that led to Dr. Mather
receiving the Nobel Prize in 2006.

For more information, visit www.uucf.org or contact Jerry
Poje, Ph.D. at poje2530@verizon.net.

For more about Dr. Mather:

http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2006/mather-bio.html

For more about the James Webb Telescope:

http://www.jwst.nasa.gov/