“The room was crackling with interest—did you feel it?” my friend Jan Broek asked me. I did. The occasion was a New School conversation with physicist Tom Nash about the nature of the universe. I expected an audience of ten—but forty New School friends showed up. There is a hunger for physics and cosmology at The New School. Clearly we have to do more.

Tom and I have been friends for 50 years. He has had a distinguished career in experimental physics at Fermilab. He is now a member of the California Institute of Technology group that participates in the search for direct detection of gravitational waves (some of which may even come from incredibly soon after the big bang). We talked about Stephen Hawking’s book The Grand Design and decided to do a New School conversation about the issues it raises. Continue reading →