Charles Bailyn is the A. Bartlett Giamatti Professor of Astronomy and Physics at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. He is also dean of faculty for the recently established Yale–NUS College in Singapore, a liberal arts college jointly established by Yale University and the National University of Singapore.
Using various ground- and space-based telescopes, Bailyn conducts observational studies of black holes and related x-ray sources, dense star clusters, and the consequences of collisions between stars. Currently he is principal scientist of the Small and Moderate Aperture Research Telescope System, which operates telescopes at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile.
Bailyn has received the Bruno Rossi prize from the American Astronomical Society for his work on measuring the masses of black holes. He is also a recipient of the Dylan Hixon Prize, Yale’s highest honor for teaching excellence in the natural sciences. The video lectures from his Frontiers and Controversies in Astrophysics course were among the first to be placed into the free, online Open Yale Courses platform.
Bailyn is author of What Does a Black Hole Look Like? (Princeton University Press, 2014), a small book (210 pages) that introduces the empirical study of black holes at an undergraduate level. Reviewed in this month’s issue of Physics Today, the book is part of the Princeton Frontiers in Physics series.
Recently, Physics Today caught up with Bailyn to discuss the book and his current professional activities.
PT: What were the challenges in explaining such a complex issue as black holes in such a relatively small book?
BAILYN: My goal in this book was not to duplicate the many excellent texts explaining the physical theory relating to black holes and general relativity. Instead, I tried to focus on the empirical data that demonstrate that black holes, or something very much like them, really do exist. It’s a different approach, and complementary to the theoretical treatments. I deliberately tried to present just the basics so that readers could get an accessible overview, which would then allow them to read directly into the literature.
The difficulty with an approach like this is that the observations are a bit of a moving target. That said, I think right now is a good moment for such an overview: The current top-line high-energy observatories have been in action for quite a while, and the basic categories of objects and their interpretation are now pretty well understood.
PT: Who did you intend the target audience to be, and with whom, if you know, has the book been most popular?
BAILYN: I suppose I really had in mind myself as a beginning undergraduate! That is, I imagined a reader who knows a bit of introductory college-level physics and doesn’t freak out when faced with an equation, but who may not be ready for a full-on graduate textbook or for reading reviews and papers in the research literature. One of my goals was to make sure that undergraduates who are working their way through the standard set of intermediate courses on classical mechanics, E&M [electricity and magnetism], thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, and so forth have somewhere to go to learn about one of the most exciting research frontiers. So the book is an intermediate case between popular books that shy away from math altogether and graduate textbooks that set out to describe in full detail everything that is known.
PT: If you were invited to consult for a movie like the recent blockbuster Interstellar, what aspects of black holes would you say would be relatively easy and essential to depict, and what aspects would be difficult and nonessential?
BAILYN: I’m a huge science fiction fan. I think Star Trek was probably the best thing that happened to the public perception of science in my lifetime. Lots of sexy people clad in skin-tight lycra solving science problems like their lives—and indeed the fate of all humanity and sometimes the universe itself—depend on it. So much better than the “evil mad scientist” trope or the lovable but socially maladroit denizens of The Big Bang Theory. But this is entertainment, not education, so I’m not particularly bothered by whether the physics of the fictitious universe is identical with that of our own universe—if it makes a better story to bend reality a bit, so be it, so long as it’s self-consistent.
That said, I confess I’m getting a bit tired of the use of wormholes as plot devices to magically transport people from one spacetime event to another. Wormholes provide an easy escape from the problems created by the finite speed of light: too easy, in my opinion, as it crowds out more thoughtful and intriguing treatments. So I’d like to challenge the science fiction writers to come up with (or go back to) other ways to address these problems.
PT: As inaugural dean of faculty for the Yale–NUS College, what plans do you have specifically for building up the physics program?
BAILYN: Liberal arts colleges generally have admirable records of preparing students in science through close and early interactions with faculty members, and we’re trying to combine that tradition with the research opportunities provided by Yale and by the National University of Singapore. Our students are very strong—even the nonscience majors often have strong science backgrounds. We have a common curriculum that is taken by all, so one interesting challenge is putting together science courses that students with the full range of previous experience can take together. We’re doing that by focusing on scientific inquiry as applied to content areas not commonly covered in secondary schools, like ecology, cognitive science, and cosmology.
As for the science majors, a key part of our program will be coordinating with NUS, which is very strong, particularly in materials science and quantum theory. We have several faculty members on loan from NUS, and some of our own faculty have joint appointments with NUS. This strengthens the research opportunities for both students and faculty beyond what a liberal arts college could ordinarily provide. We’re also coordinating with Yale. Through Yale’s connections, I’ve taken students from Singapore to observatories in Chile, and several students are doing research projects with Yale faculty who have visited Yale–NUS. We’re still small and young: Our first cohort of students are rising juniors, and number only 150, of whom only a handful are majoring in the physical sciences. But I’m hopeful that we’ll provide really first-class opportunities for them.
PT: What books are you currently reading?
BAILYN: I’ve just finished reading Confucius’ Analects. I’m trying to come up to speed with the nonscience parts of the Yale–NUS common curriculum. We start our required course on philosophy and political thought with Confucius rather than the Greeks, among other reasons because a primary concern of Chinese philosophy is the upbringing and proper behavior of a well-educated “gentleman.” This concern can be applied directly to questions surrounding liberal arts education, and so are topics that our students face every day in their intellectual and personal lives. To my mind it’s perhaps a more accessible starting point than jumping straight into Plato’s Cave and the nature of reality.
