This course is offered online via the easy-to-use Zoom program.
Why
do hot coals glow red rather than, say, blue?
Remarkably, this simple, everyday question cannot be fully answered
without invoking one of the key ideas of quantum theory, namely, that light is
“lumpy.” Quantum theory, developed a
century ago, explains glowing coals, the periodic table and much, much
more. And yet we find it difficult to
extract from the theory any coherent picture of reality. In this course, we study the origins of
quantum theory, its potential for future technology, and the efforts of
physicists and philosophers to figure out what the theory is telling us about
the world.
Bill Wootters is a retired professor
of physics at Williams College, with a PhD from the University of Texas at
Austin. Most of his research has been in quantum information theory and the
foundations of quantum mechanics. He has taught two previous OLLI courses, “The
Speed of Light” and “Gravity.”
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Berkshires
OLLI: the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Berkshire Community College Partners in education with Williams College, Bard College at Simon's Rock and the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts 1350 West Street | Pittsfield, MA 01201 | 413.236.2190 | olli@berkshirecc.edu