Dr. Arno A. Penzias has passed away at the age of 90.
While this is another one of those obits for a relatively obscure figure, I feel there’s a good chance many of my readers have actually heard of Dr. Penzias.
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In 1961, Dr. Penzias joined AT&T’s Bell Laboratories in Holmdel, N.J., with the intention of using a radio antenna, which was being developed for satellite communications, as a radio telescope to make cosmological measurements…
In 1964, while preparing the antenna to measure the properties of the Milky Way galaxy, Dr. Penzias and Dr. Wilson, another young radio astronomer who was new to Bell Labs, encountered a persistent, unexplained hiss of radio waves that seemed to come from everywhere in the sky, detected no matter which way the antenna was pointed. Perplexed, they considered various sources of the noise. They thought they might be picking up radar, or noise from New York City, or radiation from a nuclear explosion. Or might pigeon droppings be the culprit?…
The cosmological underpinnings of the noise were finally explained with help from physicists at Princeton University, who had predicted that there might be radiation coming from all directions left over from the Big Bang. The buzzing, it turned out, was just that: a cosmic echo. It confirmed that the universe wasn’t infinitely old and static but rather had begun as a primordial fireball that left the universe bathed in background radiation…
The discovery not only helped cement the cosmos’s grand narrative; it also opened a window through which to investigate the nature of reality — all as a result of that vexing hiss first heard 60 years ago by a couple of junior physicists looking for something else.
Charles Osgood. THR. I feel like I’m giving him the short end of the stick, but there’s really nothing I can add to what others have said about him.
Gary Graham, actor. Other credits include “Crossing Jordan” (the “Quincy” of the 2000s except it sucked), “Walker, Texas Ranger”, and the 2003 “Dragnet”.
Melanie (aka Melanie Safka), who sang at Woodstock. This is another one where there’s not much I can say: pigpen51 may be more familiar with her music than I am.
The only thing I really know about Melanie is her song Brand New Key. You know the tune, most likely.
“I’ve got a brand new pair of roller skates, you’ve got a brand new key”.
The best description of her music other than her being a folk singer would have to be quirky. Her Roller Skates song did get a lot of air play in the late 60’s and early 70’s, if my memory serves me correctly.
The one death that really struck a chord for me was that of Charles Osgood. I remember listening to him on Sunday Mornings w/ Charles Osgood. His smooth voice and calm demeanor in introducing some really interesting subjects always made you want to just sit and listen to whatever he was showcasing at the time.
No doubt a respected professional, he is yet another part of my youth that brings back a feeling of nostalgia and daydreams of a simpler time. It always makes me feel wistful for those much simpler days, which almost could be called quaint when compared to the rush and hurry of today.
Of course the story about the cosmic radiation is important, and the passing of Dr. Penzias is of note. While I am not a scholar of the beginnings of the universe, I am always interested in learning more about it, with the many questions that always accompany such observations.
As a conservative Christian, I actually believe in a young earth, but it is important to keep watch on the body of knowledge about the universe and creation. Often discoveries serve to actually reinforce ideas from the Bible, rather than disprove them.
A very interesting and varied post today. Many thanks, and have a great weekend.