I. I. Rabi As Educator and Science Warrior

SEP 01, 1999

Rabi the educator argued passionately for science as an integral component of our culture. For Rabi the statesman, Benjamin Franklin was the figure in American history most worthy of emulation.

DOI: 10.1063/1.882811

Gerald Holton

Isi dor Isaac (known to the world simply as I. I.) Rabi was, first of all, a superb physicist. He headed a marvel ously productive laboratory at Columbia University, with brilliant students and postdocs. During World War II, he was associate director of the MIT Radiation Laboratory and a senior adviser to J. Robert Oppenheimer at Los Alamos, After the war, he continued to work as a physicist, and as a consultant to government, laboratories, and international organizations. He became a most respected senior statesman of science. Always the voice of reason and of moral authority, he sometimes succeeded in hiding his commitment behind his down‐to‐earth humor.

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References

1. I. I. Rabi, Science: The Center of Culture, World Publishing, New York (1970).
2. A. Einstein, “Autobiographical Notes,” in Albert Einstein: Philosopher Scientist, R. A. Schilpp, ed., Library of Living Philosophers, Evanston Ill. (1949), pp. 3–5.
3. G Holton, F. J. Rutherford, F. Watson, Project Physics Course, Holt, Rinehart & Winston, New York (1970, 1981), preface.
4. John S. Rigden, Rabi, Scientist and Citizen, Basic Books, New York 119871, pp. 257–59.
5. American Physical Society, American Philosophical Society, Quantum Physics Oral History Project, Interview with I. I. Rabi, 8 December 1963. (Courtesy of Archives for the History of Quantum Physics, Center for History of Physics, American Institute of Physics, College Park, Md.).
6. Jeremy Bernstein, Exploring Science, Basic Books, New York (1978), p. 46.
7. A Festschrift for I. I. Rabi, L. Motz ed., New York Academy of Sciences(1977) p. 13.

More about the authors

Gerald Holton, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts.