KOHALA — Christian Fisher, a self-professed “astronomy nerd,” loves science and loves technology.
But astronomy especially, he said, “really hits home.”
“It’s the thirst for knowledge, discovering new worlds,” he said. “It’s basically the only new frontier that we have left.”
Fisher, 19, was one of about 750 people who came out Friday evening to the Mauna Lani Bay Hotel &Bungalows to hear from Kip Thorne who is the Richard P. Feynman Professor of Theoretical Physics, Emeritus, at the California Institute of Technology as well as a Nobel laureate.
Thorne was also involved as science advisor for the 2014 science-fiction film, “Interstellar” and the author of “The Science of Interstellar,” a book that explains many of the concepts behind the film’s ideas, and the subject of Friday’s presentation.
The film originally started as a description of the story and science to be explored in the film, written by Thorne and producer Lynda Obst. And while the story changed drastically on its way to becoming the film audiences eventually saw, it still remained grounded in the science.
Throughout his talk to the packed room, Thorne described his involvement with the film and filmmakers, including director Christopher Nolan.
From the outset, Thorne said, he suggested two guidelines: Nothing in the film could violate established laws of physics or knowledge of the universe and any speculation about less understood laws of physics must come from real science.
Nolan agreed and was enthusiastic about those parameters, Thorne said, “as long as it did not get in the way of making a great movie.”
And while he said blockbuster films like Interstellar don’t have very much opportunity to explain the science within them, he said in a conversation with media that they can do something else important.
“In film, the principal thing you can do is to inspire the general public and particularly young people about science,” he said.
Hilton Lewis, W.M. Keck Observatory director, said he appreciates that filmmakers are showing a keen interest in incorporating real science into their movies for audiences, saying stimulating people’s interest in science is critical.
People, he said, often think of science in dry terms, associating them with people in lab coats or equations on chalkboards.
“But it’s nothing like that,” he said. “It’s really a human endeavor. And the creativity it takes to make a blockbuster movie, the creativity it takes to make a new theory of physics — they’re really closely related. It’s the sort of ultimate human activity.”
Lewis said professional researchers can look for ways to connect with the public, such as public talks like the one Friday evening, or visiting schools to talk to students.
“Those are really great ways for us to translate some of the excitement and the curiosity that really drives us,” he said.
And the public, likewise, should take “every opportunity you can” to make use of whatever scientific resources in their community. Locally, he said, that includes the observatories, academic talks and visits to NELHA.
“We’re really blessed in the islands with marine science, volcanology and astronomy,” he said. “There are a lot of opportunities and ways to get involved.”
And he advised people not to get turned off by a preconceived image of science.
“It is really fascinating stuff,” he said.
In addition to being the ‘Interstellar’ science adviser, Thorne is also, in the words of Lewis, “one of the most influential theoretical physicists of our time.”
Thorne is one of three physicists — along with Rainer Weiss at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Barry Barish, also at the California Institute of Technology — who were awarded the 2017 Nobel Prize in physics for their work on the detection and observation of gravitational waves with the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory, or LIGO.
But Thorne was quick to credit the work of the many, many others who contributed to the effort. Given the complexity of the instruments used and data sets involved, an effort of this magnitude requires experts in a wide variety of fields to come together and pull it off, he said.
“It really is a large number of people that deserve the credit,” he said, saying the Nobel Foundation has a responsibility to tell people that certain undertakings “can only be done in a very collaborative way.”
Thorne compared LIGO’s detection of gravitational waves to Galileo’s observation of Jupiter’s moons in 1610, which ushered in a revolution in astronomy.
“Suddenly you had a tool for probing the universe around you in a way that humans were never able to do before,” he said.
That tool, he added, went on to be expanded from optics to radio waves, x-rays and much more.
And because gravitational waves are the only other kind of wave that can propagate across the universe, he said, their detection and observation marks “a complete revolution in our understanding of the universe.”
The effect is the start of multi-messenger astronomy, in which some of the things astronomers will be able to see can be detected and observed with gravitational waves and electromagnetic waves.
And combining those tools means they can reinforce each others’ findings.
Thorne anticipates the next 50 years will bring much more multi-messenger astronomy, with observatories like Keck playing a big role.
After Thorne’s presentation, which included questions and answers with the crowd, audience members said they were thrilled with the chance to attend.
Matthew Brown, a software engineer at W.M. Keck Observatory, said while he came to the speech with a “pretty solid foundation” of the science Thorne discussed, the event was an opportunity to get a deeper understanding from someone so renowned in the field.
“So being able to hear him break down the information — especially to such a simple level — really helped build on my foundation,” he said. “So I feel like I have a better understanding about gravity and gravitational waves coming out of it than I did before. So that was a really fantastic experience.”
