Great series from @PhysicsWorld on scientists (nearly all women) overlooked for a Nobel. Additional reason that Meitner was overlooked: as a refugee in Sweden, she was working in Manne Siegbahn's lab... 1/
Siegbahn was a physics Nobelist, very influential in the higher echelons of Swedish science and, apparently, a notorious misogynist (see Ruth Lewin Sime's ace biog) who was resentful about Meitner's presence.
Sime's quarter-century old biography is a compelling portrait of Meitner's life-- including a record of the many many slights she endured during her life at the hands of some of her closest colleagues-slights we now commonly call microaggressions and gaslighting. 3/
After the atom bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the press called her the 'Jewish mother of the bomb' -- even though she refused to work on the Manhattan project and was a life-long pacifist 4/
After the Nobel was awarded to her former colleagues for the discovery of fission, she continued her research on a shoestring budget and never regained her professorship.
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1/ Thread on Sweden, #coronavirus, the mathematician John von Neumann and the war that didn’t occur
2/ Von Neumann helped invent, among other things, the modern computer, game theory and the atom bomb. He predicted WWII, the Holocaust, that France would be overrun quickly, that the US would enter the war when UK struggled...
3/ One of his predictions, however, was that there would be a catastrophic nuclear war with the Soviet Union before 1950. He advocated pre-emptive war-a massive nuclear strike on Russia before it could get the bomb
1/ Some thoughts on medium/long term 'exit strategy'. I can't see one without significant drawbacks if, as seems likely, relatively small proportion of population infected with #coronavirus. Very happy to be corrected. Possibilities...
2/ Option A: Slowly lift lockdown measures when peak has subsided eg send kids back to school, reopen shops - but continue social distancing. This will result in second wave of infections, which would have to be followed by another lockdown lasting weeks...
3/ ..There might have to be a third cycle of lockdowns before vaccine arrives. Given economic devastation caused by first lockdown, I can't see UK/US/EU governments going down this route.
Fun #Boris fact. About 13 years ago, when I was news ed at @ResFortnight, we sent a reporter along to interview the then shadow higher education minister about universities and science policy. It was a total farce. He neither knew nor cared one jot....
@ResFortnight At one point, he blustered (approximately), "Well you clearly know more about this than I do, Why don't you tell me what our policies should be."
@ResFortnight Universities and research, I've always believed, are incredibly important-economically and socially. I was naive enough at the time to be shocked at such blatant disregard of the issues that I still regard as central to Britain's future.