RocketSTEM Issue #7 - May 2014 | Page 10

RocketSTEM: Why physics? Were you curious as a child? Did that curiosity guide you gracefully towards your career path? Brian GREENE: “It was a pretty seamless path. When I was a little kid I was completely fascinated by numbers, so I was kind of a math kid. A little later on I learned that math was more than just something you played with – that it could be used to describe how the world works - and that was a pivotal moment for me. I carried on that trajectory of applying mathematics to understand the physical universe, then as a grad student using math for some of the more esoteric and far-out ideas Credit: Steve Jurvetson I worked on and continue to work on, and that pretty RS: What was a challenge you overcame to get where you are, something that people can relate to? GREENE: “Well, physics is challenging every minute of every day. I like to think of it the following way: we have certain mental abilities that were largely formed in response to our need to survive. When we were in the jungle learning survival skills, really understanding how the world works and the mathematics of the underlying reality wasn’t useful. What was useful was the ability to run fast enough to catch your dinner. What we do in physics is, in some way, going against the grain of evolution. We are really trying to push our minds into a place that they weren’t easy for students to learn physics and it’s not easy for physicists to do physics, but the ideas are so to push onward, and push through those challenges. So I encourage all students to push through those challenges and recognize that they aren’t alone – even professionals are constantly scratching their heads, working RS: What is a really cool fact about you – something that no one would expect? GREENE: “Well, I don’t know if it’s a ‘cool’ or ‘curious’ fact, but I am vegan. I don’t eat anything of animal origin. When I was nine years old, I was a city kid, so I didn’t know where meat came from; it was just this stuff that came packaged from the supermarket. and that made the connection for was obvious all the sudden and that sickened me. So, I stopped eating meat at that age, but I still ate dairy. years ago, I went to an animal 08 08 www.RocketSTEM .org