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Alan Lightman on Muck Rack

Alan Lightman

  • American Physicist and Writer
As seen in: The New York Times, The Washington Post, Washington Post Opinions, Yahoo Canada, Goodreads, PBS, TED, TED Ideas Blog, The Atlantic, Scientific American and
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Articles

Brothers in this place: A close encounter with my osprey neighbors

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By Alan Lightman
| Harpswell Anchor Verified
Over the years, I have seen a great many animals near our island summer home in Harpswell: cormorants, gulls, owls, hummingbirds, ospreys, red squirrels, wild turkeys, eagles, crows, terns, occasional woodpeckers, seals, fisher cats, deer (who are surprisingly good swimmers) and vols (who destroy the garden with relish). All of them are part of the local ecosystem. We habitate together. They go about their daily routines, and I go about mine.
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Alan Lightman on his childhood in science

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By Alan Lightman
| Scientific American Verified
In late 1957, around my ninth birthday, the Soviet Union launched the world’s first artificial satellite, called Sputnik. I became entranced with the idea of building a rocket of my own. I imagined the lift-off, the graceful arc of the craft as it careened through space. By the age of 13 or 14 I had started mixing my own rocket fuels. A fuel that burned too fast would explode like a bomb; a fuel that burned too slow would smolder like a barbecue grill.
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The Ordinary Miracle of Existing

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By Alan Lightman
| The Atlantic Verified
On the northwestern shore of Africa, some 150 miles south of the Canary Islands, the coastline slightly bulges in a pimple known as Cape Bojador. For Europeans in the early 15th century, Cape Bojador marked the boundary between the known and the unknown. North of the cape was civilization and the cities of light.
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