dotlah! dotlah!
  • Cities
  • Technology
  • Business
  • Politics
  • Society
  • Science
  • About
Social Links
  • zedreviews.com
  • citi.io
  • aster.cloud
  • liwaiwai.com
  • guzz.co.uk
  • atinatin.com
0 Likes
0 Followers
0 Subscribers
dotlah!
  • Cities
  • Technology
  • Business
  • Politics
  • Society
  • Science
  • About
  • People
  • Technology

Oppenheimer: July 28 Panel Discussion Focuses On The Man Behind The Movie

  • July 19, 2023
J. Robert Oppenheimer (left) and the actor Cillian Murphy, who plays Oppenheimer in the new film. (Photo credits: Atomic Archive and Universal Pictures, respectively)
Total
0
Shares
0
0
0
J. Robert Oppenheimer (left) and the actor Cillian Murphy, who plays Oppenheimer in the new film. (Photo credits: Atomic Archive and Universal Pictures, respectively)

The story behind the summer blockbuster movie Oppenheimer, which opens across the nation on Friday, July 21, began at the University of California, Berkeley.

A 25-year-old J. Robert Oppenheimer arrived at UC Berkeley in fall 1929 as an assistant professor, and over the next dozen years established one of the greatest schools of theoretical physics in the U.S. — one that continues to this day. He made UC Berkeley’s physics department the center of American thought about the new field of quantum mechanics and how to apply it to atoms, nuclei and even neutron stars.

He and Ernest O. Lawrence, who made the campus the go-to place for experimental particle physics with his work on the atom-smashing cyclotron, were instrumental in raising the alarm that the Germans could be trying to develop an atomic bomb, and that the U.S. should do the same.

The three-hour movie, directed by Christopher Nolan and partly filmed at UC Berkeley, follows Oppenheimer through his leadership of the Manhattan Project to develop the first nuclear weapons and his subsequent humiliation when the Atomic Energy Commission stripped him of his security clearance in 1954 because of claims that he was a Communist sympathizer and an unreliable adviser.

To provide a different perspective on that history, four UC Berkeley faculty members and a nuclear physicist from Los Alamos National Laboratory will assemble for a panel discussion at 11:30 a.m. on Friday, July 28, to discuss Oppenheimer’s pre-war UC Berkeley years and his scientific and human legacy.

The public can register here for the in-person-only event in Chevron Auditorium at International House in Berkeley.

Christopher Nolan brought his film crew to UC Berkeley in May 2022 to film scenes for the movie Oppenheimer, opening July 21, 2023, across the U.S. Along Campanile Way, cast members seen in 1930s attire include Josh Hartnett (gray suit) playing Berkeley professor E. O. Lawrence, and Cillian Murphy (brown suit, seen from rear), playing J. Robert Oppenheimer, the Berkeley theoretical physicist who led the Manhattan Project to develop an atomic bomb. (Photo credit: Brittany Hosea-Small)

Christopher Nolan brought his film crew to UC Berkeley in May 2022 to film scenes for the movie Oppenheimer, opening July 21, 2023, across the U.S. Along Campanile Way, cast members seen in 1930s attire include Josh Hartnett (gray suit) playing Berkeley professor E. O. Lawrence, and Cillian Murphy (brown suit, seen from rear), playing J. Robert Oppenheimer, the Berkeley theoretical physicist who led the Manhattan Project to develop an atomic bomb. (Photo credit: Brittany Hosea-Small)

The discussion will be moderated by Cathryn Carson, UC Berkeley professor of history and a specialist in the history of 20th century physics, including its cultural, social and political contexts. She co-edited a volume of papers about Oppenheimer, Reappraising Oppenheimer: Centennial Studies and Reflections, that was presented during a 2004 conference celebrating the 100th anniversary of his birth.

Carson will be joined by Jon Else, UC Berkeley professor emeritus of journalism and longtime director of the documentary program at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism. Else directed the 1981 documentary, The Day After Trinity: J. Robert Oppenheimer and the Atomic Bomb, which was the first documentary about Oppenheimer’s role in the Manhattan Project. Trinity was Oppenheimer’s name for the first-ever test of an atom bomb, which lit up the night sky in the New Mexico desert on July 16, 1945.

The participants in the July 28 panel are Cathryn Carson, Mark Chadwick, Jon Else, Yasunori Nomura and Karl van Bibber.

The participants in the July 28 panel are Cathryn Carson, Mark Chadwick, Jon Else, Yasunori Nomura and Karl van Bibber.

Also participating in the July 28 discussion will be two physicists: Yasunori Nomura, professor of physics and director of the Berkeley Center for Theoretical Physics; and Karl van Bibber, a professor of nuclear engineering who spent 25 years conducting nuclear energy research at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

Mark Chadwick, chief scientist and chief operating officer for weapons physics at Los Alamos National Laboratory, will round out the panel. In 2021, he edited and published a suite of papers on the technical history of the Trinity test, written on the occasion of its 75th anniversary.

They’ll delve into Oppenheimer’s impact on quantum mechanics and quantum field theory, the school of theoretical physics he created at UC Berkeley — where he supervised 25 Ph.D. students and many more postdoctoral fellows — and the left-leaning milieu at UC Berkeley that made it an unusual place from which to select the director of a top secret government project.

“However unexpected his colleagues found his appointment at Los Alamos, its spectacular accomplishments came to stand for the Manhattan Project at large,” Carson wrote in an introduction to the centennial volume. “Then his postwar apotheosis epitomized the physicists’ entry into positions of power, just as the McCarthy-era stripping of his security clearance defined their political bounds.”

Christopher Nolan’s five-minute Opening Look trailer for his new film, Oppenheimer. The movie, from Universal Pictures, arrives in theaters July 21, 2023.

The movie is based on American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer, a book published in 2005 that won the Pulitzer Prize for authors Kai Bird and Martin Sherwin. That book and numerous others have contributed to what Else refers to as the “mythologizing” of Oppenheimer, not only for his incredible accomplishment at Los Alamos, but for his tragic fall from grace. Oppenheimer died from throat cancer in 1967. Only last year did the U.S. government vacate the decision to strip him of security clearance.

In the movie, the intense, chain-smoking Oppenheimer is portrayed by Irish actor Cillian Murphy. Other UC Berkeley luminaries are also portrayed: Ernest O. Lawrence (played by Josh Hartnett); physicist and future Nobel laureate Luis Alvarez (played by Alex Wolff); Frank Oppenheimer (played by Dylan Arnold), a Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory physicist who later founded the Exploratorium in San Francisco; and Haakon Chevalier (played by Jefferson Hall), the professor of French literature whose Communist sympathies entangled Oppenheimer in a web of suspicions about the physicist’s own ties to the Communist Party of the United States of America.

Other key protagonists are Oppenheimer’s wife, Kitty (played by Emily Blunt), who was a biologist and mother of their two children; and Oppenheimer’s ex-lover, Jean Tatlock, the daughter of a UC Berkeley literature professor (played by Florence Pugh).

Total
0
Shares
Share
Tweet
Share
Share
Related Topics
  • Christopher Nolan
  • Movie
  • Oppenheimer
  • Physics
  • UC Berkeley
majulah

Previous Article
Parliament Hall by Frederick Koberl
  • Features
  • People
  • Technology

Inside International Institutions And Their Hierarchy

  • July 17, 2023
View Post
Next Article
singapore-passport--1305469798-2-2_cover_1500x1250
  • Cities
  • Features
  • People

Major Shake-Up in World’s Passport Power Ranking

  • July 19, 2023
View Post
You May Also Like
View Post
  • Cities
  • Technology

Meralco PowerGen’s PacificLight starts up 100 MW fast-response plant in Singapore

  • dotlah.com
  • June 20, 2025
View Post
  • Technology

Apple services deliver powerful features and intelligent updates to users this autumn

  • Dean Marc
  • June 12, 2025
View Post
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Machine Learning
  • Technology

Apple supercharges its tools and technologies for developers to foster creativity, innovation, and design

  • Dean Marc
  • June 11, 2025
View Post
  • Technology
  • Working Life

It’s time to stop debating whether AI is genuinely intelligent and focus on making it work for society

  • dotlah.com
  • June 8, 2025
View Post
  • People
  • Politics

Singapore PM Wong arrives in Malacañang

  • dotlah.com
  • June 4, 2025
oracle-ibm
View Post
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Technology

IBM and Oracle Expand Partnership to Advance Agentic AI and Hybrid Cloud

  • Dean Marc
  • May 6, 2025
View Post
  • Featured
  • Features
  • People

Conclave: How A New Pope Is Chosen

  • Dean Marc
  • April 25, 2025
View Post
  • Software
  • Technology

Canonical Releases Ubuntu 25.04 Plucky Puffin

  • Dean Marc
  • April 17, 2025


Trending
  • 1
    • Lah!
    Enterprises To Benefit As Singapore Furthers IP Cooperation With The Republic Of Korea
    • July 2, 2020
  • 2
    • Animals
    • Cities
    • Environment
    • People
    Outbreaks Like Coronavirus Start In And Spread From The Edges Of Cities
    • February 18, 2020
  • Acer 3
    • Technology
    Acer’s New Swift Go and Aspire Vero 16 Laptops Feature New Intel Core Ultra 200H Series Processors and Sustainable Designs
    • January 6, 2025
  • 4
    • People
    Here’s What To Do If You’re A Victim Of Medical Malpractice
    • September 1, 2020
  • 5
    • Cities
    • Lah!
    Westgate Reopens With Enhanced Precautionary Measures To Safeguard Public Health
    • June 11, 2021
  • 6
    • Cities
    • Technology
    New Ideas To Feed A Growing Island
    • March 8, 2018
  • 7
    • Cities
    PSA And A*STAR Collaborate On Smart, Scalable Solutions For Managing Automated Guided Vehicle (AGV) Fleets In Preparation For Tuas Port
    • March 3, 2022
  • 8
    • Lah!
    ICA To Trial Beta Version Of “SG Arrival Card” E-Service And Mobile Application With Selected Transport Operators
    • August 15, 2019
  • 9
    • Cities
    • Science
    • Technology
    Singapore Marshalls R&D Efforts To Combat Covid-19
    • April 10, 2020
  • 10
    • Lah!
    Sembcorp Industries Launches Sembcorp Energy For Good Fund With Initial Injection Of S$1.5 Million
    • September 22, 2020
  • new orleans 11
    • Cities
    Paris and New Orleans – The Two Cities that Helped Roulette Become a Global Phenomenon
    • December 9, 2020
  • 12
    • Technology
    ​NTU Singapore Teams Up With Association For Persons With Special Needs And YOOZOO Games To Create Apps That Aid In Learning Social And Emotional Intelligence
    • November 19, 2020
Trending
  • 1
    Meralco PowerGen’s PacificLight starts up 100 MW fast-response plant in Singapore
    • June 20, 2025
  • 2
    A Father’s Day Gift for Every Pop and Papa
    • June 14, 2025
  • 3
    Apple services deliver powerful features and intelligent updates to users this autumn
    • June 12, 2025
  • 4
    Apple supercharges its tools and technologies for developers to foster creativity, innovation, and design
    • June 11, 2025
  • 5
    It’s time to stop debating whether AI is genuinely intelligent and focus on making it work for society
    • June 8, 2025
  • 6
    PBBM asks Singapore to invest more in PH renewable energy projects
    • June 6, 2025
  • 7
    Singapore PM Wong arrives in Malacañang
    • June 4, 2025
  • 8
    Renewable energy, carbon credits are priority areas of cooperation for Singapore, Philippines: Lawrence Wong
    • June 4, 2025
  • 9
    Singapore businesses eye more investments in PH, says PM Wong
    • June 4, 2025
  • 10
    The Summer Adventures : Hiking and Nature Walks Essentials
    • June 3, 2025
Social Links
dotlah! dotlah!
  • Cities
  • Technology
  • Business
  • Politics
  • Society
  • Science
  • About
Connecting Dots Across Asia's Tech and Urban Landscape

Input your search keywords and press Enter.