Scientists share a love of_____.
By Yifan Xia, 21st Feb 2023
You may have heard of Einstein's love of music, but many scientists, past and present, have found music to be a treasure in their lives, and what stories do they have to tell?
1. Einstein
Einstein's lifelong study and research knowledge: one in physics, the other in music.
Einstein said: "The picture of our world can be made up of the notes of music or the formulas of mathematics."
According to Einstein: "The researches in the fields of music and physics, although they have different origins, are linked by a common goal, and this common goal is the perpetual pursuit of natural beauty, the search for future knowledge; music and physics complement each other, reflecting in different ways the harmony and order of our world.
Einstein not only played the violin but also the piano at a very high level. During the days of his research on the theory of relativity, he would go to the piano and play some logical chord connections with both hands to open his mind when he was not thinking well.
2. Planck
Planck made a major contribution to quantum theory and is considered the founder of "quantum physics".
He had a good musical education from childhood and was good at playing the piano in a deep and quiet style. Although he did not choose music as a career, his love of the piano remained with him throughout his life.
Planck once said: "Music not only helps me to get rid of fatigue but also helps me to think scientifically about the physical quantum singularity".
3. Bohr
His outstanding contributions are the quantum orbital model of the atom and the principle of complementarity in interpreting quantum mechanics. These two exceptional scientific achievements are also at the heart of his scientific aesthetic ideas.
Bohr once said: "My personal experience is that many scientists and engineers are well educated and love the art of music; when I was young I played the piano very well." From Bohr's remark, we can understand the importance of musical art in scientific research.
4. Osterwalder
He made significant contributions to electrochemistry, chemical equilibrium and catalysis, and was also an amateur pianist. Piano works by Bach, Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven were among the pieces he loved to play.
5. Siguang Li
People know Siguang Li as a famous geologist, but few people know that he was also extremely interested in music and had a high musical quality, even the first violin piece ever written in China was composed by him.
Siguang Li learned to play the violin while studying in England in 1915, and his violin piece "The Difficult Journey", composed in Paris in 1920, was the first violin piece written by a Chinese. This was not proven until the discovery of Siguang Li’s manuscript of the composition "Walking on the Road" in the early 1990s, correcting the claim that Sicong Ma was the earliest Chinese violin composer.
6. Xuesen Qian
The famous scholar Xuesen Qian was rich in the cultivation of many kinds of art and liked to play the piano; his wife was Ying Jiang, a famous singer and professor at the Central Conservatory of Music. He once said: "When I have difficulties with a piece and can't understand it, it is often Ying Jiang’s singing that enlightens me…I want to emphasize the point that literature with science and technology interact with each other."
7. Longping Yuan
Academician Yuan Longping once said, "Besides scientific research, what I love most is music". He believes that the violin can make "the most soulful sound" and that music is the warmth that accompanies him throughout his life.
8. Youyou Tu
Tu Youyou is the first Chinese scientist and pharmacist to win the Nobel Prize in Science and the first Chinese scientist to win the Nobel Prize in Physiology. It is the highest award ever received by the Chinese medical profession and the highest award for the achievements of Chinese medicine.
When we celebrated the Nobel Prize in Medicine, we were even more surprised to find out that Professor Tu Youyou is also a music lover.
And when the press interview called for a cover photo, 85-year-old Grandma Tu chose not to stand in front of the trophy and the certificate of honour, but sat gracefully on a piano stool and leaned against an antique piano for the photo.