Avi Blizovsky
The letter of the Chairman of the Association for Astronomy, Yigal Fatal, in Walla's science forum:
On Friday, the association's conference was held. The conference has been held almost every year since the founding conference of the association in May 1951 and has been held continuously since 1976 until today. The lectures at the current conference dealt with many areas, some of which were mentioned by my friend Dr. Issachari. Among them is an interesting lecture by Prof. Ari Laur from the Technion on massive black holes. Prof. Laor is one of the examples of active members of the association or the observatory in Givatayim who have reached the degrees of doctorate and professorship and there are (in the last two decades alone) more than 10 of these! (not to mention those with first and second degrees) In my humble opinion, it is difficult to find a similar body in Israel that produces so many graduates with such high qualities (and with such meager budgets).
And back to the point. The lectures were on different topics,
Space: Col. Yitzhak Mayo, before the launch of the shuttle that will carry the first Israeli astronaut.
Astrophysics and planetary sciences: Prof. Ari Laur (massive black holes) and Prof. Dina Prielnik-Kovacs (comets-the connection with the past).
Physics: the combined lecture of Dr. Avshalom Elitzur and Shahar Dolev (also an active association member who met Avshalom Elitzur at one of our previous conferences and is now finishing his doctorate) on the subject of time and quantum mechanics.
History of science: Dr. Raz Chen, who dealt with the history of science (Kepler's reference to optical issues in astronomical observations), an extremely important subject that, in my opinion, is quite neglected in Israel and deserves more attention.
But the most important of all: the association, which has hundreds of members, among them many young people, is one of the few associations in Israel whose members all carry out their activities - without exception - on a voluntary basis and without receiving any salary. In addition, it should be noted that all the lecturers mentioned above appeared at the association's conference fully voluntarily (and it should also be said enthusiastically).
There is no doubt that the association's activity is extremely important, especially when the scientific subject has lost its importance in the education system in recent years. And the association, like other associations in other areas of Israeli society, tries to fill the void (literally...) left by the governmental system.
Members who wish to join the activities of the association or learn about the activities of the observatory in Givatayim are invited to look at the website of the association that appears in the link.
See you in the next activity - already next Friday - observation of the Geminid shower.
And here is the passage by Dr. David Isshachari Alin that Fatal refers to: "Regarding Prof. Dina Kovac's lecture on comets. She showed that comets are ancient bodies from the days of the creation of the solar system and perhaps those that literally "froze" from the beginning. Being bodies that contain water, organic material and exposed to solar radiation (although a temperature of only about 3 degrees Kelvin or more, but under radiation, it is possible And the processes of prebiotic chemistry that led to the creation of life began there."
So the abstract concept of the "primordial sea" also includes the "sea" of the Kuiper belt and the Oort cloud? And there is a theory that the source of the water here is in comets that came from there.
Maybe this is a research topic in the comet physics laboratory? To conduct experiments in "pre-biochemistry" in the ice of comets under radiation?
Regarding Dr. Avshalom Elitzur's lecture. It's a shame because he tried to boil all the "history of time" in the twentieth century into one lecture,
In this way, he managed not to explain the basic problems to those who are not familiar with the field, nor to let those who are familiar with the innovations, which he and the future Dr. Shahar Dolev, are dealing with today. In short - you caught a lot - you didn't, and it's a shame because he is an excellent lecturer.
It is interesting that he referred to the "aspect experiment" ("a bunch of Frenchmen" in his language) as valid, contrary to the opinion raised here in the forum in the recent past.
The interesting point was in Prof. Hawking's proposal to "save causality" in that evaporating black bodies hide information and thus provide an arrow of causality for a time that was recently questioned both in the lecture itself, in the book by Hugh-Fries (the arrow of time and the Archimedes point), and certain physicists from the Yakir Aaronov school ( and Dr. Elitzur as his student among them).
In my humble opinion, science must lead to a causal picture of the universe, because it starts from the basic premise of causality, and as long as science does not collapse under logical contradictions, within its framework - there must be causality.
In general, the association that is actually engaged in the popularization of science, and maintains regular activities for the general public, is to be congratulated, something that no other academic body does, regularly and over time, they came up and succeeded.
The website of the Israeli Astronomical Society
https://www.hayadan.org.il/BuildaGate4/general2/data_card.php?Cat=~~~392671882~~~56&SiteName=hayadan
