Philip Morrison - "Newton Among the Quasars", 1975 February 2

The Karl Taylor Compton Lecture Series at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) was established in 1957 to honor Karl Taylor Compton, who served as president of MIT from 1930 to 1948 and chairman of the MIT Corporation from 1948 to 1954. The purpose of the lectureship is to bring to the campus “scholars noted for their universality of thought and influence on human values.” The lecturers are chosen from a broad spectrum of fields, including science, philosophy, religion, education, and the humanities. This collection contains correspondence and background material about the lectures; and audio tapes of the lectures of Otto Struve (1959), Andre Lwoff (1960), John Kemeny (1980), Freeman Dyson (1982), and Isidor I. Rabi (1962). Also included are tapes of the panel discussion “40 Years After: Los Alamos, MIT, and the Bomb” by men who worked in MIT’s Radiation Laboratory or on the Manhattan Project: Francis Low, Victor Weisskopf, Martin Deutsch, Bernard Feld, Anthony French, D. H. Frisch, Philip Morrison, Cyril S. Smith, Jerome Weisner, and Jerrold Zacharias.

Further information about some of the lectures:

1957 - Niels Bohr – The Tech 77, no. 38 (November 5, 1957)

1959 - Otto Struve – Technology Review 62 (1959-1960), January, p. 11

1960 - Andre Lwoff – Technology Review, June 1960, p. 23

1962 - Isador I. Rabi – Technology Review 64 (1961-1962)

1969 - Hubert H. Humphrey - The Tech 89, no. 17 (April 15, 1969)

1972 - Jerome Bruner – The Tech, April 4, 1972

1975 - György Kepes - President's Report 1976, p. 68

1978 - Linus Pauling – The Tech 98, November 21, 1978

1980 - John Kemeny – Article based on lecture in Technology Review (June/July 1980, p. 65

1989 - Yasuhiro Nakasone - MIT Office of the President Records (AC 180), box 117.

1993 - John Armstrong - President's Report, 1994

1997 - Oscar Arias Sanchez - MIT News Office

1998 - John H. Gibbons - The Tech 118, no. 53 (October 27, 1998)

Some of the more recent lectures are available on MIT’s Compton Lecture website at https://compton.mit.edu/speakers