Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
A physicist and astronomer who, as a student, discovered pulsars — a find that some believed should have earned her a share of the Nobel Prize.
On the island
Eight records
It's like the night sky. It gives me tingles.
Horn Concerto No. 2 in E-flat major, K. 417
Timothy Brown, Academy of St Martin in the Fields and Iona Brown
I came across Iona Brown quite early in my life. She and I were both at Southampton at the same time. And I became a fan and have followed her career.
Academic Festival Overture, Op. 80
Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Daniel Barenboim
It's an academic one. It's Brahms' setting of the student song Gaudiamus Igitur. Which has all the energy of student life in it.
Reel of the 51st Highland Division
1st Battalion of the 51st Highland Volunteers
The idea of being isolated in some way and putting your energies into devising a Scottish country dance, I think would enhearten me hugely.
Va, pensiero (Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves)Favourite
Chorus and Orchestra of La Scala Milan and Riccardo Muti
These are the Hebrews in exile in slavery. And homesick. And you can hear their homesickness coming over them and then they recover a bit and then another wave comes over them and then they perk up a bit and so on. It's so true to life, it's great.
Bless the Lord, O My Soul (from All-Night Vigil, Op. 37)
Corydon Singers and Matthew Best
Rachmaninoff's Vespers are to remind me of that experience in the Soviet Union. and hearing hours and hours and hours of Russian Orthodox liturgy. Glorious.
Serenade for Solo Violin, Strings, Harp and Percussion
Hilary Hahn, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and David Zinman
Hilary Hahn. She's a very young American. I heard her play live. And she was amazing, and I wrote in my diary, This nineteen-year-old will go places.
The Protecting Veil: Eternal Memory
Steven Isserlis, Moscow Virtuosi and Vladimir Spivakov
His music I find quite touching, it gets somewhere deep within one. And I think that would be good to have on a desert island.
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:01Is it very daunting working in such an infinite field [as astronomy]?
It can be both daunting and dangerous working with these big, big things. Daunting for the obvious reason the scale and how minute we are. Dangerous because it can go to your head. You're working with this grand stuff. And you find something, come across something, and the danger is that you assume you're working with something cosmic, when in fact what you're working with is a flaw in your equipment.
Presenter asks
4:10Can it really be true, Jocelyn, that you went into radio astronomy because it meant you didn't have to work by night?
Yes, it's absolutely true. … As a teenager I needed my bed. I still do, but I'm getting better at it.
Presenter asks
6:10When did you begin to spot that there was something interesting going on [with the radio telescope]?
Very soon afterwards, within the first month or so. There began to be a funny signal that I couldn't properly place.
The keepsakes
The book
Fyodor Dostoevsky
I believe it's a book That has many layers of meaning in it, many levels. I've meant to read it for years, never have. I think this is the opportunity to read it and re-read it.
The luxury
a book on how to sketch and a generous supply of paper and sketching materials
I've always wanted to improve my drawing and sketching skills, so I'd like a book on how to sketch and a generous supply of paper and sketching materials.
Presenter asks
12:16Did you feel miffed about not getting any credit for [the discovery of pulsars] yourself?
No. Um, first of all, there is no Nobel Prize for Astronomy. And this was the very first time that the people that allocate the physics prize had decided that astronomers could be counted in. And I was very flattered that my stars were seen as the first astronomical physics prize.
Presenter asks
15:21What was the first manifestation of [being exorcised by gender]?
About age 18 months. I was the eldest child in my family, the next child was a boy. We were living in Northern Ireland, but we had a lot of um Irish people around us. And the new baby and I would be taken out for a walk by the nanny, who would meet up with some other nannies who would say, Isn't it marvellous that Mrs Bell now has a son? In my hearing. Because in Irish society the men count and the women don't.
Presenter asks
27:37How can you reconcile [science and belief in God]?
I do find that both sit comfortably, provided I am not required to carry with me all the baggage that sometimes is attached to the Christian God. … Yes, I do believe in a God, I do sense the presence of God, but I don't require God to be the Creator. Nor do I require God to be in control of the world.
“If you took a big cathedral like Saint Paul's or Westminster Abbey, cleared everything out, put two or three grains of sand in that cathedral. Then the cathedral would be more densely packed with sand than space is with stars.”
“We still had a rather more hierarchical image of science as being done by a great man, and it nearly always was a man. with a load of minions under him who did what he told them to and didn't think.”
“It was traditional at that time that whenever a woman entered a lecture theatre, all the men stamped, thumped the benches, whistled, catcall. So for my final two years of university, every class I went into, I had to face that kind of barrage.”
“I noticed at the time that people were much more willing to congratulate me on my engagement. Then congratulate me on making a major astrophysical discovery.”