Wednesday, January 28, 2015

Charles H. Townes, renowned physicist and Nobel laureate, dies

Charles H. Townes, the indefatigable Nobel laureate physicist known to the world as the “inventor” of the laser that ultimately led to bar codes in supermarkets and tools to help surgeons in the most delicate operations, died in Berkeley on Tuesday. He was 99.

Dr. Townes was a thoughtful churchgoer, terming himself in interviews a “Protestant Christian and a very progressive one.” He was a member of Berkeley’s First Congregational Church and often emphasized the importance of faith in his life as a physicist. His many essays exploring the relationship between science and religion won him the $1.5 million Templeton Prize for research into those issues.

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Charles-H-Townes-renowned-physicist-and-Nobel-6047011.php

Keith Conning:  Marian Barr and I were married in the First Congregational Church of Berkeley on June 5, 1964.    We celebrated our 50th wedding anniversary last year.  Our three children James, 48, of Dublin, CA; Sarah, 45, of Chicago; and Andrew, 43, of Harvard; were raised in the church. 

Jim Schaal, who is married to Sarah, served as Program Director of Science and the Spiritual Quest, a program of the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences in Berkeley, California. http://ctns.org/ssq/people.html

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