George Ellis
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| George Ellis | |
| Born | August 11, 1939 Johannesburg, South Africa |
|---|---|
| Residence |  South Africa |
| Nationality | South African |
| Fields | Cosmology |
| Institutions | University of Cape Town; previously University of Cambridge and SISSA |
| Alma mater | Michaelhouse, Cape Town and Cambridge |
| Doctoral advisor | Dennis W. Sciama |
| Doctoral students | John M. Stewart Malcolm A.H. MacCallum Andrew R. King Roy Maartens Marco Bruni Henk van Elst Tim Gebbie Jeffrey Murugan Ulrich Kirchner |
| Known for | Theoretical physical cosmology |
| Notable awards | Templeton Prize 2004 |
| Religious stance | Quaker |
George F. R. Ellis, FRS, (born August 11, 1939) is the Distinguished Professor of Complex Systems in the Department of Mathematics and Applied Mathematics at the University of Cape Town in South Africa. He co-authored The Large Scale Structure of Space-Time with University of Cambridge physicist Stephen Hawking, published in 1973, and is considered one of the world's leading theorists in cosmology. He is an active Quaker and in 2004 he won the Templeton Prize[1]. From 1989 to 1992 he served as President of the International Society on General Relativity and Gravitation. Currently he is President of the International Society for Science and Religion.
Ellis was a vocal opponent of apartheid during the National Party reign in the 1970s and 1980s, and it is during this period that Ellis' research has focused on the more philosophical aspects of cosmology, for which he won the Templeton Prize. He was also awarded the Star of South Africa (Decoration) by Nelson Mandela, in 1999. On May 18, 2007, he was elected a Fellow of the British Royal Society.
In 2005 Ellis appeared as a guest speaker at the Nobel Conference in St. Peter, Minnesota.
Contents |
[edit] Ideas
George Ellis proposed a model universe that contains a naked singularity as a recycling mechanism, which he claims gives almost as good a description of the real universe as the conventional model.
The Ellis universe is like a cylinder-shaped universe, except that the Earth is located on one side and a naked singularity on the other. There is no cosmic inflation – the galaxies are arranged very unevenly, with a great deal of material crowded round the singularity, and very little near the Earth. The effect of such a distribution of matter is to produce a red shift of light that, at the Earth, has the same characteristics as if the galaxies were receding.
In terms of philosophy of science, Ellis is a Platonist.
[edit] Publications
[edit] Books
- (with Stephen Hawking): Hawking, S.W.; Ellis, G.F.R. (1973). The Large Scale Structure of Space-Time. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-20016-4.
- (with David Dewar): Low Income Housing Policy in South Africa, Urban Problems Research Unit, UCT, 1979.
- (with Ruth Williams): Flat and Curved Space Times, Oxford University Press, 1988, revised 2000.
- Before the Beginning, Bowerdean/Marion Boyars, 1993.
- (with A Lanza and J Miller): The Renaissance of General Relativity and Cosmology. University Press, Cambridge 1993; paperback, 2005.
- Science Research Policy in South Africa, Royal Society of South Africa, 1994.
- (with Nancey Murphy): On The Moral Nature of the universe: Cosmology, Theology, and Ethics. Fortress Press, 1996.
- (with John Wainwright, Eds.): (1997) in Wainwright, J.; Ellis, G.F.R.: Dynamical Systems in Cosmology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-55457-8.
- (with Peter Coles): Is The Universe Open or Closed? The Density of Matter in the Universe. Cambridge University Press, 1997.
- (Ed.): The Far Future Universe. Templeton Foundation Press, 2002.
[edit] Papers
Ellis has over 500 published articles[2] including 17 in Nature. Notable papers include:
- "Cosmological perturbations and the physical meaning of gauge-invariant variables" (with Marco Bruni, Peter K. S. Dunsby) The Astrophysical Journal, volume 395 (1992) - cited 117 times.
- "Cosmological models (Cargèse Lectures 1998)" (with Henk van Elst) - Cited 93 times
- "The case for an open Universe" in Nature 370, 609 - 615 (25 August 1994) (Cited 60 times)
- A paper in Nature arguing that physics has no adequate explanation of design
[edit] Notes and references
- ^ Templeton Prize for Progress Toward Research or Discoveries about Spiritual Realities
- ^ see Google Scholar
[edit] External links
- George Ellis' web page
- Professor George Ellis: a man of many parts, Cape Argus, March 18, 2004
- George Ellis' scientific work as listed at SPIRES
- Radio interview on Philosophy Talk
- Interview with George Ellis (Recorded June 2004) on Speaking of Faith with Krista Tippett
See also the transcript of the above radio interview ...
| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| NAME | Ellis, George |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION | South African Cosmologist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | August 11, 1939 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Johannesburg, South Africa |
| DATE OF DEATH | |
| PLACE OF DEATH | |
