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Culture, history and society

Culture, history and society

The ethical dilemmas of renaming scientific principles that honour fallen idols

26 Dec 2022 Robert P Crease

It might seem right to rename scientific principles that honour physicists who have done bad things. But doing so raises ethical questions, says Robert P Crease

Still of the film Tár showing Cate Blanchett conducting
Human impact Like the main protagonist in the movie Tár, there are physicists who have soared and fallen – but should we cut their names from history? (Courtesy: LANDMARK MEDIA / Alamy Stock Photo)
Tár is a fictional film about a classical-music conductor who soars and crashes. Released in 2022,

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Robert P Crease is a professor in the Department of Philosophy, Stony Brook University, US and writes the monthly Critical Point column for Physics World, robertpcrease.com, e-mail robert.crease@stonybrook.edu. His latest book is The Leak: Politics, Activists, and Loss of Trust at Brookhaven National Laboratory
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