56 | New Scientist | 3 August 2019
The back pages The Q&A
Quantum physicist and broadcaster
Jim Al-Khalili on oil painting, the nature
of space-time and why he once wanted
to play football for Leeds UnitedAs a child, what did you want
to do when you grew up?
As a young boy, I wanted to be an inventor.
But by my teens, I had decided that I also wanted
to be a rock star and to play for Leeds United.
So yeah, not very ambitious then!Explain what you do in one easy paragraph.
I am an explainer. As a professor of quantum
physics, I conduct research into the tiniest
particles that make up the world. I also spend
about half of my time communicating scientific
ideas to the wider public. It keeps me busy.
No time to play for Leeds United.What do you love most about what you do?
I get as much pleasure explaining complex
scientific concepts as I do in finding them out
for myself in my research. But probably my
greatest love is writing.Sum up your life in a one-sentence
elevator pitch...
I’ve always been curious about the universe and
have been lucky enough to pursue a career that
has allowed me to find answers. But more
importantly, I have a loving, happy family that
I really am far more proud of than any of
my scientific achievements.What’s the most exciting thing you’re
working on right now?
We have just written a paper on the foundations
of quantum mechanics. We are trying to
understand how quantum systems like atoms
do what they do. Our work, I hope, will have
implications in a new field of science that I am
working in, called quantum biology – basically,
what distinguishes life from non-life and does
that have any connection with quantum physics?Were you good at science at school?
Pretty good. I also liked art and music, though
my favourite subject was definitely maths.If you could send a message back to
yourself as a kid, what would you say?
I’d say, “Believe in yourself. Listen to advice,
but don’t let others talk you out of pursuing
your dreams.”What’s the best piece of advice
anyone ever gave you?
Probably what my wife, Julie, told me many
years ago. We were about to get married and I
felt I needed to do the responsible thing and earn
a living. She told me to follow my dream and do a
PhD and that we could manage. I did, and we did.
And I’ll always be grateful to her.If you could have a long conversation
with any scientist, living or dead,
who would it be?
Oh, Albert Einstein, without a shadow of a doubt.What’s the best thing you’ve read
or seen in the past 12 months?
Reality Is Not What it Seems and The Order of Time,
by the cosmologist Carlo Rovelli. Translated from
the original Italian, they retain a beautifully
poetic charm and are full of profound ideas.Do you have an unexpected hobby, and
if so, please will you tell us about it?
Oil painting. If only I had more time for it.How useful will your skills
be after the apocalypse?
Terrible. You can’t defeat zombies with
mathematical equations. But I’m fit and healthy
and pretty resourceful, so who knows...OK one last thing: tell us something that
will blow our minds...
This is something from an appendix of a book
by Einstein. We think of gravity as a force acting
between objects within space-time. In fact, the
gravitational field is space-time. So, just as there
can be no gravity without space and time for
it to act in, space and time themselves have no
meaningful existence without gravity, even out
in the emptiness of space. This is because the
reality of space and time is inextricably linked
to the existence of matter and energy within it. ❚Jim Al-Khalili is professor of quantum physics at the
University of Surrey, UK, an author and a broadcaster.
His first novel, the sci-fi thriller Sunfall, is out now“ Space and
time have no
meaningful
existence
without gravity,
even out in
the emptiness
of space”
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