|
|
|
|
|
Lyndsay Fletcher
At high school I enjoyed science (physics and chemistry) and math, but I also loved
literature and German. But when it came to making a choice of what subject to study at
University, I guess I was just more curious about physics. I wanted to pursue it in an
academic way. I thought that studying literature or language at University would be
rather dry, and might even kill what I liked about it. Probably untrue... but this naive
thought helped propel me into physics. Also, being a girl doing a course where most of
the students are boys, I was possibly trying to prove something! At university in Glasgow
I studied physics, math and astronomy. The physics and math kind of go together, and I
needed a third subject to make up my degree. (Note, British universities work in quite a
different way from American universities: we go in as freshmen knowing more or less what
subject will be our major when we graduate, and our curriculum is concentrated on that
subject, which is why I had to make a choice very early at age 17 or so). I had read some
popular books about black holes and the origin of the Universe, and astronomy sounded
like it might be fun, which certainly turned out to be the case.
At university I discovered quite early on that I was much happier doing "theoretical"
work than I was with "observational" or practical work. I remember going out to the
observatory with a friend one night to do an experiment together which involved timing a
number of stars as they crossed our local meridian. I couldn't find a single star through
the telescope and was assigned to doing the calculations. She found them all. Many years
later I ended up concentrating on theoretical science, and my friend has a much more
practical science job; she designs optical systems for infrared astronomy, and uses some
of the world's biggest telescopes. Perhaps our roles were decided that night.
|
