Pervez Hoodbhoy | |
|---|---|
| File:Pervez hoodbhoy.jpeg | |
| Born | July 11, 1950 |
| Nationality | Pakistani |
| Citizenship | Pakistan |
| Alma mater | Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) |
| Known for | His work on the Parton distribution functions, Field Theory, Phenomenology, supersymmetry and Abstract algebra |
| Awards | UNESCO Kalinga Prize (2003) Fulbright Award (1998-99) Faiz Ahmed Faiz Award (1990) Abdus Salam Award (1984) Baker Award for Electronics (1968) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Nuclear Physics |
| Institutions | Quaid-e-Azam University National Centre for Physics |
Dr. Prof. Pervez Amirali Hoodbhoy (Urdu: پرویز ہودبھائی; born 11 July 1950), is a Pakistani nuclear physicist, essayist and political-defence analyst. He is the professor of nuclear and high-energy physics, and the head of the Physics Department at the Quaid-e-Azam University (Qau), and also a senior academic scientist at the National Center for Nuclear Physics at the Islamabad. He graduated and also received PhD from MIT and continues to do research in Particle physics. He received the Baker Award for Electronics in 1968,[1] and the Abdus Salam Prize for Mathematics in 1984.[2] He has authored various scientific research papers in peer-reviewed journals.[2]
Hoodbhoy is also a prominent environmental and social activist and regularly writes on a wide range of social, cultural and environmental issues. He is the chairman of Mashal, a non-profit organization which publishes Urdu books on feminism, education, environmental issues, philosophy, and modern thought. Dr. Pervez Hoodbhoy is a strong and avid supporter for peaceful use of nuclear technology in Pakistan, non-nuclear proliferation, and nuclear disarmament; and criticizing the United States, Israel, Pakistan's and India's nuclear program in many national and international forums.
Hoodbhoy did O and A-Level from Karachi, Sindh. While in Pakistan during his college studies, Hoodbhoy was tutored by Nobel Laureate in Physics Professor Abdus Salam in Mathematics and Physics.[3] Hoodbhoy showed great interest in Electronics and Mathematics, and his love for science led him to travel to United States to pursue his education.[3] In United States, Hoodbhoy studied for his double major and gained his double Bachelor of Sciences in Mathematics and Electrical engineering, followed by M.S. in Solid-State Physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1973.[4]
He went on to obtain a D.Phil. in Nuclear Physics in 1978 from the same institution.[3] During his doctoral studies, Hoodbhoy had worked with numerous Manhattan Project scientists (who had worked closely in the development of a first implosion device— Fat Man atom bomb in the 1940s) to the field of nuclear physics.[3] Later, he remained a post-doctoral research fellow at the University of Washington.[4] Hoodbhoy, joined Institute of Physics, later Department of Physics as professor of Physics, since 1973.[4] He engaged his research career extensively on Quantum field theory, Particle Phenomenology, and Supersymmetry in that arise in the theory of Particle physics.[4] Hoodbhoy currently teaches at Lahore University of Management Sciences, and is a visiting professor of Mathematics at the Carnegie Mellon University, and visiting professor of physics at both University of Maryland at College Park, and remained senior visiting scientist at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center.[4] Hoodbhoy also occasionally lectures at various topics in Mathematics and Physics at American and European research institutions. Hoodbhoy is a prominent sponsor of The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, representing the Pakistan's delegation.[5] Hoodbhoy is also a senior member of Pakistan Atomic Scientists Federation (PASF). He also serves on the International Advisory Council of the Brookings Doha Center. After receiving his doctorate in physics, Hoodbhoy, at MIT, met with renowned dr. Abdus Salam and Riazuddin where Salam to attend Salam's lecture on Particle physics. Hoodbhoy then traveled to Trieste where he became research associate at the International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP).[6] At ICTP, Hoodbhoy began his research in particle physics that was supervised under by Professor Salam.[6] In 1999, Hoodbhoy with Ishfaq Ahmad and Riazuddin, played a major and influential role in the establishment of National Centre of Physics (NCP). With its establishment, Hoodbhoy became among one of the earliest academic scientists to join the NCP since its inception.
Apart from his specialist field of research, Hoodbhoy extensively writes and speaks on general topics ranging from science in Islam to education and nuclear disarmament issues around the world.[7] He is author of Islam and Science: Religious Orthodoxy and the Battle for Rationality, that has been translated into 5 languages.[2] In his book, Hoodbhoy outline the history of Pakistan, implications of theocracy and military dictatorships in Pakistan, and the abstract textbook system in education system of Pakistan. His articles on various issues related to science and social issues are often published in international media. Nowadays, Dr. Pervez A. Hoodbhoy is considered one of the prominent and renowned scientist who had published his work in every aspect of live. His publications repeatedly published in both technical and non-technical papers.[2] Hoodbhoy widely writes about the role and modernization of Pakistan Armed Forces, particularly the defence budget spending by the Government of Pakistan on Pakistan Armed Forces. While he is critical to the role of Pakistan Armed Forces in politics, Hoodbhoy gives much criticism to the Pakistan Army for imposing unlawful Martial Law. Hoodbhoy heavily criticizes the militant and fundamental Islam, while avidly supporting Pakistan Armed Forces to initiate their operations against the Islamic extremism in his country. Hoodbhoy was among the first activist who rose their support for the Pakistan Armed Forces Operation Black Thunderstorm, as part of conflict in West-Pakistan.
Hoodbhoy remains one of the leading and vocal critic of the nuclear weapons, especially the on-going nuclear weapons expansion in South Asia.[8] Hoodbhoy openly criticizes the United States' foreign aide to expand the Indian nuclear programme, and held India responsible for Pakistan's symmetric nuclear weapons programme as part of Pakistan's self credible deterrence after country was dismembered in 1971 by India.[8] While, he agreed that Pakistan's nuclear deterrence programme had protected and avoided Pakistan in numerous war threatening situations with India and the present relations with the United States.[8] Hoodbhoy remains staunch supporter for Pakistan's nuclear energy programme exclusively devoted for the industrial and economical use and human welfare.[8] According to Hoodbhoy, Pakistan puts tremendous and extreme science efforts to developed its deterrence programme which was developed in extreme secrecy under Munir Ahmad Khan.[8] If the same the finance and efforts on economical and technological progress, Pakistan would be equivalent to that of either Japan or South Korea.[8] In his recent article, Hoddbhoy gave a vehement and vigorous criticism to India's 1974 nuclear test (Smiling Buddha) and the second nuclear tests (Operation Shakti) in 1998. According to Hoodbhoy, India nuclear tests forced and pushed Pakistan to jump into nuclear arena in 1974, and again in 1998, after war-threatening statements were made by Indian government to Pakistan; Pakistan equalized (see Chagai-I and Chagai-II) this magnitude over the nuclear edge that same month, a fact that India now surely regrets.[8]
Hoodbhoy made an important in physics, particularly in particle physics. Many of the Hoodbhoy's lecture shown at the Urduphysics.com, sponsored by National Center for Physics. Hoodbhoy lectures in Newtonian Mechanics, Einsteinian Mechanics, Electricity and Magnetism, Vibration and Waves, among others.[9] At NCP, Hoodbhoy engaged his research in different aspect of particle physics, and pioneered his studies in modern physics and its extension to mathematical and nuclear physics. In 2006, Hoodbhoy published his brief mathematical description on Generalized Parton Distributions or GDP. In 2007, Hoodbhoy re-published the work of Jens Lyng Peterson the on Maldacena conjecture where he contributed mathematically in the theory. A Maldacena conjecture is a conjectured equivalence between a string theory and gravity defined on one space, and a quantum field theory without gravity defined by one or less dimension.[10] The same year, he also re-published the work Edward Witten on Anti de Sitter space and its extension to the field of Holography. While, the paper was published experimentally in 1998 by Witten, Hoodbhoy provided the brief mathematical proofs and description to understand, logically, the subject of Sitter space— a scalar curvature in general theory of relativity.[11]
On 14 April 2001, it was announced that Dr. Hoodbhoy would be receiving Sitara-e-Imtiaz from the former President, General (retired) Pervaiz Musharraf which he refused to accept. His refusal prompted The Friday Times to interview him.
"I am reasonably satisfied with my scientific work, I do not think it is earth-shaking or that it deserves any kind of award. On the other hand, receiving an award – even if it is a high national award – would give me absolutely no sense of achievement or satisfaction because it carries no credibility or prestige in professional circles. Such things do not indicate that you have done good work in your field. Therefore I decided to refuse the award".[12]
He produced a 13-part documentary series in Urdu for Pakistan Television on critical issues in education, and two series aimed at popularizing science. In 2004, he made a documentary film 'Crossing the Lines: Kashmir, Pakistan, India' along with Dr. Zia Mian.[13] The Center for Global Peace and Conflict Studies. University of California, Irvine. 11 May.[2] Documentaries of his are heavily emphasized on the issues of education, public health and scientific revolution in Pakistan.
In his documentaries, Dr. Hoodbhoy heavily criticized Pakistan and India's nuclear weapon program. He also pointed out the seriousness of the Talibanization in Pakistan and its immediate effects on the South Asia. His documentaries also pointed out that Americans and NATO forces in Afghanistan didn't help the Afghan people's life and there was no reforms in Afghanistan's social and public sector instead the insurgency and corruption grew which also destabilized Pakistan's western front.[2]
Hoodbhoy was a harsh critic of the Higher Education Commission (HEC) while it was headed by Dr. Atta-ur-Rahman. This led to numerous print and television media debates.
The administrative competency of HEC was called into question. The achievements of the HEC initiative which involved the development, staffing and management of universities, with the aim of attracting foreign academics to Pakistan, were described as ‘dismal’. In the case of UESTP-France, in Karachi, out of an expected faculty strength of between 450 to 600, no French faculty or administrative staff actually arrived.
The data used to support the positive appraisal of HEC’s activities was questioned in a series of communications between Hoodbhoy and HEC Chairman Atta-Ur-Rehman. It was claimed by the latter that in mathematics, Pakistani authors received 20% more citations than the worldwide average. Hoodbhoy questioned this on several grounds including the number of self-citations these publications received and said that this was a crucial aspect that the HEC left out of its interpretation.
Criticism was levelled by Hoodbhoy at the practice of hiring those foreign academics in local universities who were said to have difficulty in communicating and teaching, although they contributed to boosting the number of research publications originating from Pakistani universities.
An article published in ‘Nature’ on 3 September 2009 was the source of much debate. While it reported many achievements and showered much praise on the activities of the HEC, Hoodbhoy asked that the education system be assessed on the changes in quality of teaching in public universities, procedures for selection of students, and on whether campuses began to see greater academic freedom, greater transparency and less violence from extremist groups.
He is also the recipient of: