Gordon Fraser - Böcker

It was no accident that the Holocaust and the Atomic Bomb happened at the same time. When the Nazis came into power in 1933, their initial objective was not to get rid of Jews. Rather, their aim was to refine German culture: Jewish professors and teachers at fine universities were sacked. Atomic science had attracted a lot of Jewish talent, and as Albert Einstein and other quantum exiles scattered, they realized that they held the key to a weapon of unimaginable power. Convinced that their gentile counterparts in Germany had come to the same conclusion, and having witnessed what the Nazis were prepared to do, the exiles were afraid. They had to get to the Atomic Bomb first. The Nazis meanwhile had acquired a more pressing objective: their persecution of the Jews had evolved into extermination. Two dreadful projects - the Bomb and the Holocaust - became locked a grisly race.

This book presents a biography of Abdus Salam, the first Muslim to win a Nobel Prize for Science (Physics 1979), who was nevertheless excommunicated and branded as a heretic in his own country. His achievements are often overlooked, even besmirched. Realizing that the whole world had to be his stage, he pioneered the International Centre for Theoretical Physics in Trieste, a vital focus of Third World science which remains as his monument. A staunch Muslim, he was ashamed of the decline of science in the heritage of Islam, and struggled doggedly to restore it to its former glory. Undermined by his excommunication, these valiant efforts were doomed.

It was no accident that the Holocaust and the Atomic Bomb happened at the same time. When the Nazis came into power in 1933, their initial objective was not to get rid of Jews. Rather, their aim was to refine German culture: Jewish professors and teachers at fine universities were sacked. Atomic science had attracted a lot of Jewish talent, and as Albert Einstein and other quantum exiles scattered, they realized that they held the key to a weapon of unimaginable power. Convinced that their gentile counterparts in Germany had come to the same conclusion, and having witnessed what the Nazis were prepared to do, the exiles were afraid. They had to get to the Atomic Bomb first. The Nazis meanwhile had acquired a more pressing objective: their persecution of the Jews had evolved into extermination. Two dreadful projects - the Bomb and the Holocaust - became locked in a grisly race.

This book presents a biography of Abdus Salam, the first Muslim to win a Nobel Prize for Science (Physics 1979), who was nevertheless excommunicated and branded as a heretic in his own country. His achievements are often overlooked, even besmirched. Realizing that the whole world had to be his stage, he pioneered the International Centre for Theoretical Physics in Trieste, a vital focus of Third World science which remains as his monument. A staunch Muslim, he was ashamed of the decline of science in the heritage of Islam, and struggled doggedly to restore it to its former glory. Undermined by his excommunication, these valiant efforts were doomed.

In 1928 the physicist Paul Dirac predicted the existence of antimatter in a mirror world, where the electrical charges on particles would be opposite to those of ordinary matter. This mirror world is found, fleetingly, at the quantum level, with positrons the counterpart of electrons, and antiprotons the opposite of protons. This book introduces the world of antimatter without using technical language or equations. The author shows how the quest for symmetry in physics slowly revealed the properties of antimatter. When large particle accelerators came on line, the antimatter debris of collisions provided new clues on its properties. This is a fast-paced and lucid account of how science fiction became fact.

In 1928 the physicist Paul Dirac predicted the existence of antimatter in a mirror world, where the electrical charges on particles would be opposite to those of ordinary matter. This mirror world is found, fleetingly, at the quantum level, with positrons the counterpart of electrons, and antiprotons the opposite of protons. This book introduces the world of antimatter without using technical language or equations. The author shows how the quest for symmetry in physics slowly revealed the properties of antimatter. When large particle accelerators came on line, the antimatter debris of collisions provided new clues on its properties. This is a fast-paced and lucid account of how science fiction became fact.

The United States has been a space power since its founding, Gordon Fraser writes. The white stars on its flag reveal the dream of continental elites that the former colonies might constitute a "new constellation" in the firmament of nations. The streets and avenues of its capital city were mapped in reference to celestial observations. And as the nineteenth century unfolded, all efforts to colonize the North American continent depended upon the science of surveying, or mapping with reference to celestial movement. Through its built environment, cultural mythology, and exercise of military power, the United States has always treated the cosmos as a territory available for exploitation.In Star Territory Fraser explores how from its beginning, agents of the state, including President John Adams, Admiral Charles Henry Davis, and astronomer Maria Mitchell, participated in large-scale efforts to map the nation onto cosmic space. Through almanacs, maps, and star charts, practical information and exceptionalist mythologies were transmitted to the nation's soldiers, scientists, and citizens.This is, however, only one part of the story Fraser tells. From the country's first Black surveyors, seamen, and publishers to the elected officials of the Cherokee Nation and Hawaiian resistance leaders, other actors established alternative cosmic communities. These Black and indigenous astronomers, prophets, and printers offered ways of understanding the heavens that broke from the work of the U.S. officials for whom the universe was merely measurable and exploitable.Today, NASA administrators advocate public-private partnerships for the development of space commerce while the military seeks to control strategic regions above the atmosphere. If observers imagine that these developments are the direct offshoots of a mid-twentieth-century space race, Fraser brilliantly demonstrates otherwise. The United States' efforts to exploit the cosmos, as well as the resistance to these efforts, have a history that starts nearly two centuries before the Gemini and Apollo missions of the 1960s.

This open access book constitutes the proceedings of the 28th International Conference on Fundamental Approaches to Software Engineering, FASE 2025, which was held as part of the International Joint Conferences on Theory and Practice of Software, ETAPS 2025, in Hamilton, Canada, in May 2025.The 9 full and 2 short papers included in the proceedings, together with one invited keynote paper and 3 tool competition papers, were carefully reviewed and selected from 31 submissions. They deal with up to date research in software engineering and its applications in, e.g., quality and testing foundations for AI-based systems, requirements engineering, etc.

This volume contains the proceedings of TAP 2010, the 4th International C- ference on Tests and Proofs held during July 1–2 in M´ alaga, Spain as part of TOOLS Federated Conferences. TAP 2010wasthe fourth event of an ongoingseriesof conferencesdevoted to the convergence of proofs and tests. In the past, proving and testing were seen as very di?erent and even competing techniques. Proving people would say: If correctness is proved, what do we need tests for? Testers, on the other hand, would claim that proving is too limited in applicability and testing is the only truepathtocorrectness. Ofcourse,bothhaveapoint,buttoquoteEdBrinksma from his 2009 keynote at the Dutch Testing Day and Testcom/FATES: “Who would want to ?y in an airplane with software proved correct, but not tested?” Indeed, the true power lies in the combination of both approaches. Today, m- ern test systems rely on techniques deeply rooted in formal proof techniques, and testing techniques make it possible to apply proof techniques where there was no possibility previously. At a time when even mainstream software engineering conferences start f- turing papers with both “testing” and “proving”in their titles, we are clearly on the verge of a new age where testing and proving are not competing but ?nally accepted as complementary techniques. Albeit, we are not quite there yet, and so the TAP conferences aim to provide a forum for researchers working on the converging topics and to raise general awareness of this convergence.

A Message from the TAIC PART 2010 General Chair TAIC PART is a unique event that strives to combine aspects of a conference, a workshop and a retreat. Its purpose is to bring together industrialists and academics in an environment that promotes fundamental collaborationon pr- lems in software testing. Among the wide range of topics in computer science andsoftwareengineering,softwaretesting is anidealcandidatefor academicand industrialcollaborationbecauseadvancesinresearchcanhavesuchwide-ranging and far-reaching implications for industry. Conversely, the advances in comp- ing and communications technology and the growth of the associated software engineering activity are producing new researchchallengesat an increasing rate. The problems that arise in software testing are related to the problems that ariseinmanyotherareasofcomputing.Assuch,testingresearchcombinesawide range of elements encompassing the theoretical work of program analysis and formal methods and the associated representations such as ?nite-state machines and dependence graphs. The inherent complexity of software testing has led to the involvement of heuristic methods. Software testing is also a human activity and has thus seen the involvement of psychology,sociologyand even philosophy. This astonishing breadth and depth have made the problems of software testing appealing to academics for several decades.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the Fourth International Symposium on Search-Based Software Engineering, SSBSE 2012, held in Riva del Garda, Italy in collocation with the 28th IEEE International Conference on Software Maintenance.The 15 revised full papers, 3 revised short papers, and 2 papers of the graduate track presented together with 2 keynote talks and 1 tutorial paper were carefully reviewed and selected from 38 initial submissions. Search-based Software Engineering (SBSE) studies the application of meta-heuristic optimization techniques to various software engineering problems, ranging from requirements engineering to software testing and maintenance. The papers present current research in all areas of Search Based Software Engineering, including theoretical work, research on SBSE applications, empirical studies, and reports on industrial experience.