Robert B. Griffiths (February 25, 1937) is an American

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate caus ...

Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. One of its predecessors was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools; it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology ...

. He is the originator of the

consistent histories In quantum mechanics, the consistent histories (also referred to as decoherent histories) approach is intended to give a modern interpretation of quantum mechanics, generalising the conventional Copenhagen interpretation and providing a natural i ...

approach to

quantum mechanics Quantum mechanics is a fundamental theory in physics that provides a description of the physical properties of nature at the scale of atoms and subatomic particles. It is the foundation of all quantum physics including quantum chemistry, ...

, which has since been developed by himself,

Roland Omnès Roland Omnès (born 18 February 1931), is the author of several books which aim to give non-scientists the information required to understand quantum mechanics from an everyday standpoint. Biography Omnès is currently Professor Emeritus of Th ...

Murray Gell-Mann Murray Gell-Mann (; September 15, 1929 – May 24, 2019) was an American physicist who received the 1969 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on the theory of elementary particles. He was the Robert Andrews Millikan Professor of Theoretical ...

, and

James Hartle James Burkett Hartle (August 20, 1939) is an American physicist. He has been a professor of physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara since 1966, and he is currently a member of the external faculty of the Santa Fe Institute. Hartle ...

Early life and education

Robert B. Griffiths was born in Etah, Uttar Pradesh in 1937 to Presbyterian missionaries. Griffiths attended

Woodstock School Woodstock School is an international coeducational residential school located in Landour, a small hill station contiguous with the town of Mussoorie, Uttarakhand, India, in the foothills of the Himalayas. Woodstock is one of the oldest resid ...

, India from fourth standard to tenth, along with his brothers and sisters. Even during his Woodstock days, Griffiths' mathematical and scientific aptitude was apparent. The 1952 year book remarks that ''"Robert is famous for his long arguments (and unsurpassed knowledge) in chemistry class, his ability to 'recite' the log tables indelibly written in his brain, and his skill when it comes to fixing anything electrical."'' This knack for electrical systems kept Griffiths at Woodstock through part of 1953, working with the school's various wiring systems.

Academic career

Following his time at Woodstock, Griffiths attended

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

where he earned a BA in Physics in 1957. He then earned both an MSc and PhD in Physics from

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

in 1958 and 1962 respectively. He was a Postdoctoral Fellow of the

University of California, San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Insti ...

, from 1962–1964, Assistant Professor at

from 1964–1967, becoming Associate Professor in 1967 and Professor in 1969. Since that time, Griffiths' academic contributions have been widely recognized. Robert Griffiths was awarded a

Phi Beta Kappa The Phi Beta Kappa Society () is the oldest academic honor society in the United States, and the most prestigious, due in part to its long history and academic selectivity. Phi Beta Kappa aims to promote and advocate excellence in the liberal a ...

in 1956, was a

National Science Foundation The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent agency of the United States government that supports fundamental research and education in all the non-medical fields of science and engineering. Its medical counterpart is the National I ...

Postdoctoral Fellow from 1962–1964, an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow from 1966–1968, a

John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation The John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation was founded in 1925 by Olga and Simon Guggenheim in memory of their son, who died on April 26, 1922. The organization awards Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been ...

Fellow in 1972, and was given the US Senior Scientist Award of the

Alexander von Humboldt Foundation The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (german: Alexander von Humboldt-Stiftung) is a foundation established by the government of the Federal Republic of Germany and funded by the Federal Foreign Office, the Federal Ministry of Education and Resear ...

in 1973. In 1981, he was awarded the A. Cressy Morrison Award of the

New York Academy of Sciences The New York Academy of Sciences (originally the Lyceum of Natural History) was founded in January 1817 as the Lyceum of Natural History. It is the fourth oldest scientific society in the United States. An independent, nonprofit organization wit ...

, in 1984, the Dannie Heineman Prize for Mathematical Physics, and in 1987 he was elected to the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

. Griffiths is well known for his research on

statistical mechanics In physics, statistical mechanics is a mathematical framework that applies statistical methods and probability theory to large assemblies of microscopic entities. It does not assume or postulate any natural laws, but explains the macroscopic be ...

in the sixties and seventies of the last century, including exact inequalities in the

Ising model The Ising model () (or Lenz-Ising model or Ising-Lenz model), named after the physicists Ernst Ising and Wilhelm Lenz, is a mathematical model of ferromagnetism in statistical mechanics. The model consists of discrete variables that represent ...

and the introduction of the ''Blume- Emery-Griffiths (BEG) model'', describing tricritical points. Within his more recent work and research, Griffiths' primary focus has been in the field of

. Of the research, he has noted that ''"Quantum mechanics is hard to understand not only because it involves unfamiliar mathematics, but also because the usual discussion in textbooks about how to relate the mathematics to the real world is incomplete"''. It is this application of quantum information to the real world that Griffiths strives for. In 1984, he initiated a research program which sought to supply the missing link between theory and application while working out an entirely

consistent In classical deductive logic, a consistent theory is one that does not lead to a logical contradiction. The lack of contradiction can be defined in either semantic or syntactic terms. The semantic definition states that a theory is consistent i ...

form of quantum theory. Along with contributions of several key colleagues, the project eventually resulted in what is now commonly called the consistent (or decoherent) history approach to quantum theory, now effectively studied and applied in several areas of the field of quantum mechanics. At present, Griffiths is the Otto Stern University Professor of Physics at

. He has published over 140 articles, as well as the book Consistent Quantum Theory. He is a member of

Sigma Xi Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Honor Society () is a highly prestigious, non-profit honor society for scientists and engineers. Sigma Xi was founded at Cornell University by a junior faculty member and a small group of graduate students in 1886 ...

, a Fellow of the

American Physical Society The American Physical Society (APS) is a not-for-profit membership organization of professionals in physics and related disciplines, comprising nearly fifty divisions, sections, and other units. Its mission is the advancement and diffusion of k ...

and a Fellow of the American Scientific Affiliation. Griffiths' research interests continue to include the foundations of quantum mechanics, quantum computation, and the relation of physical science and Christian theology.

References

External links

Consistent Histories: Questions and Answers

{{DEFAULTSORT:Griffiths, Robert Living people 1937 births Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Carnegie Mellon University faculty American Christians American people of Welsh descent 20th-century American physicists 21st-century American scientists