João Magueijo

João Magueijo in 2005

João Magueijo (zh-'wow ma-'gay-zhoo) (born in 1967) is a Portuguese professor of theoretical physics at Imperial College, London, where he was for three years a Royal Society Research Fellow. He has been a visiting scientist at the University of California at Berkeley and Princeton University, and received his doctorate in Theoretical Physics at Cambridge University.

Quotes

Faster than the Speed of Light

Magueijo, João (2003). Faster than the Speed of Light: the Story of a Scientific Speculation. New York: Penguin Group. ISBN 0-14-200361-1. 

• And indeed, if VSL is correct, black holes may have very different properties than we thought. Collapsing stars could have a totally different demise and die a rather eccentric death.
  • pg. 10

• The game of science can accurately be described as a never-ending insult to human intelligence.
  • pg. 13

• It was then that through the open door Einstein saw the man connecting the new battery, and precisely at the same time he did it, Einstein saw the cows jumping up away from the wire. All at once. Exactly. A fair amount of displeased mooing ensued.
  • pg. 16

• In that year [Einstein] had roughly equal numbers of large and small cats. Therefore, quite logically, he cut two holes in each door: a large one for the large cats, and a small one for the small cats. It made perfect sense. ... A hole should have a meaningful existence, and the small cats might be offended if a personalized nothing was not prepared for them.
  • pg. 71

• Thus, the distance between any two galaxies increases in time, creating the illusion of mechanical motion. But in reality, galaxies just sit there, contemplating the spectacle of the universe creating more and more space in between them.
  • pg. 87

• I've always felt that copious use of the word 'something' allows anyone to solve any problem, even insoluble ones.
  • pg. 107

• For instance, the blood of hibernating arctic squirrels may supercool to minus 3 degrees, when it would normally congeal. The supercooled blood still flows, since it remains a liquid, but the slightest disturbance will cause it to freeze, killing the squirrel; therefore, you should not disturb hibernating arctic squirrels.
  • pg. 113

• Inflation is really like drugging the baby universe with speed. The supercool union of the hitherto unfriendly gods was blessed by amphetamine, and this made the universe inflate rather than just expand. The early orgy of expansion in the universe comes to an abrupt end as soon as the supercooled particle stuff finally freezes.
  • pg. 115

• Ever since then, the place has accommodated people with the necessary level of imbalance required to come up with new ideas.
  • On Cambridge, pg. 129

• Although the term dialogue was really a euphemism for scientists trying to kill each other, this format worked very well...
  • pg. 137

• Cornelia would not be altogether surprised if she saw the grazing cow start tap dancing, lap dancing, or whatever quantum gravity might cause cows to do.
  • pg. 249