Maurice Stewart: An observer of the world
Maurice Stewart
An observer of the world
You’re originally from Edmonton, Alberta Canada?
I was born in Edmonton Alberta Canada and moved to Oregon when I was 26 years old. Eventually I became an American citizen in the 1980’s.
What prompted you to come to Oregon?
I studied at the University of Alberta, receiving my BSc and MSc in Physics. I knew when I finished my education that I didn’t have the mind or interest to be a researcher. Also, from my experience being a teacher’s assistant during my graduate studies I discovered that I loved teaching. I wanted to go to a place that emphasized teaching over research. Soon after graduating I accepted a faculty position at Willamette University. I joined the Physics Department in 1958.
What was it about physics that intrigued you?
The high school experience I had was one in which the inspector system would attempt to create uniformity, where every high school in Alberta on the same day was teaching the same thing. I was participating in the normal curriculum and at the end there was a universal province wide examination. The school didn’t decide what happened to you. The government decided whether you would graduate or not.
I took the examination, which covered seven subjects. My worst score was in physics. However, I observed that the difference between the other subjects and physics was that physics laid much less stress upon memorization and more on thinking. I prefer the thinking versus memorization. So, it made sense for me to go into something that was congenial to my being.
What was your experience at Willamette University?
Being on a college campus for 41 years was a very agreeable experience. I enjoyed my time at Willamette. It was a great way to spend my life.
When I first joined the Physics Department I became the 2nd member of the faculty. There was a struggle to get enough students to justify so many faculty members, so in addition to teaching physics I also developed an introductory course to astronomy, which was successful in bringing in more students. There is also a mandatory foundational freshman course, sometimes called the Freshman Experience or Introduction to Learning. I also participated in teaching this section. My contribution was to influence how they saw things.
Can you speak more about seeing?
It’s more about broadening one’s awareness and getting people to see things that they’ve never seen before. For instance, when you’re riding in your car on the freeway, especially when you ride under an overpass, and you look up at the railing on the overpass you will see that something seems to be moving sideways through it. That’s called the moiré effect. That’s one of thousands of things which, if you pay attention, you can see when you look around.
Did your approach to teaching change over four decades?
My approach to teaching changed because I learned more from teaching. I learned two things. First, I was grossly misled by the teachers I had myself and the textbooks that were available to me. The second thing I learned is that it is much more important to get the students involved in the daily activity of learning than it is to stand in front of them talking.
What was it about the textbooks that were wrong?
There is something traveling back and forth between the viewer and the viewed, and nobody can see it. If it is invisible it doesn’t make any sense to ask what color it is. That’s nonsense. But if you open any physics or psychology textbook they will talk about visible light and green light and blue light, which is terribly misleading. Blue light isn’t light that is blue. You can’t see light. There are hundreds of examples of things like this. It’s just sloppy talk.
Why do you think that is?
There was an article the other day in The New York Times about how detached from the world of experience modern cosmology is today. In theoretical physics there is a strong prejudice to think that the laws of physics are primary and what happens is derivative. Which is crazy. What happens is that the primary thing, how we understand it, is derivative. That’s my opinion – and I’m not the only person who has that opinion. It’s a very different opinion than the received opinion.
Did you contribute to textbooks during your career in teaching?
There was once a man in England who wrote a wonderful textbook on electricity and magnetism that I was using. His approach which was characteristically British was the presentation of the phenomena first and explanation second. As is customary in physics textbooks at the end of each chapter there are problems.
There was one problem that I couldn’t solve. I even had my students try to solve the problem and no one could. I wrote the author of the textbook and said that neither I nor my students could solve this problem. He wrote back an effusive apologetic letter to let me know of a misprint in the problem. It couldn’t be solved. When the 2nd edition of his book came out he wrote in the preface that the problems have been carefully checked by Professor Stewart. That’s my contribution to textbooks.
Can you speak to your travels to Japan and fascination with the language and system of writing?
My first trip to Japan was in 1980 when I joined a planned Willamette alumni trip. Just before the trip, a colleague shared with me a travel book that had Japan spelled out in Kanji on the cover. This was my first encounter with Kanji, a system of Japanese writing using Chinese characters. When I arrived in Japan, this was my first introduction to a world in which you can only read a very small portion of what you look at. It was very interesting.
In my opinion, based on my limited experience, Japanese has the most complicated writing system in the world. A normal page of a newspaper contains five different kinds of writing. These include Chinese characters, Kanji; two syllabaries, Hiragana and Katakana, another use of Hiragana called Furigana and another character called Romaji. You will find all five of these on an ordinary page, in an ordinary newspaper.
The Japanese language is also extremely impoverished with syllables. English has thousands of syllables. Japanese has perhaps 100 syllables. That is why the Chinese characters, Kanji, are so important to resolve ambiguities because so many things sound the same. You’ll see people in the streets in Japan speaking with each other and writing Kanji on their palms.
Are you fluent in Japanese?
No. I am fluent enough to go to the railway station and get to the ticket gate to ask what track the train to Kamakura leaves from and understand the answer.
What draws you back again and again to Japan?
Since my first trip I have gone several times a year, often two or three weeks at a time. It’s fascinating. The most amazing place I’ve ever been. It’s astonishing. It’s extremely safe, orderly, and clean. It’s also a country that has never learned the concept of, “that’s good enough.” Instead, if it’s worth doing it’s worth doing right.
I have been to a lot of places in Japan, - by airplane, boat, bus, and railway. Most of Japan is uninhabited – an extremely mountainous country. As a result, the inhabited parts are extremely crowded. When you go to Japan you never know what’s around the next corner. I have pictures of myself at the easternmost railway station in Japan, the southernmost railway station, the northernmost railway station, and the westernmost railway station. From my travels, I would say that Japan has the best public transportation system in the world.
Where else have you traveled?
I’ve been to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Spain, France, Switzerland, Italy, Austria, Germany, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Sweden, Belgium, the Netherlands, Estonia, Japan, Nepal, Thailand, China, and Taiwan.
When I first came to Oregon there was an eclipse of the sun in Alaska that I went to and have also been to an eclipse of the sun in Oaxaca, Mexico, and one in Colombia. There was an eclipse of the sun in Indonesia, where I passed through Singapore, and an eclipse in the sea between Greece and Crete. I also once went to see an eclipse of the sun that occurred in the Atlantic Ocean between the Canary Islands and the West African coast - and the ship that took me went into Dakar, Senegal.
What brought you to Portland?
I moved to Terwilliger Plaza 28 years ago in 1995. I hadn’t yet retired but was thinking about where I wanted to live when I did retire. Portland was a candidate, although, I love to see the night sky which is difficult in an urban setting. So, I spent a summer in Tucson. While it’s a wonderful place to view the night sky, and I could get use to the heat, I didn’t like the cultural climate.
Can you explain what you mean about the cultural climate in Tucson?
In those days, back in the 20th century, compact discs with classical music could be bought in several different places in Portland. When I went into a place in Tucson to ask for classical CDs, they looked at me as if I had asked, “do you have zebras?” After that Tucson wasn’t a candidate for retirement, although a nice place to visit.
Why Terwilliger?
Once I made my decision on Portland, I wanted to be in walking distance to Powell’s bookstore. As well, all the other places I looked at eliminated themselves by requiring a meal plan. Eventually, after living here for a few years, I was able to secure an apartment in the northeast corner of The Tower where I can see Mount Rainier, Mount St Helens, Mount Adams, and Mount Hood from my living room window.
How do you spend your days?
I enjoy walking – it’s a wonderful activity. 6.8 miles a day is my target. Beside walking and looking at things and taking pictures, I also think.
Where do you walk?
I have walked throughout Portland. Never the same place twice if I can help it. I don’t have a formal plan with marks on a map, but my ambition is to walk on every street in Portland. When you walk on the street you get to see some great stuff if you pay attention. I love looking at the trees and plants, and bumper stickers. I am extremely well-acquainted with the bus system. By American standards, TriMet is an outstanding mass transit system – one of the best public transportation systems I’ve experienced.
I get on the bus and head off to explore. When I see something interesting, I get off.