“When Africa does for science what it has already done for music, then the world will really be in trouble,” says world acclaimed physicist, Professor Neil Turok, who recently received two honorary doctorates from Eastern Cape universities.
“When Africa does for science what it has already done for music, then the world will really be in trouble,” says world acclaimed physicist, Professor Neil Turok, who recently received two honorary doctorates from Eastern Cape universities.
Turok received an honorary doctorate from Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University on Wednesday, 10 April 2014, and another from Rhodes University on Thursday 11 April 2014. Turok was honoured for his significant and ground-breaking contributions to theoretical physics and support for mathematical sciences in South Africa.
On receiving the doctorates, Turok said, “I think, when getting a degree like this, one always feels like a bit of a fraud because you didn’t do any work for it and you’re in the graduation ceremony with hundreds of students who’ve spent the last several years studying. So, I don’t really feel I deserve it.”
What drove him to accept these doctorates was his love and commitment to the advancement of mathematical sciences in South Africa and Africa.
It is this commitment that led him to establish the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS) in Cape Town in 2003.
AIMS provides free hands-on mathematical training to promising postgraduate students from around the continent.
AIMS already has institutes in Senegal, Ghana and Cameron and aims to have 15 more around Africa.
Turok said the AIMS' goal is to prove that young Africans can be just as good as – or even better – than the young scientists elsewhere.
“I believe African graduates have massive potential and have overcome such difficulties that they can do anything. There’s huge talent here. They are the future and must be supported in every way.”
When not lecturing at AIMS or working at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, where he is the director, Turok either travels to South Africa to see his parents and brother (who returned after exile) or spends time exploring the Canadian outdoors.
