The Bertrand Russell Society Quarterly

in memoriam:
joseph rotblatt, whitfield cobb

JOSEPH ROTBLAT, 96, died in London on 31 August 2005. A 1995 Nobel Peace Prize recipient (with Hans Bethe), knighted in 1998, and member of the Royal Society, Dr. Rotblat, a physicist, was among those scientists who signed the 1955 Russell-Einstein Manifesto. A long time Secretary General of the Pugwash initiative, which is credited with being instrumental in decelerating the cold war nuclear arms race, Rotblat was the only scientist to leave the Manhattan Project on moral grounds. For this act, he was banned from the US for several years.

WHITFIELD COBB died in Blacksburg, Virginia on 31 July 2005. A member of the BRS, and a statistician with a doctorate from UNC, Cobb first studied philosophy, receiving a BA and MA from UNC in that field before turning to mathematics. A longtime teacher of mathematics, Cobb taught at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and was retired as emeritus at State University. He is remembered for his social conscience and his willingness to defend unpopular positions in the face of threats to his person, as in his defense of school integration.