Hugh Everett III

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Hugh Everett III : biography

November 11, 1930 – July 19, 1982

Wheeler himself had traveled to Copenhagen in May, 1956 with the goal of reaching a favorable reception to at least part of Everett’s work, in vain.Olival Freire, Jr.: Science and exile: David Bohm, the hot times of the Cold War, and his struggle for a new interpretation of quantum mechanics Olival Freire Jr.: Science and exile: David Bohm, the Cold War, and a new interpretation of quantum mechanics In June 1956 Everett started defense work in the Pentagon’s Weapons Systems Evaluation Group, returning briefly to Princeton to defend his thesis after some delay in the spring of 1957. A short article, which was a compromise between Everett and Wheeler about how to present the concept and almost identical to the final version of his thesis, was published in Reviews of Modern Physics Vol 29 #3 454-462, (July 1957), accompanied by an approving review by Wheeler. Everett was not happy with the final form of the article.

Early life and education

Born in 1930, Everett was born and raised in the Washington, D.C. area. Everett’s parents separated when he was young. Initially raised by his mother (Katherine Lucille Everett née Kennedy), he was raised by his father (Hugh Everett Jr) and stepmother (Sarah Everett née Thrift) from the age of seven.

Everett won a half scholarship to St John’s College, a private military high school in Washington DC. From there he moved to the nearby Catholic University of America to study chemical engineering as an undergraduate. While there he read about Dianetics in Astounding Science Fiction. Although he never exhibited any interest in Scientology (as Dianetics became), he did retain a distrust of conventional medicine throughout his life.

During World War II his father was away fighting in Europe as Lieutenant Colonel on the general staff. After World War II, Everett’s father was stationed in West Germany, and Hugh joined him, during 1949, taking a year out from his undergraduate studies. Father and son were both keen photographers and took hundreds of pictures of West Germany being rebuilt. Reflecting their technical natures, the pictures were "almost devoid of people".

Death and legacy

Everett, who believed in quantum immortality,See Keith Lynch’s recollections in Eugene Shikhovtsev’s Biography of Everett died suddenly at home on his bed in the night of July 18/19, 1982, of heart failure at the age of 51. Everett’s obesity, frequent chain-smoking and alcohol drinking almost certainly contributed to this, although he seemed healthy at the time. A committed atheist, he had asked that his remains be disposed with the trash after his death. His wife kept his ashes in an urn for a few years, before complying with his wishes. About Hugh’s death his son, Mark Oliver Everett, later said:

Of the companies Everett initiated, only Monowave Corporation still exists (in Seattle as of November 2007) and is still managed by co-founder Elaine Tsiang (who had studied physics under Bryce DeWitt at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill).

Everett’s daughter, Elizabeth, suffered from manic depression and committed suicide in 1996 (saying in her suicide note that she wished her ashes to be thrown out with the garbage so that she might "end up in the correct parallel universe to meet up w[ith] Daddy"), and in 1998, his wife, Nancy, died of cancer. Everett’s son, Mark Oliver Everett, who found Everett dead, is also known as "E" and is the main singer and songwriter for the band Eels. The Eels album Electro-Shock Blues, which was written during this time period, is representative of these deaths. Mark explored his father’s work in the hour-long BBC television documentary Parallel Worlds, Parallel Lives., Nancy Banks-Smith, Guardian blog, 27 November 2007., Band Weblogs, 16 November 2007.]"], BBC Press Release, BBC iPlayer The program was edited and shown on the Public Broadcasting Service’s Nova series in the USA during October 2008., PBS Nova TV program, October 2008.Healy, Pat, , Metro newspaper, October 21, 2008. 60 second science, Scientific American blog, by Jordan Lite and George Musser