Opening address
by JINR Director V.G.Kadyshevsky
Ladies and Gentlemen:
It is my honour and great privilege to take part in the opening of two exhibitions having great humanitarian importance.
The Joint Institute for Nuclear Research is represented mostly in the exhibition entitled "Science bringing Nations together".
This motto has indeed a very deep meaning, and is associated with what the Russian writer Anton Chekhov said at the beginning of the 20th century.
"Science cannot be national, in the same way that a multiplication table cannot be national. If a science becomes national it ceases to be a science".
For over four decades of their existence, CERN and JINR have proved that science does bring nations together. At present, as many as 34 Member States are participating in these two international organizations, including three common countries. But the actual orbits of CERN and JINR have a far larger scale: they embrace practically the whole world community of physicists.
Much is known about the excellent scientific achievements of both centres - they are universally recognized. But there is one achievement gained in the human sphere, the importance of which can hardly be overrated, and that is rapprochement of people representing so many nations, different races and religious beliefs, but unified by their common peaceful endeavour to help mankind better understand the hidden secrets of Nature.
For visitors to this exhibition, the photos presented here can give a good idea about the activities of the people working at CERN and JINR. The pictures show many examples of how researchers from all over the world have come together to achieve common scientific goals regardless of political differences and closed borders between their home countries.
Like a powerful magnet, the common scientific interests attract people from many countries in their desire to solve problems of frontier physics which is often impossible for an individual country. Over the past 40 years CERN and JINR have been and remain such powerful magnets. The Joint Institute maintains scientific contacts and carries out joint investigations with 690 institutes and universities in 57 countries of the world.
Let me say a little more about CERN and JINR collaboration.
Scientific ties between the two centres date back to 1957, when JINR Vice-Director Marian Danysz, a Polish professor, visited CERN and agreed with CERN Director General C.J.Bakker on exchange of scientists and on joint experiments. Since that time the co-operation has always been progressing. Now JINR takes an active part in the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) project at CERN, which is supposed to be a few decades long.
Being in close contacts with each other even in the most gloomy years of the Cold War, scientists from JINR and CERN performed a noble mission promoting mutual understanding among people from different countries. I would like here to recall the wise sayings of the Russian empress Elizabeth Petrovna: "The deeds of mind enlightening root out the evil".
Since 1970 CERN and JINR have been holding joint Schools of Physics, attended by young scientists from many countries of the world.
Here they not only learn the latest ideas in elementary particle physics but also become involved in a process that leads to rapprochement of people from different countries. Now it looks natural but before the Berlin Wall and the entire Iron Curtain collapsed, these schools provided a rare opportunity for relations among young people from countries with different political systems.
The co-operation between JINR and CERN is surely mutually beneficial. In confirmation of this let me quote my colleague - CERN Director General C.Llewellyn Smith who said the following at the opening of the JINR photo exhibition «Atom for Peace», organized in 1996 at the Palais des Nations of the United Nations Office in Geneva.
"CERN has therefore enjoyed a long history of collaboration with JINR, including links that were kept alive, and provided very important human and scientific contacts, at the height of the Cold War, when scientific contacts generally between East and West were minimal. Today, our contacts remain strong and mutually beneficial: we benefit from Dubna's contributions - human, material, and intellectual - to collaborative experiments at CERN, while JINR scientists benefit from unique facilities that we can make available".
The important role played by JINR and CERN in bringing nations together is acknowledged not only by scientists.
Let me show this by quoting some of the congratulation messages received by JINR on the occasion of its 40th anniversary from high ranking political and state figures.
Boris Yeltsin, President of the Russian Federation:
"Your Institute is known to the world scientific community for its great contribution to the development of international scientific and technological co-operation and thus to rapprochement of peoples".
Aleksander Kwasniewski, President of the Republic of Poland:
"The Joint Institute has demonstrated its capability to be a school of every-day practical interaction and communication for representatives of different nations, different cultural traditions and political convictions".
His Holiness Alexy II, Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia:
"It is rather hopeful that the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research is further developing its excellent traditions of international co-operation. For as is witnessed by experience of long standing, through their united efforts, besides purely practical interactions, scientists can make an absolutely significant contribution to the development of peace and trust among the peoples of the world".
One can say that CERN and JINR actually offer a concrete model of human relations which I am sure will be universally accepted by mankind in the 21th century. I also believe that these organizations will continue to play their role of a Scientific Congress for Peace.
I wish success to these exhibitions.
Thank you.
"Science cannot be national, in the same way that a multiplication table cannot be national. If a science becomes national it ceases to be a science".
Anton Chekhov
"CERN has therefore enjoyed a long history of collaboration with JINR, including links that were kept alive, and provided very important human and scientific contacts, at the height of the Cold War, when scientific contacts generally between East and West were minimal. Today, our contacts remain strong and mutually beneficial: we benefit from Dubna's contributions - human, material, and intellectual - to collaborative experiments at CERN, while JINR scientists benefit from unique facilities that we can make available".
C.Llewellyn Smith
Boris Yeltsin,
© Joint Institute for Nuclear Research. Dubna, 1997