Cosmic Coda

How do you build a machine to test an idea—Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity—that’s beyond most people’s comprehension? And what does an astrophysicist actually do on a regular Tuesday while probing the depths of space?

In Cosmic Coda, a naive grad student filmmaker asks these questions in 1985—then returns nearly 40 years later to continue the journey, capturing one of the most profound scientific discoveries of our time as it happens.

A special screening of the full documentary Cosmic Coda, this program traces the story of LIGO and the landmark detection of gravitational waves. Together, participants will be able to explore how our understanding of the universe — and the very nature of scientific discovery — has evolved across generations.

This screening of Cosmic Coda is presented to honor the life of MIT physicist Rainer Weiss.