Ole Molvig

Assistant Professor of History
Assistant Professor of Communications of Science and Technology, Physics

Professor Molvig is a historian of the modern sciences and technology who joins Vanderbilt following 4 years on the faculty at Yale. He completed his B.S. degrees at the University of Wisconsin in Physics, Astronomy, and History of Science, and did his graduate work at Princeton University where he examined the creation of and responses to Albert Einstein's General Theory of Relativity for his Ph.D. in History. 

Professor Molvig explores how science, technology and society interact.  How did Einstein, and his theories, become seen as revolutionary?  How has, and how will, digital innovations like artificial intelligence impact society?  How does magic become technology?  These are the types of questions he explores, researches, and teaches.  

Professor Molvig's other interests include virtual reality, autonomous vehicles, gaming, the history of astronomy, precision instrumentation, physics in WWI, popular science, and modern European intellectual and cultural history. 

His regular course offerings include a survey of the modern sciences, as well as more focused graduate and undergraduate seminars in the history of science, the history of technology, innovation, the scientific revolution, and virtual reality.