Episode 26: Alfred Nash - Insatiable curiosity, NASA and Team X, and the return of the Renaissance Man
Dr. Alfred Nash is the leader of the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Team X and one of the most imaginative, generative people you will meet. He shares his brilliance and winsome wisdom as we discuss the pivotal moments across his life.
You have likely been inspired by Dr. Alfred Nash for years without explicitly realizing it. Dr. Nash is the Lead Engineer and Study Facilitator for the Advanced Projects Design Team (or Team-X) at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. That makes him the leader of one of the most imaginative and generative groups at one of the most imaginative and generative institutions in the world. Alfred has built a career around imagining and making a reality space missions that have given answers to the questions we each ask anytime we gaze at the night sky.
We have him and his cohort to thank for events like the landing of the Mars Rover that have transcended boundaries, both in engineering and science and in the societal divisions as each of us are unified in our exhilaration watching them occur.
I can’t think of a more fitting person than Alfred to be leading the group creating such wonder for the world - he’s one of the quickest, most capable, and fun-loving people I have had the pleasure to meet. In addition to his impressive resume of formal education (a B. S. in Physics from Stanford University and a Ph.D in Physics from the University of California, Santa Barbara) and long lists of career honors and awards, Dr. Nash is also a professional track cycling race announcer and a two-time winner of the National Beard and Mustache Championships in the English Mustache category.
It’s a rare gift to talk with Alfred about his life, the pivotal moments in it, and the wisdom he’s accumulated across it.