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Concept
Olivier Costa de Beauregard
Summary
Olivier Costa de Beauregard (6 November 1911 - 5 February 2007) was a French engineer, physicist and philosopher. He spent much of his career studying quantum physics and relativity. From the early 1950s, he also wrote extensively about his belief in parapsychology.
He was born in Paris, the first of two boys to Geneviève (née Imbert de Balorre, a Bourbon family) and Bérold Costa de Beauregard, part of the wealthy, established :fr:Costa de Beauregard family which originated from Savoie. He received a home education from his father, nurses, clergy and others before attending Sainte-Croix de Neuilly school. His father died when he was fifteen. He gained a place at university but took sabbaticals for sport and reading first. He gained his degree in Physics in 1938 and did national service as an artillery lieutenant.
In 1938, he became a research engineer at Société nationale de constructions aéronautiques du Sud-Est (SNCASE) [National Society for Aeronautical Construction of the South-East]. At the onset of World War II, he was mobilised in his national service rank. After the Franco-German armistice in June 1940, he joined the theoretical physics department of the Institut Henri Poincaré, part of the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS) [National Centre of Scientific Research]. He completed his PhD in 1943, his thesis entitled Contribution à l'étude de la théorie de l'électron de Dirac [Contribution to the study of Dirac's electron theory]. Louis de Broglie was his thesis advisor; he was part of de Broglie's team working on relativity and quantum mechanics.
From 1947, he proposed to de Broglie his interpretation of the EPR paradox, questioning the interpretation of time, a central theme of his career. In 1950, he married Nicole de Peyronnet, his life partner. He joined the Institute for Advanced Studies in 1951 where he became acquainted with Albert Einstein. During the 1950s, his and de Broglie's different approaches to physics meant that they parted ways. He became director of research at CNRS in 1971 and remained so until he retired in 1980.
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