Mailvaganam Memorial Lecture - 2008
	2008 lecture was delivered by Dr. W. L. Sumathipala Director, Climate Change Division, Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources Beautiy of Nature and Dangers of Natural Phenomena.
	Date: October 30th, 2008 Venue: Physics Conference Room (PCR), Department of Physics, University of Colombo.
	Summary: Many of the natural phenomena which we observe around us are beautiful. But, some of them are dangerous. Generally scientists who are curious, need to be sensitive and develop methods to observe them properly, initially to understand and for survival. Physics the oldest branch of science was initiated and developed through the observation of nature; many of the basic laws in physics were based on observations of nature or incidents around us. Through this process scientists and technologists have made living safe and comfortable by avoiding some disasters due to natural phenomena. Further proper understanding has paved the way for safe and healthy living. However, there are things that are not properly understood by man and technological development itself has made the planet a dangerous place to live. One such unexpected result is global warming and ozone layer depletion which threatens our survival. Today the world is experiencing disasters of unimaginable magnitude. Some of the disasters are predictable with reasonable lead time and accuracy. Others are unpredictable due to poor understanding and the extremely short time available for prediction. Many of them are aggravated by mans action. While natural disasters are unpreventable there is a possibility of reducing the damage by proper understanding and developing scientific tools. But the most important aspect of the problem will be the understanding of the root cause or reasons for these natural phenomena. An attempt has been made to understand the problems using basic physics principles.