All the fun of the festival – part 3

The festival spilled over onto the lawns behind the Town Hall

In my third report on the Cheltenham Science Festival I want to cover the last three talks I managed to see. So, without further ado, let me introduce Alien Evolution, When to listen to heretics, and “Penisology”!

Alien Evolution

This was quite low-key compared to some of the other talks. The presenter, an astrobiologist, first talked about how humanity might change if we lived our lives in space. The major hurdle is that embryos require a gravity “cue” to develop, so reproduction would be rather problematic. Add to this cosmic radiation and microgravity and it would not be as easy as sci-fi movies have been telling us! Secondly, if we find alien life on a “second Earth”, what would it look like? We heard about the basic requisites for life, and the things constraining life wherever it evolves: plant-like life still has to overcome the need to gather light against the problems of having a large surface area in different climates, and animal life must evolve to move over land or through the air or water.

A speculative subject, but it was good fun to explore some of the weirder “what if” scenarios that arose from audience questions.

When to listen to heretics

Presented by a favourite author of mine, Matt Ridley. He talked about some of the crazy “scientific” ideas (crop circles!) of recent times, and some of the seemingly crazy ideas that turned out to be right (antisepsis and child-birth). Towards the end we heard about the role of journalists in things like the MMR vaccine scare, and the need for journalists to check their sources and not be swayed unduly by a person’s title or “expert” status. Very interesting stuff, and several of the examples were object lessons in how not to report science in the media.

“Penisology”

The final talk of the day – post-9pm watershed – was a very different affair. A small audience consisting mostly of groups of women and couples laughed along to a quick run-down of the animal kingdom’s more unusual reproductive techniques. Everything from enormously well-endowed ducks to the violent love-lives of bed-bugs was covered, and the talk was followed by some quirky and rather enlightening audience questions.  It was a very enjoyable end to the day, and an interesting way of bringing in an audience that might not normally come to a science festival.

My overall conclusions of the festival – Good fun and very thought-provoking. I wonder how much of it is preaching to the converted and whether such events do attract new people to engage with science? I suspect it does, and it’s obviously a very successful festival, but there’s always more we could do.

All the fun of the festival – part 2

Streamers fly above Cheltenham Town Hall

As I mentioned, I managed to attend quite a few talks at Cheltenham on Thursday. I’ve summarised the first three below.

Rutherford

The first talk was quite interesting. We heard about Ernest Rutherford’s life and family in a presentation given by his great granddaughter, followed by an explanation of the science he did that earned him his reputation and a Nobel Prize for chemistry. The explanation of the modern work on nuclear physics left me slightly confused, but the central message – that the inside of an atomic nucleus can be a very complicated place – was something I hadn’t truly grasped before.

The future for stem cells

An excellent talk, chaired by Robert Winston, and followed by some very moving and thought-provoking questions. The speakers described stem cell therapies for various things: growing replacement cartilage (and a whole new windpipe for one patient!), replacing damaged retinal cells to treat macular degeneration, and various other things. The audience’s questions ranged from the political –should funding be concentrated on embryonic or adult stem cell research – through to very personal questions about treatments.

In particular, two questions made me sit up and realise how important and personal a topic stem cell therapy is, and how careful the media must be not to give people false hope. One elderly gentleman began his question with the phrase “I seem to have found myself in possession of an eighty year-old brain”, and went on to ask about using stem cells to support and regenerate the central nervous system. The second was an 86 year-old lady who asked whether treatment for macular degeneration would be available in her lifetime. When the speaker replied that it would likely be a few years until it was routine, she offered herself as a “guinea pig”.

Can science make you happy?

This was presented solely by Robert Winston, who rattled through various things that affect our mood and emotions. Less focussed than the other talks of the day, it was nevertheless a great pleasure to listen to him work his way through some interesting science and anecdotes on subjects as diverse as the terrible accident that befell one Phineas Gage, and paintings by the artist Il Bronzino.

We were fortunate enough to meet Sir Winston at a book signing afterwards, and he came across as a very warm, friendly and humble man.

Look out for more on the evening’s talks in a future post.

All the fun of the festival…

The Cheltenham Festival of Science 2009

Yesterday I spent a very enjoyable day at the UK’s Cheltenham Science Festival. This annual event aims to make science accessible to the public, and get people engaged with contemporary science issues. As far as I could see, it seemed to be doing rather well!

Although it was (supposedly) a work day, all of the events and talks I saw were very well-attended, and the central hall was packed full of visitors, demonstrations and enthusiastic explainers. It struck me as a modern take on an old-fashioned fun-fair: “Roll-up, Roll-up, ladies and gentlemen. See the amazing science, wonder at the pipe-climbing robot, marvel at the skulls of our ancestors, and meet actual real-life scientists.” Once the hoards of school children had left it was a great chance to chat to some really knowledgeable people about things they were obviously very passionate about.

In the evening the festival took on a slightly more refined atmosphere. We were sat outside a marquee enjoying the last of the evening sunshine surrounded by people quietly discussing science. In the background there were the muffled sounds of talks and events from the other tents, and wandering by were some of the country’s great science communicators, including such luminaries as Sir Robert Winston and author Matt Ridley.

I managed to get to six talks over the course of the day, and I’ll talk a little more about those in future posts. There was quite a range of topics covered, from nuclear physics to stem cells to “penisology” (!) and they all stirred up some interesting debate.

Anyway, if you’re free tomorrow or Sunday, and can make it along to Cheltenham, I’d thoroughly recommend it!