Science Festival, 2009

So the Science Festival has finished for another year…

Madeleine’s mini-film fest of math-y films was a success and I also enjoyed the other events I got along to…

The first one was Asimo the humanoid robot at the McEwan Hall – plenty of pictures from other people on Flickr  – who is very small and needs a lot of preparatory programming to do very much! But he can keep his balance and make allowances for various things as he achieves his objective, which is pretty impressive.

Other events included a talk about the Royal Observatory’s key collection of astronomy books, the mathematics of juggling (with demonstration), some of the math behind Pixar productions (especially the creation of realistically crumpling clothes, etc. for the characters in Ratatouille) and a panel discussing the future of the human body, with Stelarc (who has a serious ‘mad scientist’ laugh!) and Martin Ware.

Yes, Martin Ware of Heaven 17; he’s heavily into sonics and sound of all sorts and had a seemingly endless supply of useful anecdotes, usually featuring somebody he was working with on some sort of project…

Excellent discussion, even if the only sf mentioned was in a question from the floor by somebody who mentioned Brave New World and The Cyberiad.

We also got out to the Museum of Flight at East Fortune and saw some of their new exhibits (opening to coincide with the EISF), but time was short (we had spent far too long in the morning enjoying the Easter weather) and we may have to go back soon.
Main disappointment was the almost complete lack of airship souvenirs and memorabilia – they have excellent airship exhibits, etc. but only a postcard of the R34 if you want a memento. If you’re into Concorde, however, any amount of stuff is filling the racks…

I should send them a list of ideas for books and toys, etc. I know about…