Cheese
| 13 August, 2010 | Richard P. Grant |
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You might remember that the Royal Institution (Ri), a charity dedicated to research, education and connecting science and the wider public, has been having financial difficulties. This wasn’t helped when ex-Director Baroness Susan Greenfield decided to sue them for unfair dismissal. That case is over, but the Ri isn’t out of the woods yet, and has been forced to cut back on its Christmas Lecture series.
The Christmas Lectures were started by Michael Faraday back in the 1820s (and televised since 1966), and have been an inspiration to many young people, some of whom have gone on to be successful scientists and others who have gone into science communication. This year, for the first time in nearly 200 years, the Christmas Lectures will take place over three days instead of five.
A sad time for science education and communication indeed.
One of the things that make flying across the Atlantic slightly less unbearable is the opportunity to check out new movie releases without paying extra to see them at the cinema (yes, I know the price of a flight cancels out cost savings, but I’m not claiming you should fly simply because of the movies), or to see movies that you wouldn’t bother with otherwise. So it was back in February I managed to catch Iron Man.
Iron Man (with Robert Downey Jr) is hugely enjoyable, and features as its protagonist a scientist (or at least an engineer). Downey’s character
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The mention of duff films on planes reminds me of a March trip to Pittcon, from Paris to New Orleans via Denver. It was about 15 years ago. I had never flown over the arctic and the frozen scenery was quite astonishing. I was soon told to close the blind… because they were showing Jurassic Park. (For the benefit of young readers, personal screens didn’t exist then).
They still ask people to close the blinds…a great shame, in my opinion. I flew over North America once in winter, it was amazing.