From: LARRY KLAES (ljk4_at_msn.com)
Date: Mon Sep 26 2005 - 20:23:49 UTC
>From: cunews_at_cornell.edu
>Reply-To: cunews_at_cornell.edu
>To: CUNEWS-CAMPUS-L_at_cornell.edu (CUNEWS-CAMPUS-L)
>Subject: Featuring Cornell: Science Cabaret
>Date: Mon, 26 Sep 2005 15:00:14 -0400
>
>In a funky setting, Science Cabaret debuts with images of Mars
>http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/Sept05/Science.Cabaret.lg.html
>
>Sept. 26, 2005
>
>By Lauren Gold
>lg34_at_cornell.edu
>
>
>ITHACA, N.Y. -- A single strand of red Christmas lights sparkles along the
>raw brick walls of the Lost Dog Cafe's upstairs lounge -- a space of
>silvery heating ducts, mirrors, beaded lamps and worn, velvety couches --
>as Jim Bell begins setting up his projector, chatting with organizers, and
>wondering what to expect from the next two hours.
>
>The Cornell associate professor of astronomy and leader of the panoramic
>camera (Pancam) team for NASA's Mars Exploration Rover mission is the
>presenter at the Sept. 20 debut of Ithaca's Science Cabaret, a monthly
>event sponsored by the Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research (BTI).
>
>Enthusiastic and easygoing, Bell is no stranger to academic talks. As for
>evening presentations in dark, funky lounges, though -- "I have no idea
>what to expect," he says. "But you know what? I'm going to have fun."
>
>As he says it, the first audience members arrive. Within 10 minutes, the
>lounge is packed.
>
>Cornell horticulture professor Dave Wolfe gives Bell a quick introduction.
>And Bell takes it from there.
>
>The Science Cabaret concept, inspired by Europe's popular Cafe Scientifique
>movement of the 1990s, is about taking science away from stiff lecture
>halls and bringing it into a laid-back social atmosphere.
>
>"It's important to get away from the ivory tower image," says co-organizer
>and BTI public affairs officer Shawna Williams. "So many science talks are
>fairly technical. People would have to come all the way up here [to campus]
>in the middle of the day [to] sit in an auditorium. We wanted people to
>feel comfortable." Williams has been working with Sarah Davidson, a Cornell
>graduate student who proposed the idea last March, to bring the concept to
>Ithaca.
>
>Bell's presentation, "Postcards from Mars," introduces the audience to "two
>amazing robot geologists -- Spirit and Opportunity." Using the images the
>rovers have sent back to Earth -- Spirit's first glimpse of its landing
>spot at Gusev Crater, Opportunity's view, taken just days ago, of the
>stretch of Meridiani Planum dubbed Erebus Highway, and dozens more -- Bell
>tells the mission's story.
>
>He pauses for questions, anecdotes and the occasional sip from his pint of
>Guinness. And yes, he has fun.
>
>So do the audience members -- Cornell graduate fellow Enyi Elekwachi, for
>example, who is full of questions for Bell. "When I saw [the notice about
>Science Cabaret] I said, 'I have to see this,'" he says.
>
>Freeville residents Ron Szymanski and first-grader (and aspiring astronaut)
>Veronica Cator-Szymanski heard about the event on the radio -- and came to
>see the planet Veronica wants to be the first to visit. "We're very excited
>to get this experience, to have this opportunity," says Ron Szymanski.
>
>Science cafés blur the boundaries between science, music, poetry and
>art. At the Cornelia Street Cafe in Greenwich Village, Cornell chemist and
>poet, Nobel laureate and Ithaca's Science Cabaret advisory board member
>Roald Hoffmann runs the similarly inspired "Entertaining Science." Topics
>range from "Coltrane, Einstein and Cosmology" to "Thermodynamics and the
>Purpose of Life."
>
>Sure, the concept is about teaching science. But more, says Hoffmann, it's
>"to put science in juxtaposition with music and the written and spoken
>word, and for people to form the implicit connections."
>
>The format, especially the give-and-take between audience members and
>speakers, encourages those connections.
>
>"It was nice that people felt comfortable jumping in the middle of things
>to ask questions," Bell says. "They said it was nice to hear some of the
>inside-track stuff. It helps make it less academic."
>
>With the first Science Cabaret now behind them, organizers Williams and
>Davidson are looking forward to the next event, on Oct. 11 -- a
>demonstration of the theremin, the world's first electronic musical
>instrument, by musician James Spitznagel.
>
>Other cabarets planned are "God in the Forest: The Ivory-Billed Woodpecker
>as a Spiritual Paradigm" with John Fitzpatrick, director of the Cornell Lab
>of Ornithology, and conservationist Dave Foreman on Nov. 1; and "Crocheting
>the Hyperbolic Plane" with Cornell mathematician Dania Taimina on Dec. 6.
>All events are at 7 p.m. on the second floor of the Lost Dog Cafe, 106 S.
>Cayuga St., Ithaca.
>
>
>-30-
>
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>Phone: (607) 255-6074
>E-mail: pressoffice_at_cornell.edu
>
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>
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