"Between the immense galaxies and the infinitesimal particles"

We've just come to the end of a DACE course on "Life in the Universe". Martin Hendry, Graeme Ruxton, Helen Fraser (Strathclyde) and I took a look at several aspects of this perennially fascinating subject.

Even the title opens up whole classes of questions:

"life" - what is it, anyway?
"the universe": how big? containing what sorts of objects? why does it look the way it does?
"in": why life on Earth? and not lots of other places? where else might we find it? can we spot it if it's out there? are there deep connections between our own emergence from inorganic matter and the universe in which we find ourselves?

From SEED magazine, here's a very nice blog posting touching on similar topics, with a leaning to biochemistry and the insights to be gained from artificial organisms, and a few very illuminating phrases, like "software that makes its own hardware". And emphasising that, between the fundamental questions associated with the very large and the very small, there is also the question of the emergence of complexity, of "life and its place in the cosmos" where a "revolution in understanding" will be just as fundamental.

Compared to professional research, a course like this is a different sort of fun, a chance to look up from the detailed equations or observations to the big picture. The sort of teaching experience that involves out-of-the ordinary conversations with colleagues and people from a huge range of backgrounds, and sends you back to your research with new questions in mind. Just as much fun for us as for the participants; just what we should be doing in a university, consultation or none.

strategy

What an incredible two days we've just lived through, many people more intensely than me. When - if ever - were such events last seen in a British University? Here's what was happening yesterday. And here's what's happening today.

This afternoon I attended an emergency meeting of Glasgow UCU. Originally called to respond to the consultation process it wound up also commenting on the extraordinary events of the previous 36 or so hours. Although rather an aside to the key issues, there was some discussion of the now-closed Research Club, former occupant of the Hetherington House (now the site of the student occupation); and here's the connection to the specific territory of this blog.

Susan Stuart pointed out that mature students particularly found the Hetherington Research Club a friendly, useful place, congenial, easier for them to be in than the Unions. I also know this was the case, that many former DACE students, from Access and other programmes, made the Research Club their headquarters. Reasons aren't hard to guess. First, they were among grown-ups. Second, they were in the sort of place many of them imagined when they started making their way to University: a place where you can have all sorts of conversation on all sorts of subjects with all sorts of people, where drunken nonsense rubs shoulders with intense debate, where most people value ideas and are happy to talk about them. A supportive environment, multi-disciplinary, research-led ... in fact with all the attributes highlighted in the University's strategic plan; surely thus a core resource for the University to realise its aims.

Cells at war

suppose all the cells in your body were individually conscious and capable of analytical thought and moral judgements. They begin to realise that the entity they're all part of, yourself, wants to do things that harm many of them (for example, drink too much whisky). Why you want to do this is a mystery to them. They, especially the brain cells, are the medium for such emergent thoughts and desires but don't individually share in them.

They begin to glimpse what's going on and don't like it, even although they, in a sense, generate it. What could they do about this situation?

Miscellaneous

WHAT should we blog about just now? There are things to be said about our present situation, about Glasgow University, adult education, etc., but this probably isn't the place to say them. Well, not yet anyway.

So instead let's first note a couple of interesting developments in the sort of science that's my own business. First of all, April's Cafe Scientifique will feature my colleague Martin Hendry, a regular contributor to DACE Astronomy courses, and a man putting even more of his effort into science outreach at the moment, as a STFC Science and Society Fellow - turn up, get yourself a drink and enjoy the chat.

Also I just learned of a new, interesting-sounding venture, the Galilean Society. Free, monthly talks will be offered on science subjects and each speaker will be asked to "include a description of the scientific methods as they see it"; process as well as findings, a philosophy we'd certainly agree with. Professor David Saxon, who was Head of the Dept. of Physics and Astronomy in Glasgow, will be the first speaker on 19 March.

Want to delve further into such topics, in a context where you can hear what academics believe and also ask them why? You know where to come!

Like the rest of the world I've been horrified by the consequences of the huge earthquake in Japan. I'm also horrified by this disgraceful article in the Daily Mail. It's discussed in more detail in the Bad Astronomy blog.

Gresham College London

Gresham College has provided free public talks within the City of London for over 400 years.

Founded in 1597, Gresham College is London’s oldest Higher Education Institution. The eight Gresham Professors — of Astronomy, Commerce, Divinity, Mathematics, Law, Music, Medicine, and Rhetoric - and other visiting speakers offer over 100 free public events every year.

What an excellent institution! Anybody know any more about it?