Science Comedian » conference

Guest hosting Dr. Kiki’s Science Hour with Greg Gbur

Brian — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 22:29:32 +0000

For the next few weeks I will be guest host of Dr. Kiki’s Science Hour on Leo Laporte’s TWiT network. Dr. Kiki is out on maternity leave, having just given birth to a beautiful baby boy 20 days ago! Previous guest hosts have included Phil Plait, David Harris, and Jeri Ellsworth.

The show streams live every Thursday on TWiT at 4pm Pacific/7pm Eastern. For other time zones, do the math! You can also watch or download it later.

For first-time visitors: in addition to my science-flavored stand up comedy, I also make science videos for Time Magazine’s website. That link will send you to my vids on Time.com, or you can click the VIDEO tab above and see them on this site. Quite a variety of topics in science and science fiction. I am also a contributor to Neil de Grasse Tyson‘s radio show StarTalk Radio.

Follow me on Twitter: @sciencecomedian
Subscribe to my YouTube videos: youtube.com/sciencecomedian

“Let There Be Light!” – my first show will be about light and weird science facts. My guest is Greg Gbur, an associate professor of Physics and Optical Science at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, specializing in research on theoretical classical optics. Since August of 2007 he has blogged as “Dr. SkySkull” at Skulls in the Stars, where he covers optics, the history of physics, historical weird fiction, and the interconnection of these subjects. Greg also co-founded the history of science blog carnival The Giant’s Shoulders. He has over 60 peer-reviewed publications and is the author of the upcoming textbook, “Mathematical Methods for Optical Physics and Engineering”.

- Follow Greg on Twitter: @drskyskull
- Skulls in the Stars blog
- Go directly to the Weird Science Facts category on Greg’s blog
- Greg’s recent invisibility article on Scientific American
- Read his very in-depth post The Saga of the Scientific Swindler! (1884-1891)

When the show is available, I will post the video here and perhaps some additional notes and links. Please follow me on Twitter, subscribe to my YouTube channel, and get on my Email list.

Next week my guest will be science writer extraordinaire Carl Zimmer!

Thanks for stopping by!

Science Online 2011

Brian — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 23:08:24 +0000

Jan. 13-16, 2011 – ScienceOnline2011, Research Triangle Park, NC

I’m thrilled to be attending and participating in ScienceOnline2011 – the fifth annual conference on science and the web in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. My first time! I’ll be leading a session with Joanne Manaster on communicating science with humor, and I’ll be speaking/performing at the Saturday night banquet. I’m looking forward to reconnecting with some friends and making some new ones.

#scio11

Synthetic Biology Conference

Brian — Tue, 04 Jan 2011 23:18:19 +0000

Feb. 3-4, 2011 – Synthetic Biology conference held at Google’s Washington, D.C. offices

I am participating in a synthetic biology conference called “Here Be Dragons: Governing a Technologically Uncertain Future.”

Stellar cast of speakers from science AND science fiction: Drew Endy, Andrew Hessel, George Church, Robert J. Sawyer, Neal Stephenson, Bruce Sterling, Robert Wright, and many more!

Part of the Future Tense series, the event is co-sponsored by Slate magazine, Arizona State University, and the New America Foundation, and will explore governance issues surrounding new, rapidly-developing fields of science.

How do we proceed when we have no maps for these unexplored territories?

*****************

Thursday, February 3, 2011 – 8:30am - Friday, February 4, 2011 – 1:30pm

Google, DC
1101 New York Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20005

SkeptiCal 2010 Science & Skepticism Conference

Brian — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 19:08:22 +0000

I will be speaking at SkeptiCal 2010, the Northern California Science & Skepticism Conference in Berkeley, April 24.

Other speakers include Eugenie Scott, Seth Shostak, Kirsten Sanford, Brian Dunning, and more. See the list of speakers.

Date: Saturday, April 24, 2010. 9AM to 6PM.
Location: Brower Center, Berkeley, California.
Sponsors: Bay Area Skeptics and Sacramento-Area Skeptics
Tickets: Tickets are $40 for the regular registration and $55 for registration and a t-shirt. See the fantastic t-shirt design by Ranch7 Creative. This event is expected to sell out, so please reserve your ticket as soon as possible!

I've Been Scooped Again

Brian — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 05:22:46 +0000

A couple of the presentations at today’s “Let’s Have An Awesome Time Doing Science” conference were conducted via Skype video.

Uri Alon of the Department of Molecular Cell Biology & Department of Physics of Complex Systems at the Weizmann Institute in Israel, gave a particularly fun presentation entitled, “Peace Love Science Happiness.”

He performed his song “I’ve Been Scooped Again” – with audience participation from across the globe. Here’s a snippet:

“Let’s Have An Awesome Time Doing Science” was a 3-day science conference (and part unconference) held at UCSF’s Mission Bay Campus, Oct. 8-10, 2009. Scientists from various fields and at all stages of career development met to discuss ways to help make science as fun, supportive and nurturing as possible.

Visit the website

Zoe Keating Performs at ETech 2009

Brian — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 21:15:11 +0000

One of the many highlights of the Emerging Technology conference was the Wednesday evening performance of Zoe Keating: “Using a 17th Century Instrument to Create the Music of the 21st Century.”

Zoe uses a cello and a laptop to make beautiful multilayered music. She plays with herself. It’s loopy. Very cool.

Excuse the rough camera work up front – it was shot on a tiny Flip camera – and it gets much better a couple minutes in when I get to the closeups.

Link: http://www.zoekeating.com/