The Starmus Festival has shaken the palm, Canary Islands, this April with a series of huge concerts and an extraordinary series of dozens of scientific interviews. Credit: Starmus/Max Alexander
Wednesday 23 April, I left for the Starmus Festival in La Palma, in the Canary Islands, together with my friend and colleague publisher Michael Bakich and his wife Holley. But we didn’t go very far. Multi delays from Tucson to Dallas meant that we would lose our flight to Madrid. We had to wait until Friday 25th Taking off, and so he arrived at the lively Starmus festival in the Canary Islands a day and a half late.
However, we refreshed and skipped in the fray. I hosted the Festival, introducing the speakers and Michael accompanied me, with his now famous exercises for the public among the interviews. This was a Stormus a little smaller because of the location: we had hundreds instead of a few thousands, but everyone was electrified to listen to the talks of great astronomers, explorers of astronauts, Nobel prizes in all the sciences and to listen to the spectacular music that we present at the event.
Michael and I missed directly in the second Saturday afternoon session. Before arriving, the talks were wonderful, so we heard. There was John Mather on the Big Bang; Michael Mayor on Exoplanets; Bernhard Schölkopf on artificial intelligence; Jane Goodall for reasons for future hope; Steven Chu on the capture of carbon; And Chris Hadfield on Space Junk. And many others. It is a dizzying series of simply surprising arguments that embrace very much what is in thinking about people’s minds these days. And all kind concession of our great founders of Starmus, those who originated this consolidated joy of science and music, the Astrophysicist Garik Israeli and the astronomer (and yes, guitarist!) Brian May. Garik was all smiled; This time we lost Brian unusually since it was a bit under the time.
The interviews went on all Saturday afternoon. We had the explorer of the space Kathryn Thornton who discussed to save the satellites in space, Anousheh Ansari who described how he is dreaming big for the future of exploiting space, Sara Garcia describes the potential for medicine out of the world and Juan Arsuaga speak how we can recognize et.
Sunday led a special day to the events on La Palma. The 108 ’round table occurred at the Observatory, the site of the largest telescope in the world, the Grand Telescope Canarias of 10.4 m. The distinct minds weighed in all the topics, scientific and social, since they contemplated a special and stimulating moment in the world of scientific research.
The last whole day of talks was again charged with very special moments. There was Kip Thorne, the leading world authority on black holes, who described some of the strangest places in the universe, accompanied by her co -author and good friend Lia Halloran, the exceptional artist who illustrated their book, The deformed side of our universe. The volcanographic Marie Edmonds described the last thought on what is known on volcanoes, which was particularly noteworthy while we sat on a chain of volcanic islands. Matt Mountain spoke of the power of astronomy to change the world. The chemist winner of the Nobel Prize Kurt Wüthrich described the dark matter in the human genome. My old friend Mario Livio spoke to us about the search for cosmic life.
And the final session of the interviews was no less spectacular. We heard from the Nobel Prize Women Strickland on Laser physics. Another Nobel winner, George Smoot, described the automation of stem cell therapy. Our wonderful friend Jill Tarter has communicated the last thought on the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, her only pioneering specialty. The astronaut of ASA Pablo Alvarez told us about the streets of the cosmos. And another old friend, the planetary scientist Jim Bell, closed the festival with the search for life on other worlds.
And of course the second half of the Stormus title translates into music. There was a classic opening concert. The concert of the Sonic universe, held in a large stadium, attracted thousands of people from the city and characterized our friends, the Starmus All-Stars home band, with Ron “Bumblefoot” Thal, Derek Sheinian, Ash Sheehan, Tony Frankl and Dino Jelusick, with Glenn Hughes as a special guest. They shook the house big, until late at night. What a fantastic moment we had. On Sunday there was also a classic night, with the great Montserrat Martí Cabellé, Simona Todaro Pavarotti, Luis Solana and Víctor Carbajo. What spectacular memories these shows have produced for thousands of us.
And so Starmus La Palma ended. But there was more! Several weeks before La Palma, we organized a small Starmus festival for the first time in the United States, in Washington, DC, which I also hosted. Held at the prestigious Kennedy Center, the Festival characterized an “Earth To Space” theme and it was an overwhelming success. Among the speakers of Washington Starmus included Mario Livio, Eva Villaver, Kip Thorne and Lia Halloran, Nicole Stoott and Frank Culbertson. We were fine!
Yes, Gorgogliano ideas for future events in Stormus. After the recovery of the Board of Directors (and mainly Garik!), We will mark the future possibilities in the coming months. Thanks to all of you who participated – I know that many of you had the times of your life and it was a great pleasure to meet so many of you.
