{"id":5762,"date":"2011-07-27T08:11:41","date_gmt":"2011-07-27T08:11:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/principles\/2011\/07\/27\/launch-pad\/"},"modified":"2011-07-27T08:11:41","modified_gmt":"2011-07-27T08:11:41","slug":"launch-pad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/2011\/07\/27\/launch-pad\/","title":{"rendered":"Launch Pad"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the past few years, astronomer and SF author Mike Brotherton has been running the Launch Pad Workshop<\/a>, a program bringing interested SF authors to Wyoming (where he’s on the faculty) to learn about modern astronomy. The idea is to teach writers the real facts about the weird and wonderful things going on in astronomy these days, so they can write better stories about astronomical objects and ideas, and reach a wider audience through fiction. This year’s workshop<\/a> just ended, and Brotherton has links to some of the presentations, and blogs about it from the attendees.<\/p>\n

I really like this idea, which is one of the cleverest ways of meeting the “broader impact” requirements of many granting agencies that I’ve seen. In the branch of the wavefunction where I have infinite free time or a strong affiliation with the JQI<\/a> or JILA<\/a>, or Perimeter<\/a>, I would totally be trying to put together an equivalent program for quantum physics. You’d need to do it someplace where there’s a big program in quantum research, because lab tours are the closest quantum physics comes to the “look through this big telescope” thing astronomy has to offer, but I think there’s some of the same potential for outreach through fiction. In an even more ideal world, it might be possible to connect this up with the Science and Entertainment Exchange<\/a> and get some good quantum physics explanations to people who do mass media, not just writers of print SF.<\/p>\n

Alas, I have neither the free time nor the institutional affiliation needed to make this happen at present. I’m doing a lot of scrambling to stay on top of (or at least out from under) the stuff I’ve got going on now, so attempting to organize a workshop in addition would be kind of foolish. If anybody wants to run with this idea, though, and things a talking dog might be helpful for the program, I’d be happy to help…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For the past few years, astronomer and SF author Mike Brotherton has been running the Launch Pad Workshop, a program bringing interested SF authors to Wyoming (where he’s on the faculty) to learn about modern astronomy. The idea is to teach writers the real facts about the weird and wonderful things going on in astronomy… Continue reading Launch Pad<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,18,265,339,7,37,11,29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5762","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-astronomy","category-books","category-in_the_media","category-outreach","category-physics","category-pop_culture","category-science","category-sf","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5762","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5762"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5762\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5762"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5762"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5762"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}