The next event in our regular series of events on Tuesdays in Second Life will be a presentation and discussion with Professor Thomas Levenson, Professor of Science Writing at MIT.

In 1695, Isaac Newton—already renowned as the greatest mind of his age—made a surprising career change. He left quiet Cambridge, where he had lived for thirty years and made his earth-shattering discoveries, and moved to London to take up the post of Warden of His Majesty’s Mint.

Newton was preceded to the city by a genius of another kind, the budding criminal William Chaloner. Thanks to his preternatural skills as a counterfeiter, Chaloner was rapidly rising in London’s highly competitive underworld, at a time when organized law enforcement was all but unknown and money in the modern sense was just coming into being. Then he crossed paths with the formidable new warden. In the courts and streets of London—and amid the tremors of a world being transformed by the ideas Newton himself had set in motion—the two played out an epic game of cat and mouse.

Professor Thomas Levenson is the author of Newton and the Counterfeiter, a new book revealing Newton’s little known career as a detective. Professor Levenson is a professor of science writing at MIT and the author of three previous books Einstein in Berlin, Measure for Measure and Ice Time, as well as the producer of 10 documentaries for which he has won numerous awards.

Professor Levenson will be Nature Publishing Group’s guest in Second Life on Tuesday 7th July at 10am PDT where he will talk about Isaac Newton and his own career and take questions from the audience. All very welcome!

Title: Newton and the Counterfeiter
Date: Tuesday 7th July, 10am PST / 1pm EST / 6pm BST
Speaker: Professor Thomas Levenson, MIT
Location: Nature Amphitheatre, Second Life
Contact: Joanna Wombat / j.scott@nature.com

The next event in our regular series of events on Tuesdays in Second Life will be a presentation and discussion with Dr Patricia Fara, Senior Tutor of Clare College, Cambridge.

How do you fit 4000 years of science into 400 pages? Historians of science call this the Big Picture problem, and now Patricia Fara has provided the first ever solution – Science: A Four Thousand Year History (Oxford University Press). In this talk, she discusses three of the Big Questions she had to confront while she was writing her book – When did science begin? Who did science? How does science change? Some of her answers may be unexpected.

Patricia Fara has a degree in physics from Oxford, and a PhD in History of Science from London. She spent fifteen years as Educational Director of an international audiovisual publishing company before moving to Cambridge University, where she lectures in the History and Philosophy of Science Department and is the Senior Tutor of Clare College. Her major research speciality is eighteenth-century England, but she has published a range of academic and popular books on the history of science.

Dr Fara will be Nature Publishing Group’s guest in Second Life on Tuesday 30th June at 10am PDT where she will talk about her work and take questions from the audience. All very welcome!

Title: Science: A 4000 Year History
Date: Tuesday 30th June, 10am PST / 1pm EST / 6pm BST
Speaker: Dr Patricia Fara, Clare College, Cambridge
Location: Nature Amphitheatre, Second Life
Contact: Joanna Wombat / j.scott@nature.com

Join us next Tuesday, 23rd June, for a live presentation and discussion with Professor Peter Ward, Professor of Biology at the University of Washington, NASA astrobiologist and author of the revolutionary new book The Medea Hypothesis.

In The Medea Hypothesis, renowned paleontologist Peter Ward proposes a revolutionary and provocative vision of life’s relationship with the Earth’s biosphere—one that has frightening implications for our future, yet also offers hope. Using the latest discoveries from the geological record, he argues that life might be its own worst enemy. This stands in stark contrast to James Lovelock’s Gaia hypothesis—the idea that life sustains habitable conditions on Earth. In answer to Gaia, which draws on the idea of the “good mother” who nurtures life, Ward invokes Medea, the mythical mother who killed her own children. Could life by its very nature threaten its own existence?

According to the Medea hypothesis, it does. Ward demonstrates that all but one of the mass extinctions that have struck Earth were caused by life itself. He looks at our planet’s history in a new way, revealing an Earth that is witnessing an alarming decline of diversity and biomass—a decline brought on by life’s own “biocidal” tendencies. And the Medea hypothesis applies not just to our planet—its dire prognosis extends to all potential life in the universe. Yet life on Earth doesn’t have to be lethal. Ward shows why, but warns that our time is running out.

Breathtaking in scope, The Medea Hypothesis is certain to arouse fierce debate and radically transform our worldview. It serves as an urgent challenge to all of us to think in new ways if we hope to save ourselves from ourselves.

Professor Ward will be Nature Publishing Group’s guest in Second Life on Tuesday at 10am PST/SLT to explain and take questions on this hypothesis and its implications. All welcome!

Title: The Medea Hypothesis
Date: Tuesday 23rd June, 10am PST / 1pm EST / 6pm BST
Speaker: Professor Peter Ward, University of Washington
Location: Nature Amphitheatre, Second Life
Contact: Joanna Wombat / j.scott@nature.com

Join us this Thursday for one of our most fascinating events yet: a live discussion with world experts Dr Richard Cytowic and Dr David Eagleman on the little known phenomenon of synesthesia.

“A person with synesthesia might feel the flavor of food on her fingertips, sense the letter J as shimmering magenta or the number 5 as emerald green, hear and taste her husband’s voice as buttery golden brown”.

Synesthetes rarely talk about their peculiar sensory gift – believing either that everyone else senses the world exactly as they do, or that no one else does. Yet synesthesia occurs in one in twenty people, and is even more common among artists. One famous synesthete was novelist Vladimir Nabokov, who insisted as a toddler that the colors on his wooden alphabet blocks were “all wrong.” His mother understood exactly what he meant because she, too, had synesthesia.

In their new book Wednesday Is Indigo Blue, pioneering researcher Richard Cytowic and distinguished neuroscientist David Eagleman explain the neuroscience and genetics behind synesthesia’s multisensory experiences. Because synesthesia contradicted existing theory, Cytowic spent twenty years persuading colleagues that it was a real – and important – brain phenomenon rather than a mere curiosity. Today scientists in fifteen countries are exploring synesthesia and how it is changing the traditional view of how the brain works."

Cytowic and Eagleman argue that perception is already multisensory, though for most of us its multiple dimensions exist beyond the reach of consciousness. Reality, they point out, is more subjective than most people realize. No mere curiosity, synesthesia is a window on the mind and brain, highlighting the amazing differences in the way people see the world.

Dr Cytowic and Dr Eagleman will be our guests in Second Life on Thursday, 10am SLT/PST for a live presentation and discussion. All welcome!

Title: Wednesday is Indigo Blue
Date: Thursday 18th June, 10am PST / 1pm EST / 6pm BST
Speakers: Dr Richard Cytowic and Dr David Eagleman
Location: Nature Amphitheatre, Second Life
Contact: Joanna Wombat / j.scott@nature.com

The SkyLabs launch party today was absolutely fantastic – the demos were all brilliant, so thanks very much to all of the speakers, and the SkyLabs themselves seem to be really popular and are I believe almost all reserved! If you’re interested in having a place in a SkyLab, contact me or l.woodley@nature.com – we’d love to chat about your ideas and get you started in the SkyLabs.

More debrief later, but for the moment, a picture:

More pictures on Flickr

On Sunday we went to Coyote Point Museum, a wildlife park and interactive museum for children in an enormous green recreation area, just south of San Francisco Airport. I hasten to add I have no children, but that never puts me off going to places which might have porcupines.

North American Porcupine, photo by Gina Sanfillipo

It was in two halves, the first a mini-zoo with outdoor exhibits containing Californian wildlife. The coyote was beautiful, asleep and basking in the sun, and the Channel Island fox was also really cool, with really unusual bright ginger patches in amongst mainly brown fur.

The Golden Eagle, badger and toad also get honourary mentions, but the best one was obviously the porcupine who was just waking up as we arrived and seemed to be thinking about washing his paws. I’d seen one before at San Francisco zoo and thought it was amazing then – I had never realised porcupines could climb but they have amazing balance and speed and they spend most of their time in trees. They are nocturnal animals found throughout Canada, Alaska and the west and northeast parts of the United States and are the second largest rodent in North America, second only to the beaver.

The second section was an indoor museum with interactive physics exhibits for children, kind of like a budget version of Launch Pad, so we only skimmed over that, but it seemed pretty well done and there were loads of kids trying them out. Definitely recommended for those with children and for everyone else, the whole area is absolutely beautiful for a day out with picnic, so worth dropping in to while you’re there for some unusual animals.

Tomorrow, Wednesday, we bring you the next in the series of live marketing/branding events in Second Life: Twitter for Business.

At first blush, Twitter appears to be an easy and friendly medium. But don’t be deceived: it’s also powerful and complex, supporting a rich third-party ecosystem and tapping subtle human dynamics.

With the generous permission of O’Reilly Media, we bring you an exciting new event: a showing of a new O’Reilly webcast followed by a live discussion with host and Twitter expert Sarah Milstein.

In the new webcast, Tim O’Reilly and Sarah Milstein, Twitter experts and coauthors of The Twitter Book, will show you how to use Twitter more effectively, whether you’re on the site for personal socializing or to meet business goals. They’ll explain why Twitter is emerging as an important channel, and they’ll share key tips—along with compelling, real-life examples—from power users.

We will screen this webcast in Second Life with our guest Sarah Milstein watching too. After the film, Sarah will take part in a Q&A session, taking questions from the audience (and from Twitter, of course!)

Date: Wednesday 10th June
Time: 10am PST / 1pm EST / 6pm BST
Location: Nature Amphitheatre
Contact: Joanna Wombat

About the Speaker:

Sarah Milstein (@sarahm) is a speaker, writer and consultant specializing in Twitter for business. She’s also co-founder of 20slides, and she’s co-author, with Tim O’Reilly, of The Twitter Book. Previously, she was on the senior editorial staff at O’Reilly Media,where she founded the Tools of Change for Publishing Conference (TOC) and led development of the Missing Manuals, a best-selling series of computer books for non-geeks. In addition, she’s written for the series, co-authoring Google: The Missing Manual. Before joining O’Reilly in 2003, Sarah was a freelance writer and editor, and a regular contributor to The New York Times. She was also the CSA program founder for Just Food, a local-food-and-farms non-profit, and co-founder of Two Tomatoes Records, a label that distributes and promotes the work of children’s musician Laurie Berkner.

Never ones to miss an opportunity for a party, we’re having another one in Second Life on Tuesday to celebrate the opening of the SkyLabs after a long period of redevelopment.

Official invite below – all welcome!

The Elucian Islands, home to Nature Publishing Group and Macmillan Publishers warmly invite you to the launch of our newly-developed Skylabs facilities on TUESDAY 9th JUNE at 10am SLT / 6pm UK time / 1pm EST

The SkyLabs are intended to be an area where Second Life users can experiment with ideas, learn building and scripting skills and create their own projects, when they might otherwise not be able to find land to do so. NPG and Macmillan cover a very wide range of topics, and we are interested in hosting projects covering all aspects of science, education and literature. The best of the completed projects can be displayed in the Elucian Islands flagship areas and we hope their creators will be able to showcase work to the existing community. Educators are also welcome to use the land for teaching or demonstration purposes and we hope to build a community which will support those efforts.

At the launch party we’ll have short demos from builders and scripters who have previously contributed content to the Elucian Islands. There’ll be a chance to ask questions, meet other members of the existing community and take up residence in a new lab if you’ve requested one!

If you’d like to attend the launch, have a lab space or use the area for workshops please contact SecondLou Skytower. Ed’s note – or message me, Joanna Wombat / j.scott@nature.com

Venue: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Elucian%20Omega/194/86/23

To what degree are we responsible for our behaviour? In her new book Evil Genes, Professor Barbara Oakley explores new research on the genetics and neurobiology of personality disorders. Drawing on the advances in brain imaging that have illuminated the relationship of emotions, genetics and the brain (with accompanying imaging scans), Oakley collects detailed case histories of famed evil geniuses such as Slobodan Milosevic and Mao Zedong to challenges our assumptions about the roots of terrorism, genocide, crime and corruption.

Barbara is a Fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineers and Associate Professor of Engineering at Oakland University in Michigan. She will join us in Second Life on Wednesday 3rd June for a live presentation and discussion of latest research surrounding this fascinating issue.

All welcome!

Title: Evil Genes
Speaker: Professor Barbara Oakley, Oakland University, Michigan
Date: Wdnesday 3rd June
Time: 10am SLT, PST / 1pm EST / 6pm BST
Location: Amphitheatre, Elucian Islands

Tesla Coils are cool.

Image by Fir0002/Flagstaffotos under the GFDL License

So we went to the Maker Faire 2009 in San Mateo on Sunday and saw two Tesla Coils. There were lots of other fun things there as well, but the best thing about the Tesla Coils was that every time something happened, the whole audience started cheering – it was just so cool seeing people so excited by science!

I also liked the 3D imaging displays, although I’m not quite sure how useful a card with a 3D kitten on it is – you’d have to put on the glasses every time you wanted to look at it.

Perhaps more usefully, I might take up bee keeping and I think I will definitely become a Bay Area Vegetarian – anything for a group who had badges enquiring “Why did the tofurkey cross the road?”.