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Thank you!
Tracy, you wanna go up next?
Yes, I would love to.
Am I suppose to stand?
Yeah, you can go stand, you can do whatever you want.
So...
...one thing is probably obvious which is I'm...
...quite different from others on the stage.
Actually... I'm... I'm...
I'm quite different another way,
I'm neither scientist nor science journalist.
And...
honestly...
...if my former friends and colleagues...
- Oh my! Sorry... - ...my friends and colleagues,
saw me on this stage with this group of people
they would laugh,
because...
I was actually a broadcast journalist and I...
covered wars, I covered politics, I covered many things,
but I never covered science
and that is, because...
we all assumed that science was boring,
and that scientists were boring.
And...
and so my story is really about how I discovered,
that science is a great story.
And...
I did a a program in about 1999 called
"The century with Peter Jennings", and I was producing
a part of it called "The thinkers"
and I interviewed many impressive, incredible people.
And what I found, I found that the scientists were actually
more interesting and more compelling than anyone else I talked to.
Actually they were:
Richard Dawkins, Brian Greene.
Many others were in that... in that program.
And so I...
I realized again that the science stories are...
really they were untapped, they were...
people didn't realize in the...
in the mainstream media, that
these are great adventure stories and many other things.
So, in 2005 or so...
Brian Greene and I co-founded a thing called World Science Festival
in what we wanted to do is bring science to a general audience in a very new way.
We wanted to use all of the storytelling multimedia techniques
you could throw at these great stories.
And the key thing is we wanted to put the scientists on the stage.
They were great communicators and they often didn't get the chance to do that.
So...
So, Lawrence is a...
is a...
wonderful participant in the festival,
he has been there a number of years, and so he asked me to...
as part of the stock, to bring
a video,
that would actually show what the World Science Festival is and does.
So...
If we can bring the lights down,
we can show a bit of that.
Some of the biggest names in science and the arts
have gathered here in New York City for the World Science Festival.
The festival which been called a 'new cultural institution' by the New York Times
takes science out of the laboratory and into the streets.
World Science Festival kicks off with a star-studded gala performance
hosted by Oscar-winning actor Alan Alda.
Tonight we flight across the cosmos with speed of art,
scientists and artist come together
and give us a view of nature that is both fascinating and fun.
It is my distinct pleasure to dedicate the "Icarus at the edge of time"
to tonight's honoree, more than any other member our species,
professor Hawking has traveled closest to the edge of time.
I am very honored by this wonderful evening.
What's such a great adventure about science?
The idea that we can all understand science
and not have to be scientist
is just a wonderful miracle of this festival.
There's a tremendous appetite in the public
for knowing what science is actually accomplishing.
Is life a one of chance?
Are our genes a destiny?
Is there a mathematical order to nature?
What the hell is mathematics?
Is there aliens in space?
This is what science is about.
The excitement, the wonder, the adventure, the discovery.
If he asked me what I hope to find,
I don't know, more cool stuff.
To moderate this panel on quantum physics
do you know anything about it?
Well, you know...
The most intimidating audience
to teach the short black holes 101 course in front of a...
professor Stephen Hawking.
Give us a thumbnail sketch
of the beginning of the cosmos as we now know it.
You can actually do a calculation
to find out how many bits are necessary
to simulate the universe.
The program here tonight
will discuss more dimensions than meet the eye.
Now, string theory, its multi-dimensional vibrating strings
that are so small there's no way to ever measure
at any imaginable point of future.
And yet, people still take you seriously.
Kinds of things will be said here on this stage this evening
are the kinds of things over which wars have been started.
There is no animal in the animal kingdom
has breed the kind of havoc that we have.
Unless we take care of the ocean,
nothing else really matters.
You deserve to be punished for doing the wrong thing.
Tonight we're gonna explore science and religion.
But you still have faith in God.
What do you mean still?
You can't predict what's coming next,
you can't prove what's coming next.
I'll tell you what...
You don't care because you're a physicist.
You can't solve a problem,
convince yourself that it's not important,
forget about it.
We gotta get especially young people into the science,
because when they will go to the school,
it is literally crushed out of them.
I think young people care a lot more about science
than we did when we were they age.
Who among the young people here
would like to go to Mars?
What can people expect from a free street fair?
You won't find falafel or tube socks.
this is really wall to wall science.
I love the idea that they've taken the exhibits out to the people.
I live for being around great young scientists
because the world has amazing possibilities.
I am a mathemagician.
That's 300 x 238 + 31 squared = 71400 + 961 is 72361.
Let's hear it for algebra!
Is something beautiful to you,
because we're hard-wired to like beautiful things
or because it relates to reality.
Put your stereo glasses on.
These images - they are artworks of the universe.
The storytelling has to be directed enough
to move us one panel to another panel to another panel.
World Science Festival, I'll be there!
So...
So, as you can tell from, from that highlights reel...
what we tried to do is open up new avenues and boundary into science,
through the arts,
through debate, discussion,
through Nobel laureates talking to children,
and what we hope to accomplish.
And based on the...
the people who attended me with, it's been five years
and nearly a million people have attended the live events.
And the goal and what we hope to continue,
is to move science out of the siloed existence
that attended to be for general audiences
and smack in the middle of popular culture where it belongs. So...
- Thank you! - Thank you Tracy!
Subtitles by: Quantum Leap Engineer