WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.920 Good afternoon, everybody, and welcome to this afternoon's session for the Adelaide Festival of Ideas. 2 00:00:04.000 --> 00:00:07.120 My name is Duncan Steele. I'm on the advisory committee for the Festival of Ideas. 3 00:00:07.620 --> 00:00:11.380 This afternoon, we're going to be talking about big science, big bucks, big deal. 4 00:00:12.060 --> 00:00:16.560 We've just been having a little discussion at the back with the three speakers for this afternoon, 5 00:00:16.700 --> 00:00:19.720 and we decided we weren't really quite sure what big science was. 6 00:00:20.680 --> 00:00:23.680 We think it's things which require a great deal of funding, perhaps, 7 00:00:24.300 --> 00:00:27.220 and maybe require, obviously, a large number of people. 8 00:00:27.220 --> 00:00:30.880 So the sort of thing we're thinking about maybe are particle physics experiments 9 00:00:30.880 --> 00:00:35.940 where you need super colliders like the one at CERN on the border between France and Switzerland. 10 00:00:36.240 --> 00:00:40.640 It costs billions of dollars. You need hundreds, thousands of people of all sorts of different disciplines. 11 00:00:41.240 --> 00:00:45.240 We're obviously going to be talking about things like space research and astronomy, 12 00:00:45.520 --> 00:00:49.520 which, again, require very substantial amounts of funding for the sort of telescopes 13 00:00:49.520 --> 00:00:53.880 which are being built at this stage in our development. 14 00:00:54.200 --> 00:00:56.860 And we're going to be hearing from Rachel Webster, 15 00:00:56.900 --> 00:00:57.200 who's... 16 00:00:57.220 --> 00:00:59.320 Professor of Astrophysics at the University of Melbourne. 17 00:01:00.040 --> 00:01:03.260 She's very closely involved with the Square Kilometre Array. 18 00:01:03.300 --> 00:01:06.600 I heard people talking about SKA in previous sessions, 19 00:01:06.680 --> 00:01:08.940 and I hate it when people use acronyms without saying what they mean. 20 00:01:09.080 --> 00:01:12.940 But when you work in a field, you get used to it using that kind of shorthand. 21 00:01:13.440 --> 00:01:18.360 SKA is Square Kilometre Array, and I'm sure she'll be telling you a little bit about what that is. 22 00:01:19.560 --> 00:01:21.800 We're also going to be hearing from Suzanne Miller, 23 00:01:21.920 --> 00:01:26.860 who's a geologist by background who is currently director at the South Australian Museum. 24 00:01:27.880 --> 00:01:34.680 We kind of decided that Rachel clearly does big science, big bucks, big deal question mark. 25 00:01:35.220 --> 00:01:36.480 We're not quite sure about geology. 26 00:01:36.760 --> 00:01:41.420 Geology could be big science, but equally well, there have been fantastic geologists who have worked on their own. 27 00:01:43.420 --> 00:01:47.020 Finally, Mandy Srinivagan. 28 00:01:47.220 --> 00:01:47.980 Just call me Srini. 29 00:01:48.100 --> 00:01:50.000 Srini. Not Mandy. 30 00:01:50.540 --> 00:01:53.880 My parents live in a road called Mandy Meadows. I just hate that as an address. 31 00:01:54.640 --> 00:01:55.720 So we'll call you Srini. 32 00:01:55.720 --> 00:01:57.540 Srini, he's an expert on bees. 33 00:01:58.180 --> 00:02:01.360 My good friend Paul Davies now works at Arizona State University, 34 00:02:01.600 --> 00:02:05.220 but he's still an advisor to the Festival of Ideas. 35 00:02:05.960 --> 00:02:13.720 Before he went off to Arizona, there was a commemorative or celebratory meeting held in his honour for his 60th birthday. 36 00:02:13.980 --> 00:02:15.660 And Srini was one of the speakers there. 37 00:02:15.740 --> 00:02:23.640 And at the big closing dinner afterwards, Paul finished his thanking remarks to all the speakers and so on 38 00:02:23.640 --> 00:02:25.700 by saying that quite often he's eating a lot of beans, 39 00:02:25.720 --> 00:02:29.820 and he's asked whether if he hadn't done maths and physics and cosmology, what would he have done? 40 00:02:30.260 --> 00:02:33.700 And he said in the past, he'd always said that he probably would have studied archaeology. 41 00:02:33.820 --> 00:02:37.420 But he said after hearing Srini speak, he certainly would have studied bees. 42 00:02:38.700 --> 00:02:41.760 And I welcome all of you to try and get along tomorrow. 43 00:02:41.920 --> 00:02:45.580 I believe Srini is speaking about his research on bees in particular, 44 00:02:45.660 --> 00:02:48.580 but also we're going to be hearing about that to a certain extent today. 45 00:02:49.640 --> 00:02:51.740 Okay, I don't want to take any more of the speakers' time. 46 00:02:51.780 --> 00:02:55.700 The format this afternoon is each of the speakers is going to talk for a short while at the podium. 47 00:02:55.720 --> 00:02:58.160 About their particular experiences and so on. 48 00:02:58.240 --> 00:03:01.220 And then we're going to have, that's going to be maybe 10 or 12 minutes each. 49 00:03:01.380 --> 00:03:02.420 Maybe more, maybe less. 50 00:03:02.900 --> 00:03:07.580 Then we're going to have about a 20 or 30 minute panel discussion about big science, big bucks, big deal. 51 00:03:07.720 --> 00:03:09.360 And then we're going to throw it open for questions. 52 00:03:10.260 --> 00:03:12.380 And we'll have that for the last 20 minutes or so. 53 00:03:12.840 --> 00:03:16.960 Again, can I urge everybody who hasn't done yet, turn off your cell phones, your mobile phones. 54 00:03:18.300 --> 00:03:19.260 Think of good questions. 55 00:03:19.460 --> 00:03:21.960 We hope we've managed to get through as many questions as we possibly can. 56 00:03:22.080 --> 00:03:24.200 We regret that at 4 o'clock we've got to be out of here. 57 00:03:24.980 --> 00:03:25.700 And thank you. 58 00:03:25.700 --> 00:03:27.560 We've got to clear everybody out to get ready for the next session. 59 00:03:28.380 --> 00:03:34.360 So, can I first of all then welcome the first speaker, who's going to be Professor Rachel Webster from the University of Melbourne. 60 00:03:35.780 --> 00:03:38.460 She's chair of the National Astronomy Committee, is it called? 61 00:03:38.620 --> 00:03:39.800 National Committee of Astronomy. 62 00:03:40.440 --> 00:03:41.920 Well, I've done my stint. 63 00:03:42.000 --> 00:03:42.620 You've done your stint. 64 00:03:42.680 --> 00:03:43.360 You've managed to escape. 65 00:03:43.720 --> 00:03:43.840 Yeah. 66 00:03:44.720 --> 00:03:45.620 It's usually like that. 67 00:03:45.740 --> 00:03:48.680 She also is instrumental in encouraging women in science. 68 00:03:48.740 --> 00:03:53.520 And speaking as somebody who's lectured in physics and taught in high school physics, it's a fantastically important thing to do. 69 00:03:53.640 --> 00:03:55.680 I was brought up in a household with three sisters. 70 00:03:55.700 --> 00:03:56.800 All of whom are quite exceptional. 71 00:03:57.060 --> 00:03:59.820 One will be inducted as a fellow of the Royal Society next week. 72 00:04:01.340 --> 00:04:07.540 But in physics, maths and all the physical sciences and so on, girls and then women are really... 73 00:04:07.540 --> 00:04:12.360 There are many, many obstacles they need to get over, largely with the boys in their classes giving them a hard time. 74 00:04:12.980 --> 00:04:13.980 We want to change that. 75 00:04:14.240 --> 00:04:19.760 And Rachel has done fantastic things in easing more and more women into the physical sciences. 76 00:04:19.940 --> 00:04:22.680 So, Rachel, please tell us about big science, big bucks. 77 00:04:25.960 --> 00:04:27.760 Well, thank you very much, Duncan. 78 00:04:27.920 --> 00:04:32.860 I'm going to start off with some comments about perspectives on big science. 79 00:04:33.320 --> 00:04:36.200 I'm clearly the person here who's got to defend the big science. 80 00:04:36.460 --> 00:04:47.520 But then the last few comments I want to make are from a much more personal point of view where I'll, you know, perhaps change the orientation just a little bit. 81 00:04:47.980 --> 00:04:52.240 The first thing that I want to talk about, though, is about discovery. 82 00:04:52.540 --> 00:04:55.680 And the history of science is littered with prognostications. 83 00:04:55.700 --> 00:04:57.480 There are prognostications about the future of discovery. 84 00:04:57.860 --> 00:05:05.340 One of the quotes that I particularly like is from a guy called Albert Michelson, who won the Nobel Prize in 1902. 85 00:05:05.820 --> 00:05:10.580 And he said at the time that the more important fundamental laws and facts of physical sciences, 86 00:05:10.860 --> 00:05:16.320 the possibility of their ever being supplanted in consequence of new discoveries is exceedingly remote. 87 00:05:16.720 --> 00:05:23.340 In other words, he basically thought that we knew all there was to know about the physical world in 1902. 88 00:05:23.860 --> 00:05:25.680 And that was just a few years before I met Duncan. 89 00:05:25.700 --> 00:05:31.900 Einstein published special relativity and general relativity. So quite clearly, our understanding 90 00:05:31.900 --> 00:05:37.640 of science took, or of the physical world, took quite a major leap very shortly thereafter. 91 00:05:39.420 --> 00:05:45.140 And we can still say today that our understanding of the physical world is very, very far from 92 00:05:45.140 --> 00:05:50.260 complete. Just when we think that we've got a pretty good grasp of what the world looks like, 93 00:05:50.260 --> 00:05:56.640 something new emerges, and it's completely out of left field. And the example that I'm going to 94 00:05:56.640 --> 00:06:00.300 mention, although I'm not going to actually describe what it is today, is something called 95 00:06:00.300 --> 00:06:05.800 dark energy. And this has come onto the scene in the last five years or so, and it's completely 96 00:06:06.320 --> 00:06:10.340 different from anything we've ever thought about before. And in fact, I can categorically say we 97 00:06:10.340 --> 00:06:13.220 don't know what it is, but I'll maybe talk a little more about that tomorrow. 98 00:06:14.660 --> 00:06:19.920 You know, up until now, we thought, we believed that the stuff that we're made of, and we call 99 00:06:19.920 --> 00:06:20.120 this, 100 00:06:20.260 --> 00:06:25.320 this baryonic matter, was actually the dominant thing in the universe. But what we've come to 101 00:06:25.320 --> 00:06:30.460 realize in the last 10 or 15 years is that the stuff that we're made of, these baryons, 102 00:06:30.560 --> 00:06:35.300 is perhaps only a couple of percent of what actually exists in the universe. There's lots 103 00:06:35.300 --> 00:06:41.000 of other stuff, dark matter, dark energy, and those are in fact the dominant constituents 104 00:06:41.000 --> 00:06:46.240 in the universe. And so this is a pretty, this is a complete orientation of how we understand 105 00:06:46.240 --> 00:06:50.240 ourselves in the universe. It's a bit like the change, the capacity, the capacity to 106 00:06:50.260 --> 00:06:55.760 be successful. And so that's where we'rePorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPor 107 00:06:55.760 --> 00:06:56.080 PorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPor 108 00:06:56.080 --> 00:06:56.420 PorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPorPor 109 00:06:56.420 --> 00:06:56.480 Por 110 00:07:20.260 --> 00:07:22.060 even though we write a science case 111 00:07:22.060 --> 00:07:24.700 and we say we're going to answer this really big question, 112 00:07:24.900 --> 00:07:27.040 in practice what usually happens 113 00:07:27.040 --> 00:07:29.720 is that the biggest question that we answer with that machine 114 00:07:29.720 --> 00:07:31.840 is something that we didn't actually think about 115 00:07:31.840 --> 00:07:32.820 when we were building it. 116 00:07:33.060 --> 00:07:35.500 So we build the big machine, we move forward, 117 00:07:35.600 --> 00:07:37.260 but the direction we move forward in 118 00:07:37.260 --> 00:07:39.840 is often quite different from where we expected to go. 119 00:07:40.160 --> 00:07:43.620 I'm going to mention the Large Hadron Collider, 120 00:07:43.720 --> 00:07:45.840 which Duncan has already mentioned, 121 00:07:45.840 --> 00:07:49.600 which is a big machine that's being built 122 00:07:50.300 --> 00:07:53.040 under parts of France and Switzerland near Geneva. 123 00:07:53.260 --> 00:07:55.780 The cost is around about $10 billion. 124 00:07:56.740 --> 00:08:00.040 And what it's going to do is it's going to accelerate, 125 00:08:00.240 --> 00:08:02.920 charge particles to very, very high energies, 126 00:08:02.980 --> 00:08:04.240 and it's going to crash them together. 127 00:08:04.480 --> 00:08:06.720 And we hope that in crashing them together 128 00:08:06.720 --> 00:08:09.760 we'll create new particles, which we haven't seen before. 129 00:08:09.940 --> 00:08:11.100 We've got names for them. 130 00:08:11.180 --> 00:08:13.080 There's something called the Higgs particle. 131 00:08:13.320 --> 00:08:15.040 And we hope that that's going to explain 132 00:08:15.040 --> 00:08:16.280 why we have mass. 133 00:08:16.780 --> 00:08:19.880 So it's really quite a fundamental notion, 134 00:08:20.100 --> 00:08:22.620 and it perhaps might tell us what the dark matter is 135 00:08:22.620 --> 00:08:23.960 that I mentioned a little bit earlier. 136 00:08:24.500 --> 00:08:27.260 Now, some of the other examples I could give at this stage 137 00:08:27.260 --> 00:08:28.260 would be in astronomy, 138 00:08:28.420 --> 00:08:29.800 but I'm going to save those up till later 139 00:08:29.800 --> 00:08:31.720 just in case you want to ask me about them. 140 00:08:31.740 --> 00:08:34.380 Obviously, that's where I feel comfortable. 141 00:08:34.600 --> 00:08:36.200 But what I want to go on and talk about 142 00:08:36.200 --> 00:08:37.740 is when we make these discoveries, 143 00:08:38.680 --> 00:08:40.360 will they change our lives? 144 00:08:40.620 --> 00:08:44.220 And the first important thing, really, 145 00:08:44.320 --> 00:08:45.020 is that when we do, 146 00:08:45.020 --> 00:08:46.240 when we deal in fundamental science, 147 00:08:47.080 --> 00:08:48.560 those fundamental discoveries 148 00:08:48.560 --> 00:08:50.320 actually don't change our lives tomorrow. 149 00:08:51.520 --> 00:08:53.820 And, you know, we can only go back 150 00:08:53.820 --> 00:08:55.600 and historically look at what's happened, 151 00:08:55.740 --> 00:08:57.940 but essentially what happens 152 00:08:57.940 --> 00:09:01.480 is that the discoveries are likely to impact on our lives 153 00:09:01.480 --> 00:09:04.120 in about 50 years' time, or maybe even longer. 154 00:09:04.360 --> 00:09:05.260 So let me give you... 155 00:09:05.260 --> 00:09:08.420 And I should just say, too, that this is a huge difficulty 156 00:09:08.420 --> 00:09:11.240 because, you know, as a fundamental scientist, 157 00:09:11.280 --> 00:09:13.100 if you go to the government and say, 158 00:09:13.180 --> 00:09:14.560 hey, how about giving me... 159 00:09:15.020 --> 00:09:16.660 a billion dollars to do this experiment? 160 00:09:16.780 --> 00:09:18.900 And no, it won't affect the next election results. 161 00:09:19.420 --> 00:09:22.080 You can imagine you have quite a lot of trouble convincing them 162 00:09:22.080 --> 00:09:23.220 that they're going to fund you at all. 163 00:09:24.320 --> 00:09:26.340 So let me give you an example, though, 164 00:09:26.360 --> 00:09:27.740 of electricity and magnetism, 165 00:09:28.240 --> 00:09:31.160 which I'm sure you've all heard of. 166 00:09:31.260 --> 00:09:34.320 And it took about 50 years for electricity and magnetism 167 00:09:34.320 --> 00:09:37.160 to actually be incorporated into people's everyday lives 168 00:09:37.160 --> 00:09:39.880 after their discovery in the 18th century. 169 00:09:40.040 --> 00:09:44.220 But, of course, the impact is revolutionary today. 170 00:09:45.020 --> 00:09:49.060 Now, quantum physics was formulated in the early 20th century, 171 00:09:49.260 --> 00:09:51.020 so in the early 1900s, 172 00:09:51.020 --> 00:09:54.540 and we had to wait 50 years for the development of the laser. 173 00:09:54.660 --> 00:09:56.800 But again, probably most of you realise 174 00:09:56.800 --> 00:09:59.260 that lasers are now a very integral part of our lives 175 00:09:59.260 --> 00:10:00.640 and quite important. 176 00:10:00.900 --> 00:10:03.000 So will dark energy and dark matter 177 00:10:03.000 --> 00:10:06.040 be an integral part of our lives in 50 years' time? 178 00:10:06.460 --> 00:10:09.000 It seems unimaginable to me at the moment, 179 00:10:09.040 --> 00:10:10.180 but maybe it's possible. 180 00:10:11.400 --> 00:10:13.700 Certainly, it's not going to be tomorrow. 181 00:10:13.700 --> 00:10:19.280 So the question we want to answer is, 182 00:10:20.240 --> 00:10:24.080 then, what we're trying to do is to push our understanding, 183 00:10:24.240 --> 00:10:25.900 to push the limits of our understanding 184 00:10:26.920 --> 00:10:29.100 by building these new machines. 185 00:10:30.040 --> 00:10:33.640 And to do that, we need orders of magnitude of improvement 186 00:10:33.640 --> 00:10:36.360 in some part of physical space. 187 00:10:36.460 --> 00:10:38.740 So it might be energy, it might be time, 188 00:10:38.900 --> 00:10:40.540 it might be intensity, 189 00:10:40.780 --> 00:10:43.000 it might be in distance out into space. 190 00:10:43.700 --> 00:10:45.620 And unfortunately, but inevitably, 191 00:10:45.800 --> 00:10:48.700 that usually means that it's going to cost a few billion dollars. 192 00:10:48.760 --> 00:10:51.960 So those are the sort of price tags we're looking at for the big science. 193 00:10:53.280 --> 00:10:55.900 What it also means is that these projects 194 00:10:55.900 --> 00:10:58.040 are no longer the province of a single country. 195 00:10:58.240 --> 00:11:00.360 So the scientists realised pretty early on, 196 00:11:00.440 --> 00:11:02.900 you might be able to get a couple of hundred million dollars 197 00:11:02.900 --> 00:11:04.700 out of a single country if you're the US. 198 00:11:04.920 --> 00:11:06.200 Not usually in Australia. 199 00:11:06.460 --> 00:11:08.740 Well, in fact, probably not ever in Australia. 200 00:11:10.020 --> 00:11:12.040 But if you want to go beyond that, 201 00:11:12.120 --> 00:11:13.240 then you have to have an international, 202 00:11:13.860 --> 00:11:15.880 you know, program or project. 203 00:11:16.080 --> 00:11:21.160 And so what we have then is science really leading the way 204 00:11:21.160 --> 00:11:25.000 in global cooperation in these major scientific projects. 205 00:11:25.280 --> 00:11:28.200 And of course, you know, 206 00:11:28.780 --> 00:11:30.940 Australia plays a role in some of these projects. 207 00:11:31.040 --> 00:11:32.080 They're not usually as a leader. 208 00:11:32.960 --> 00:11:37.600 So I just want to finish up on these perspectives by saying, 209 00:11:37.680 --> 00:11:39.200 so do we need these machines? 210 00:11:39.480 --> 00:11:41.520 And I'm going to say there are really four reasons 211 00:11:41.520 --> 00:11:43.680 that we can argue why we do need them. 212 00:11:43.700 --> 00:11:45.800 One is to expand our horizons. 213 00:11:46.020 --> 00:11:49.060 Two is to develop a fundamental understanding of the universe. 214 00:11:49.320 --> 00:11:53.000 And that might underpin our technology for the next decade. 215 00:11:53.420 --> 00:11:55.920 Three is the development of new technologies. 216 00:11:56.020 --> 00:11:58.340 So actually building these machines develops, 217 00:11:58.520 --> 00:12:01.200 very often develops significant new technologies. 218 00:12:01.500 --> 00:12:03.980 And then the final thing, which I haven't really explored, 219 00:12:04.220 --> 00:12:07.340 is to actually excite and transform our young scientists. 220 00:12:07.640 --> 00:12:11.200 And in many ways, I believe that's one of the most important issues. 221 00:12:11.740 --> 00:12:13.040 Now I said, so, 222 00:12:13.700 --> 00:12:15.340 that's the perspective on big science. 223 00:12:15.540 --> 00:12:18.800 But I also want to make a couple of personal comments. 224 00:12:18.880 --> 00:12:23.600 Because obviously I'm embedded in this process and participate in it. 225 00:12:23.700 --> 00:12:26.220 And I'm even an advocate of it. 226 00:12:26.660 --> 00:12:32.500 But at a personal level, and a reflection of the, you know, 227 00:12:32.520 --> 00:12:38.780 the title of the session, I do question sometimes whether I should be, 228 00:12:38.800 --> 00:12:40.440 you know, trying to convince our politicians 229 00:12:40.440 --> 00:12:43.360 to spend $200 million on a new telescope. 230 00:12:43.700 --> 00:12:45.460 You know, is that something that I should be doing? 231 00:12:45.780 --> 00:12:49.000 And I think what it comes down to is a question of balance. 232 00:12:49.200 --> 00:12:51.760 Or for me, it comes down to a question of balance. 233 00:12:52.000 --> 00:12:55.580 And so yes, I do spend some considerable time 234 00:12:55.580 --> 00:12:58.340 and energy convincing them to do big science. 235 00:12:58.740 --> 00:13:04.180 But I've also, I also spend time and energy convincing them 236 00:13:04.180 --> 00:13:06.320 to do other things that I think are important. 237 00:13:06.660 --> 00:13:08.940 And the example I'm going to give is, you know, 238 00:13:08.960 --> 00:13:13.380 I've been personally quite caught up in the debate around climate change. 239 00:13:13.700 --> 00:13:14.540 For a long time. 240 00:13:14.860 --> 00:13:18.640 And I've, you know, speak publicly on this. 241 00:13:18.800 --> 00:13:22.360 And have developed programs at the University of Melbourne 242 00:13:22.900 --> 00:13:27.900 for the students to, you know, try and introduce them to some 243 00:13:27.900 --> 00:13:30.400 of the deeper concepts and issues around climate change. 244 00:13:30.880 --> 00:13:39.720 But more recently, I've become quite strongly convinced that we haven't, 245 00:13:39.720 --> 00:13:42.420 that there's a part of the climate change debate 246 00:13:42.420 --> 00:13:43.660 that has been largely ignored. 247 00:13:43.700 --> 00:13:48.640 And you in South Australia will be reasonably or somewhat familiar with this. 248 00:13:48.720 --> 00:13:49.840 And this is geothermal energy. 249 00:13:51.380 --> 00:13:54.300 Geothermal energy holds an extraordinary promise 250 00:13:55.040 --> 00:13:57.080 if it can be harnessed in an appropriate way. 251 00:13:57.300 --> 00:14:03.500 And the promise is to develop base load electricity supply to our major cities. 252 00:14:03.860 --> 00:14:07.060 And so I've teamed up with some people at the University of Melbourne. 253 00:14:07.200 --> 00:14:10.380 And because, you know, I'm not scared of big projects, 254 00:14:10.560 --> 00:14:13.560 we're putting together a big project to really look very, 255 00:14:13.700 --> 00:14:16.180 very seriously at geothermal energy in Victoria, 256 00:14:16.460 --> 00:14:18.620 in slightly different way from South Australia. 257 00:14:18.940 --> 00:14:22.780 And I know that the next year this is going to consume a lot of my energies. 258 00:14:23.080 --> 00:14:26.180 So as I said a minute ago, it's a question of balance. 259 00:14:26.460 --> 00:14:31.240 And I guess I will sell my conscience of getting a few hundred million dollars 260 00:14:31.240 --> 00:14:36.460 for radio telescopes by hopefully driving a new project in an area 261 00:14:36.460 --> 00:14:40.140 that probably has more immediate relevance for today. 262 00:14:40.280 --> 00:14:40.880 Thank you. 263 00:14:40.960 --> 00:14:41.460 Thank you. 264 00:14:45.260 --> 00:14:46.120 Thank you, Rachel. 265 00:14:46.440 --> 00:14:49.320 Very few people seem to realise how hot it is down below. 266 00:14:49.560 --> 00:14:52.480 The hottest place I've ever been was down at the bottom of North Broken Hill mine 267 00:14:52.480 --> 00:14:54.800 where the temperature was 60 degrees Celsius. 268 00:14:54.840 --> 00:14:55.800 That is the rock temperature. 269 00:14:56.020 --> 00:15:00.080 So they had the blast air conditioned, cooled air through all the time. 270 00:15:00.480 --> 00:15:02.060 The reason I was down there was the University 271 00:15:02.060 --> 00:15:05.380 of Sydney was building a neutrino detector to look for neutrinos from the sun. 272 00:15:05.540 --> 00:15:06.720 That's another example of big science. 273 00:15:07.120 --> 00:15:10.940 The miners just couldn't understand why when they're digging lead out of the ground, 274 00:15:11.040 --> 00:15:13.400 the University of Sydney was actually taking lead ingots 275 00:15:13.700 --> 00:15:17.940 and backed down a lead mine in order to make a wall around their big detector 276 00:15:17.940 --> 00:15:20.720 to shield out the other cosmic ray background and so on. 277 00:15:21.060 --> 00:15:22.360 Very strange thing they thought. 278 00:15:22.960 --> 00:15:26.420 Our next speaker, Suzanne Miller, is currently director 279 00:15:26.420 --> 00:15:29.540 of the South Australian Museum, arrived here in Adelaide in 2007. 280 00:15:29.720 --> 00:15:31.200 She says the last two years have whizzed by. 281 00:15:32.060 --> 00:15:34.780 I'm not going to read out the full description of everything she's done. 282 00:15:34.960 --> 00:15:36.520 We all here can read, I'm sure. 283 00:15:37.060 --> 00:15:39.080 I don't want to waste your time by doing that. 284 00:15:39.660 --> 00:15:42.720 But she has an amazing array of accomplishments in the past, 285 00:15:42.820 --> 00:15:43.680 worked in all sorts of different places. 286 00:15:43.700 --> 00:15:48.100 It also says here she's got a PhD from Imperial College in London. 287 00:15:48.620 --> 00:15:51.400 Because of that, because I'm also a graduate of Imperial College, 288 00:15:51.460 --> 00:15:52.320 I know she's got a dick. 289 00:15:54.020 --> 00:15:57.780 Imperial College hand out this qualification, DIC, 290 00:15:57.960 --> 00:15:59.780 Diploma of Membership of the Imperial College of Science 291 00:15:59.780 --> 00:16:01.980 and Technology and Medicine as well. 292 00:16:02.020 --> 00:16:03.820 It's a little bit embarrassing when you've got it on your card. 293 00:16:05.420 --> 00:16:07.420 Anyway, Suzanne is a geologist. 294 00:16:07.660 --> 00:16:11.240 Again, if I hadn't been a physicist, I think I would have liked to be a geologist. 295 00:16:11.380 --> 00:16:12.440 I think it's an amazing thing. 296 00:16:13.060 --> 00:16:13.680 I think it's a great thing. 297 00:16:13.680 --> 00:16:15.460 I think she's going to tell us about why she's a geologist 298 00:16:15.460 --> 00:16:16.920 and what she's done in the past. 299 00:16:17.040 --> 00:16:18.960 And please fire away. 300 00:16:19.180 --> 00:16:20.320 Thank you very much. 301 00:16:23.880 --> 00:16:27.700 Well, today when I was thinking about the subject of today's discussion, 302 00:16:27.900 --> 00:16:31.620 I was trying to reflect on the science I'd been involved in. 303 00:16:31.680 --> 00:16:36.840 And I reckon I'd been involved in very small science and some big science. 304 00:16:37.100 --> 00:16:40.220 I think a lot of Rachel's science really could be called super science 305 00:16:40.220 --> 00:16:42.700 because the stuff I've been involved in is somewhere in the middle. 306 00:16:43.100 --> 00:16:43.660 But I think it's a great thing. 307 00:16:43.660 --> 00:16:47.980 But I was trying to think about why I had become a scientist in the first place at school. 308 00:16:48.080 --> 00:16:52.780 I was very keen on the idea of archaeology and I was very lucky to be at school in Scotland 309 00:16:52.780 --> 00:16:54.880 where you could have a lot of different subjects. 310 00:16:54.960 --> 00:16:55.820 I did the classics. 311 00:16:55.880 --> 00:16:56.960 I did Latin and Greek. 312 00:16:57.040 --> 00:16:58.040 And I did the sciences. 313 00:16:58.080 --> 00:17:01.340 I did biology, physics and maths and chemistry. 314 00:17:02.160 --> 00:17:06.500 And I was trying to think what was it made me choose to go into science at university. 315 00:17:07.440 --> 00:17:10.080 And it came down to the fact that it was about dreaming. 316 00:17:10.560 --> 00:17:12.980 It was about the big questions out there. 317 00:17:12.980 --> 00:17:20.180 I had some fantastic science teachers at school who had an amazing capacity to really engage with their students. 318 00:17:20.660 --> 00:17:24.180 Not by teaching through a very vertical nature of science, 319 00:17:24.300 --> 00:17:28.260 which I think is a way that a lot of science teachers have to teach science these days 320 00:17:28.260 --> 00:17:31.140 because they have to push students through getting exams. 321 00:17:31.480 --> 00:17:34.540 And those numbers are the numbers that education departments count. 322 00:17:35.000 --> 00:17:36.420 But when I was going through school, 323 00:17:36.500 --> 00:17:42.760 I was lucky enough to have some teachers who asked the big questions and asked us the big questions and said, well, 324 00:17:42.980 --> 00:17:44.360 why is the sky blue? 325 00:17:44.440 --> 00:17:45.280 What is out there? 326 00:17:45.320 --> 00:17:46.340 What are we made of? 327 00:17:46.500 --> 00:17:47.340 What is matter? 328 00:17:47.760 --> 00:17:49.020 And then worked backwards. 329 00:17:49.580 --> 00:17:52.660 And a lot of people find that a really odd way of teaching science. 330 00:17:52.740 --> 00:17:56.440 It's sort of you have to learn A before you can move on to B before you can move on to C. 331 00:17:56.740 --> 00:17:58.440 And I don't think that's the case. 332 00:17:58.460 --> 00:18:03.920 I was fascinated by science from a very early age because of those big questions. 333 00:18:04.480 --> 00:18:05.900 I love orreries. 334 00:18:06.060 --> 00:18:12.640 I love the idea of somebody hundreds, thousands of years ago sitting and working out how the planets moved around the sun. 335 00:18:12.980 --> 00:18:16.360 And some of the very ancient orreries were, of course, the Earth is the center. 336 00:18:17.080 --> 00:18:25.760 And some of those ideas, the thought that an individual could sit and think and dream about something beyond the stars is what got me into science. 337 00:18:26.160 --> 00:18:30.620 It wasn't small questions about science, although that came later because you need that background. 338 00:18:31.380 --> 00:18:33.660 So I was very lucky when I was at university. 339 00:18:33.740 --> 00:18:36.120 I had a range of science subjects. 340 00:18:36.360 --> 00:18:40.880 I went to St. Andrews in Scotland and in Scotland or at St. 341 00:18:40.940 --> 00:18:42.440 Andrews, you choose to go into a faculty. 342 00:18:42.520 --> 00:18:42.960 And I was very lucky. 343 00:18:42.980 --> 00:18:43.360 I was very lucky to go into a faculty. 344 00:18:43.360 --> 00:18:45.660 Rather than choose a subject when you first arrive at university. 345 00:18:46.340 --> 00:18:49.120 And so I just chose a range of science and maths. 346 00:18:49.440 --> 00:18:53.640 And then you kind of specialize as you go through the four-year degree course. 347 00:18:54.040 --> 00:18:58.700 And so I got to the end of first year and I thought, well, I can start to choose now. 348 00:18:58.800 --> 00:18:59.680 Will I go into chemistry? 349 00:18:59.920 --> 00:19:00.640 Will I go into maths? 350 00:19:00.800 --> 00:19:01.720 Will I go into geology? 351 00:19:02.400 --> 00:19:04.780 And because those are the three subjects I had chosen. 352 00:19:05.020 --> 00:19:09.540 And basically all the geology lectures in the summer seemed to go to really fun places. 353 00:19:09.820 --> 00:19:10.940 They went all over the world. 354 00:19:11.080 --> 00:19:12.620 They worked in really interesting groups. 355 00:19:12.620 --> 00:19:13.860 Doing really interesting things. 356 00:19:14.220 --> 00:19:19.820 And the chemistry and the maths guys, they seem to stay in the labs and the offices in front of their computers. 357 00:19:19.880 --> 00:19:21.020 Or in front of their experiments. 358 00:19:21.140 --> 00:19:23.320 And I thought, no, geology sounds like the right one for me. 359 00:19:24.300 --> 00:19:29.020 I hope that a more laudable reason was also because it was a very holistic subject it seemed to me. 360 00:19:29.120 --> 00:19:32.420 It involved chemistry, biology, physics, maths. 361 00:19:32.760 --> 00:19:37.460 It was a complete package looking at the earth and hopefully beyond. 362 00:19:37.840 --> 00:19:42.600 In fact, one of my lectures at St. Andrews was involved in the NASA space program. 363 00:19:42.600 --> 00:19:49.220 And I probably was one of the few students who one of my final questions was looking at a thin section of moon rock. 364 00:19:49.420 --> 00:19:52.040 I don't think that probably happens to many undergraduate students. 365 00:19:52.580 --> 00:19:58.540 But again, it was a lot of my lectures at university were people who did really big science. 366 00:19:58.660 --> 00:19:59.780 Really super science. 367 00:20:00.280 --> 00:20:05.740 And at the time, I don't suppose I really realized how many Nobel Prize winners I was being taught by. 368 00:20:05.860 --> 00:20:07.420 That just kind of goes past you. 369 00:20:07.460 --> 00:20:10.200 You know, you think, oh, it's another lecture by Professor Tedder. 370 00:20:10.260 --> 00:20:12.540 And then you find actually he's quite a big guy. 371 00:20:12.600 --> 00:20:13.320 You know, in science. 372 00:20:13.840 --> 00:20:19.380 And I suppose there you realize that what you were seeing were really great minds. 373 00:20:19.580 --> 00:20:26.960 Thinking about really incredible questions that, you know, I as a student hadn't even begun to think about the question, let alone the answer. 374 00:20:27.460 --> 00:20:33.480 And so when I was choosing a PhD, I had the opportunity to go and work for the International Ocean Drilling Program. 375 00:20:33.840 --> 00:20:36.040 And that for me was big science. 376 00:20:36.320 --> 00:20:39.480 It was huge teams of people, huge sums of money. 377 00:20:39.620 --> 00:20:42.580 But what was really exciting about it was the questions that were brought in. 378 00:20:42.580 --> 00:20:44.320 And the questions that were being asked were completely holistic questions. 379 00:20:44.660 --> 00:20:50.560 What would happen if you set up a completely global array of ocean detection? 380 00:20:51.640 --> 00:21:02.800 What if you were able to sample sediments and rocks from the seafloor all around the world and look at the globe as a holistic globe, as a holistic planet? 381 00:21:02.960 --> 00:21:09.420 You were looking at really big questions about ocean circulation, about the way that minerals form on the seafloor. 382 00:21:09.720 --> 00:21:12.280 And you were working with enormous teams of people. 383 00:21:12.580 --> 00:21:15.480 And that was really exciting because it was an international team of people. 384 00:21:15.860 --> 00:21:20.700 You had, I was very lucky to join a couple of ship cruises. 385 00:21:21.340 --> 00:21:30.340 I have to admit as well I probably had a slightly less altruistic reason for choosing the PhD that I did and that it was based in the southwest Pacific and I got to go to places like Fiji and Tonga. 386 00:21:31.340 --> 00:21:33.760 But it was a really interesting project. 387 00:21:33.780 --> 00:21:38.620 We were working with Japanese, the Americans, people from Europe, people from Australia and New Zealand. 388 00:21:38.960 --> 00:21:41.320 And it was a fascinating time for me. 389 00:21:41.800 --> 00:21:42.240 Thank you. 390 00:21:42.580 --> 00:21:47.020 with some really top oceanographers. I was working with some really top biologists. There was a lot 391 00:21:47.020 --> 00:21:51.840 of people there looking at the interaction of biochemistry, microbiology, and chemistry of 392 00:21:51.840 --> 00:21:56.500 sediments. My field was the chemistry of sediments, but I was working with people across all sorts of 393 00:21:56.500 --> 00:22:01.360 scientific disciplines. And that was incredibly exciting. I was incredibly lucky to be able to do 394 00:22:01.360 --> 00:22:07.560 that as a PhD student, to be involved in something as completely holistic and cooperative as that. 395 00:22:07.560 --> 00:22:12.800 And I think that was the first time I'd really become aware of the cooperative nature of science, 396 00:22:12.920 --> 00:22:16.900 of the fact that you could ask these big questions, and when countries came together, 397 00:22:17.100 --> 00:22:22.240 that they could pool together an enormous amount of resources. I mean, these ships, the equipment, 398 00:22:22.540 --> 00:22:27.960 they cost vast sums of money. And it would take a huge team of people, very dedicated people, 399 00:22:28.060 --> 00:22:33.640 to write enormous proposals and spend a lot of years getting together the funding. A ship 400 00:22:33.640 --> 00:22:36.260 doesn't get built overnight, and these are specialist ships. 401 00:22:36.680 --> 00:22:37.540