Lovell Telescope

Awakening mercifully (and slightly worryingly) hangover free after yesterday afternoon and evening's drinking, I headed across to Manchester where I had lunch at Teacup with @artminx, @delphdahling and the latter's delightful and charming son.

After that, The Minx and I headed down to Jodrell Bank for 'Transmission 006', a concert with Sigur Rós headlining. After the mild disappointment of suffering highway robbery when were obliged to pay £15 to park in a field, we made our way into the event.

The stalls on the main field were limited to food and drink, so we grabbed a bottle of wine and walked across to the stage. Behind the stage, the *enormous* Lovell Telescope loomed, its back turned to us. We watched the second support act, Daughter, before walking through to the Science Arena. This really was rather good: lots of stalls with wonderful, engaging, young people explaining their experiments with light, sound, chocolate, LEDS and all manner of other things. Wandering around in the (highly localised!) sunshine, it was hard not to feel excited and enthused by these people working towards a better future.

After a bite to eat - Senegalese; fantastic! - we went back 'round to the main arena, positioning ourselves to the left of the stage to watch Poliça,who were good in a post-Massive Attack-y kind of way. They were offstage just after eight o'clock and I knew we had an hour until Sigur Rós came on but just as I was wondering how we might entertain ourselves, a chap called Professor Tim O'Brien came on stage.

He spoke entertainly about the history of Jodrell Bank and the Lovell telescope, built in the fifties and first used in 1957. Then there was a hook up to Cape Town, using Skype, where Professor Tim and a South African colleague discussed their plans for a vast array of radio telescopes there. It was all infectiously interesting stuff.

For a while the stage was populated by men and women in the traditional black garb of the stagehand, setting up for Sigur Rós. Then a voice crackled across the PA:
"Stage to telescope control, are you receiving me?"
The hairs on the back of my neck stood up and my scalp tingled.
"This is telescope control. Receiving you, stage."
(I love this stuff; I'm tingling again now, as I write!)
"Please proceed with turning the Lovell telescope."
"Copy that. Commencing."
It was AMAZING. As we watched, the telescope turned towards us. Fifty-six years old, this huge testament to man's creativity and thirst for knowledges, built in the years just after the second world war, turned smoothly through one hundred and eighty degrees to face us. Magical.

And then we were treated to a special sound collage, put together by Sigur Rós, consisting of signals that had come through the radio telescope. It was breathtaking and we hadn't even seen the main act yet!

[Pause]

The last few days have been taken up in the news with discussion about Syria, including, I'm delighted to say, David Cameron's intention to take the UK to war being squashed in the commons. This does not constitute us ignoring the plight of innocents in Syria, at least no more than we have been doing for the last two years. I fervently hope that through the United Nations and organisations such as The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, that we might help those who are suffering and go some way to resolving this horribly complicated conflict.

Tonight's gig or, more specifically, the evening leading up to the actual performance by Sigur Rós, filled me with renewed enthusiasm for science and admiration for our capacity as humans to make this world a better place. And, as we headed home afterwards, I wondered about the difference between the keen, curly haired, slightly awkward youth who had talked to me and The Minx about LEDs and people like Assad and Cameron (and Bush and Blair and Hussein and, sadly so many others) who just seem to want to hurt people, to be the biggest bully in the playground. And it struck me, as it has doubtlessly struck so many other people before me, that the last people that we want in power are those people who want it.