Thank You to All!

The Planetarium Grand Reopening was a big success, with over 200 participants! I would like to thank everyone who attended and helped with the activities, especially (in no particular order):

• Holley Wood, Sissy Orr, and Rick Schmidt
• Tad McElroy, Margaret Day, Jared Canada, and Dan Lapoint
• Wayne Userly and his cohorts on the Lambuth maintenance crew
• Vicky Moeller, David Hawkes, and the Lambuth Chemistry Club
• Lendon Noe and the Lambuth art students
• Rebecca Cook, Nick Ashbaugh, and the Lambuth Biology Club
• Pam Dennis, Sammy Chapman, Laura Simpson, and the library staff
• and of course Prof. Lawrence Krauss, our special guest, who delivered the keynote address

My profound apologies to anyone I left off this list. Please drop me an e-mail if you should be here, but aren’t.

Ronnie Barnes (past planetarium director), Matthew Francis (current director), and Lawrence Krauss, the guest keynote speaker at the Planetarium Grand Reopening on February 9, 2008.

Saturday February 9, 2008

The M. D. Anderson Planetarium will hold its Grand Reopening event on Saturday, February 9, 2008. Doors will open at 1:30 PM, with events taking place at various locations all over campus. We will have:

• Magic shows by the Lambuth chemistry club at 1:30 and 2:30 in Hyde Hall, Room 215
• The Gobbel Library will be showing two videos: “Welcome to Mars: NASA’s Ongoing Search for Life Beyond Earth” will be presented at 1:30, and “The Dark Side of the Universe,” a Scientific American Frontiers presentation narrated by Alan Alda, will be presented at 2:30. In addition, there will be displays designed by the library student staff, along with books by the keynote speaker, Dr. Lawrence Krauss.
• Walk-through displays in Hyde Hall, depicting the history of life on Earth, presented by Lambuth biology students and faculty
• Scale models of the planets, presented by Lambuth art students and faculty
• And, of course, a brand-new planetarium show created just for the event: “See How Far the Light Came: A Journey from Our Solar System Outward”. Viewings will be held at 1:30, 2:00, 2:30, and 3:00.
• The Keynote Address will be presented by Dr. Lawrence Krauss at 4:00 PM in the Hamilton Performing Arts Center. Immediately following the keynote will be a reception, to which all are invited.

All events are free, and all are welcome!

Keynote Address

“Einstein’s Greatest Blunder: A Cosmic Mystery Story”

Presented by Lawrence Krauss at 4:00 PM in the Hamilton Performing Arts Center

Lawrence M. Krauss is Ambrose Swasey Professor of Physics, Prof of Astronomy, and Director of the Center for Education and Research in Cosmology and Astrophysics at Case Western Reserve University. Krauss received his PhD from MIT in 1982 and then joined the Society of Fellows at Harvard University. He was appointed as a professor of physics and astronomy at Yale University in 1985, and then joined Case as Chair of Physics in 1993, a position he held until 2005. During this period he built an internationally ranked research center, and created such novel new programs as the Physics Entrepreneurship Masters Program.

The author of 7 popular books including international bestseller The Physics of Star Trek, the award winning Atom, and his newest book, Hiding in the Mirror: The Mysterious Allure of Extra Dimensions from Plato to String Theory and Beyond, Krauss is also a regular radio commentator and essayist for newspapers such as the New York Times, and appears regularly on television. Krauss is one of the few well known scientists today described by such magazines as Scientific American as a public intellectual, and with activities including performing with the Cleveland Orchestra, being a judge at the Sundance Film Festival, and his grammy nominated notes for Telarc Records, he has also crossed the chasm between science and popular culture. At the same time he is a highly regarded international leader in cosmology and astrophysics, and is the author of over 200 scientific papers, winner of numerous international awards for his research accomplishments and his writing (he is, for example, the only physicist to have been awarded the highest awards of the American Physical Society, the American Association of Physics Teachers, and the American Institute of Physics) and is a Fellow of the American Physical Society, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

He has been particularly active leading the effort by scientists to defend the teaching of science in public schools, and to help define the proper limits of both science and religion, as well as defending scientific integrity in government. His essay in the New York Times on Evolution and Intelligent Design in May 2005 helped spur a recent controversy that has helped refine the Catholic Church’s position on evolution.