Dawkins successor

[merkavah12]

When I heard that Richie D was going to be replaced by a man whose name and works are as alien to me as a polar bear to a camel, I was a bit perturbed.

But lo! It would appear that this Dr. du Sautoy has one thing doing for him: he seems to have figured out the unified theory of everything.

"In March, 2006, his article Prime Numbers Get Hitched was published on Seed Magazine's website. In it he explained how the number 42, mentioned in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy as the answer to everything, is related to the Riemann zeta function. He has also published an article in the scientific magazine New Scientist".

Not too shabby.

[unkleE]

I can't help wondering whether those who chose Richard Dawkins for the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science were happy with the results? I would have thought his most publicised efforts in the past few years have been better suited to the Chair for the Public Misunderstanding and Defeat of Religion. And while some would see the two as being sides of the same coin, I can't help feeling that he may have turned many people slightly against science by this confusion. Someone like Stephen Jay Gould (of course not him, for obvious reasons!) who tried to keep the two separate might have promoted science better, even though I don't agree with that separation in the way he proposed it.

So it will be interesting to see if the new incumbent stays more closely within his remit, and if he has a different profile.

[humphreyclarke]

Damn. I was hoping it would be Peter Atkins.