Life and Physics

Things beginning with P

Posted on 09/11/2019 by Jon Butterworth

I occasionally get asked, since the LHC is not currently providing collisions, what we’re actually doing now. Answers include Protons, Papers, Poppadoms, Preparation, Python, Pictures and Philip Pullman.

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Posted in Arts, Particle Physics, Physics, Rambling, Science, Silly, Travel, Writing | Tagged A Map of the Invisible, CERN, Chris Wormell, LHC, LINAC4, Manchester, Philip Pullman, UCL | Comments Off

Genoa and Atomlandia

Posted on 03/11/2019 by Jon Butterworth

I’m on the way back to London from Genoa now, after an enjoyable visit to the Festival della Scienza. I was giving a talk to help launch the Italian edition of Atom Land/A Map of the Invisible, (Atomlandia, published by Hoepli, who organised the trip).

The talk was in the Doge’s Palace, definitely one of the grandest venues in which I have banged on about particle physics (I am more used to pubs, to be honest). It was also my first time being simultaneously translated. It was a challenge for me to speak slowly and clearly, and even more of a challenge for the translators when I failed. As you can see towards the bottom of this cartoon, they just about managed to keep up, to applause from the audience:

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Posted in Arts, History, Physics, Science, Travel, Writing | Tagged A Map of the Invisible, Atom Land, brexit, Emmanuele Luzzati, Genoa, Hoepli, Monty Python, Quentin Blake | Comments Off

Summer Highlights

Posted on 29/10/2019 by Jon Butterworth

One of the highlights of my summer was giving the “Highlights” talk at the end of the European Physical Society’s High Energy Physics meeting in Ghent. I wrote something about it here and here already, but today my write up of the talk is available on the arXiv. It is aimed at fellow physicists, but as the abstract says, is “opinionated and informal” so might be of slightly wider interest, hence posting it here.