The World Science Festival is gearing up for its third year in New York, and I’m delighted to participate once more. This time I’ll be talking about a topic near and dear to my heart–telling stories about science. On Thursday June 2, they’ll have a full day of scientist-writers, television producers, and science writers.

Here’s the lineup (go to the festival site to purchase tickets):

Science on Screen
Thursday, June 2, 2011
(9:00 – 10:00)
Participants: Bill Weir, Louie Psihoyos, Simon Singh, Howard Swartz

Fantastic imagery and groundbreaking journalism dominate the best of documentary science storytelling. Director Louie Psihoyos’ Oscar-winning documentary The Cove (2009) stands as one of the most audacious and dangerous-to-film operations in the history of the conservation movement. NOVA’s Emergency Mine Rescue (2010) chronicled the unprecedented technological feat of rescuing 33 trapped Chilean miners. Today’s best producers of on-screen science are pushing the envelope, using a range of computer-based tools—including the highly cinematic techniques of digital science animation—to take viewers on a swooping ride through previously unseen worlds. How do these newly available techniques influence and enhance their editorial judgment? And what stories of science are left to be told?

Science Storytellers
Thursday, June 2, 2011
(10:15 – 12:30)
Participants: Steven Pinker, Siddhartha Mukherjee, James Watson, E.O. Wilson, Brian Greene, Jonathan Weiner, Deborah Blum, Natalie Angier, Timothy Ferris

Scientists with literary sensibilities are telling extraordinary stories about their quest to understand the natural world. With consummate narrative skill, these scientist-storytellers are creating compelling works that provide broad audiences with an entryway into otherwise impenetrable scientific subjects. They are joined in this panel by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists who have ventured into strange but thrilling fields of science. Their work turns the abstract and the seminal into writing so memorable that the rest of us can embrace the science and fully appreciate it.

Improvising Science
Thursday, June 2, 2011
(2:00 – 3:00)
Participant: Alan Alda

What happens when scientists try a short course of training in improvisation? Actor-director-writer Alan Alda, who has interviewed hundreds of scientists from around the world in his role as host of the Emmy-award winning PBS series Scientific American Frontiers, is leading an effort to teach improvisational techniques to scientists. The goal is not to turn scientists into actors, pretending to be what they’re not, but to bring about greater authenticity, clarity, and personal presence. The exercises help scientists communicate with a warmth and lucidity that makes their work more understandable to a lay audience and to colleagues across other disciplines.

Telling Science Stories in Print and on the Web
Thursday, June 2, 2011
(3:15 – 4:15)
Participants: Seth Mnookin, Carl Zimmer, Andrew Revkin, Bora Zivkovic, Emily Bell

A new generation of science writers is tackling issues where the repercussions of not communicating responsibly with the public have enormous policy and research implications. Meanwhile, it is the best of times and worst of times for science writing on the Web. An expanding cadre of fiercely independent, talented, and often very young science bloggers is coming to grips with a new dilemma: Just how do they fit into the changing landscape of science journalism, and to what degree are they willing to incorporate some old media standards into their new media work?

The outbreak continues…

1. On Friday, I talked to Ira Flatow about A Planet of Viruses. The podcast is now available here.

2. I also spoke to the Guardian’s Alok Jha for their Science Weekly podcast. You can listen to that here.

3. Tomorrow around 9:30 am EST I’ll be on Newstalk, an Irish radio network.

4. Thursday I’ll be giving a lecture at California State University Fresno.

5. Sunday I’ll be talking about the book in Los Angeles and Irvine CA. Details here.

Here’s the video of last night’s science-writing event at the MIT Museum. Thanks to everyone who made it possible!

Today I’m in Cambridge, Mass., to take part in the Cambridge Science Festival. I’ll be speaking with Ed Yong and Hillary Rosner about how blogs, Twitter, and social media are changing science writing. I’ll play the part of the old fogey who remembers the days when modems screeched. The event will be live-streamed here, starting around 7:30 pm. Hope you can join us, virtually!

This Friday I’ll be on public radio, talking to Ira Flatow on Science Friday, starting around 3:40 pm EST about A Planet of Viruses.

Also in the good viral news department, the book has been getting good buzz in places like BoingBoing, Bytesizebio, and ERV. Thanks to all!

Tonight at 6 pm EST I’ll be talking about my ebook, Brain Cuttings: Fifteen Journeys Through The Mind. (Amazon / BN/ Mobipocket ). You can listen live to Your Health Connection on KSKA Public Radio, and even ask questions via phone or email.

I’ll be speaking tomorrow at SUNY Plattsburgh on the occasion of the publication of the new edition of Parasite Rex. I’ll be talking about the many ways in which parasites have infiltrated my mind since the book first came out a decade ago. I hope some Loominaries will be able to attend, and be infiltrated as well.

Where: SUNY Plattburgh, Plattsburgh NY. Room 206, Yokum Hall. (Directions and campus map)

When: Friday, April 15, 12:15 pm.

More details here.

An interview with me is running on the latest episode of “Consilience,” a podcast on science and skepticism out of South Africa. The conversation, which takes up the second half of the podcast, covers lots of ground. We talked about my new book, A Planet of Viruses, the secret weapons whales use for fighting cancer, and the enduring, tiresome mistake people make of thinking of bloggers as angry children. Check it out.

If you live in central Connecticut, please consider coming to my public lecture tomorrow (Wednesday 4/12). It’s entitled, “Synthetic Biology: Playing God or Harnessing Nature?” The talk is sponsored by the Connecticut Association of Biology Teachers, the Connecticut Valley Branch of the American Society for Microbiology, and Manchester Community College.

Here are the details:

Where: Manchester Community College, Great Path Academy Building, Community Commons. (Here are directions and maps.)

When: 5:30 pm, Wednesday, April 12

More information here.

Greetings, Loominaries of Philadelphia! I will be heading your way to give a talk tomorrow (Thursday) at the Center for Neuroscience & Society at the University of Pennsylvania.

My talk will be entitled, “Soul Made Flesh: The Origin of Our Brain-Centered World.” I’ll argue, as I did in the eponymous book, that as we grapple with the implications of twenty-first-century neuroscience, we’d do well to cast our minds back 350 years ago, when scientific revolutionaries first discovered that the brain was not a bowl of curds.

The details:

When: Thursday, April 07 2011, 4:00pm – 5:30pm
Location : Silverman Hall, Room 245A, University of Pennsylvania (3400 Chestnut St.)
Contact : info@neuroethics.upenn.edu

[Image: The frontispiece of "The Anatomy of the Brain," reproduced in Soul Made Flesh]

I’m heading into New Haven this evening to take part in The Ordinary Evening Reading Series. Tonight I’ll be talking about my upcoming book, A Planet of Viruses, and the writer Annie Murphy Paul will discuss her book Origins, which looks at how our experiences in the womb shape the rest of our lives. Join us at 7 pm tonight in the Mermaid Room at the Anchor Bar, 272 College St.

[Image: New Haven Advocate]

If you’re a parent of a child with a developmental disorder, such as autism, ADHD, or Downs syndrome, you’re invited to a panel discussion I’ll be moderating in Guilford, CT, on Tuesday, April 26 at 6 pm. The panel will include doctors, researchers, and social workers. We’ll be discussing some of the most common questions parents have, on topics such as how developmental disorders are assessed, how early intervention helps children, and how parents themselves can cope with the challenges of caring for a disabled child.

The meeting will be hosted by SARAH, Inc., a non-profit agency serving the intellectually disabled in Connecticut. You can find more details about the meeting and the panelists on their web site here. To attend the meeting, register here. If you’d like to have the panel address a question, you can email the organizers, or post your question on their Facebook page. The event will be taped, and will be broadcast later here in Connecticut. Please spread the word to parents you think might be interested.