Question: what brought you closer to the idea of creativity on DART

Shane Bergin answered on 18 Nov 2012:

This is a project of mine that I’m working on at the minute. It’s called Dart of Physics. THe other professors in physics and I will pick catchy statements and design some challenges to put in the advertisement slots on the DART.

Why are we doing this? Physics has a PR problem. It’s seen as abstract and borring by a lot of people. people think ‘it’s ugly, but nescessary and not for them’… I want to change this. Dart of Physics will educate people about what physics really is like, it will change their perception, and it will capture the beauty of physics.

Some of the things we’ll be putting up include “Take the DART to work – arrive younger than if you walked” (this is TRUE!!) or “The moon is moving away from the earth at the rate your fingernails grow” (one day, it’ll be gone – no longer orbiting us)

Physics is about figuring things out in a creative way – exams in school strangle the creativity out of the subject (just like maths).. i want people to see it the way i do.. interesting!

I wanted to do this particular project as i thought it would be a good way to catch people’s attention on their way to work or school.