Natural History Museum Today, Italy Tomorrow!

Fall break is officially upon us.
After tomorrow's Internet Psychology of course...

Today, I took my last midterm in math class and following the normal Wednesday schedule, I would have gone to my computer science class to learn more about routers, packet switching, cyborgs, wikis, and the lions, and tigers and bears (oh my!) that computer science is all about. However, as part of our class interaction with technology, Dr. Lenox arranged a class field trip to London's famous Natural History Museum to examine the interactive technologies used in the exhibits - especially in the newly opened Darwin Center.

I must tell you, I was not all that excited to walk through an exhibit center about a scientist so controversial like Darwin. However, it was a nice change of pace from computer science (which we took the final for on Monday) so I approached the museum with an open mind and even more open arms...

Before going to the Darwin center, I went through the dinosaur section (which is one of the world's best dinosaur collections) and probably bored Alyssa to death with my geeky science knowledge about dinosaurs that I gained from my childhood dreams of becoming an archeologist. Needless to say, I was very pleased with the dinosaurs despite the lack of interaction on the exhibits.

Next I went to the Darwin center which is a brand new section of the museum. It started in "the cocoon" which also serves as a state-of-the-art lab for over 100 leading scientists in insect preservation.

Walking through the cocoon was very interesting to say the least. I've never been a big fan of bugs - in fact, I'm terrified of bees (especially bumble bees), and I'm a posterchild candidate for arachnidphobia. I ended being a big boy (and also trying to impress Alyssa, although I think my fear of bugs may exceed her own if possible) and braved the exhibits of bugs and stuff.

One of the first things I noticed were the walls. They were filled with electronic tv screens of "experts" talking about the nearest exhibit. Some walls contained picture slideshows of nature while others portrayed images from a projector. Overall, wherever I went, I could count on being informed simply by staring at the walls.

The other main technology I was impressed with was the Nature Plus Card. Basically, what this card did was remember what exhibits you interacted with by a simple scan. Near every station, a fancy-looking touch screen interactive booth was present. One would simply touch what categories they're interested in learning about what was related to the exhibit. After the screen ran its course, you scan your card and when you go home, you can actually enter your card number in on the website and learn more about those topics on the touch screen. This was a very sophisticated technology because children can impress their parents by gathering their information online from the museum website.

Overall, I, as a bit of a natural science myself, rather enjoyed the majority of the museum. I was not a fan of the Darwin center but that may be because I don't like insects or some of Darwin's theories...however, I got to get a future look ahead at what all technology is coming to. I can only wait and see when even more sophisticated stuff makes its way into museums and such.

That's all I have for now. I'm still writing my major "catching up" blog from the past couple weeks and I will try to post that before I leave for Italy tomorrow.
Believe me, I'll have a blog posted for that one as well.

until next time,
Ciao!