FAITHFUL READERS WILL KNOW that this time last week Books was up at Jodrell Bank, in Cheshire, frolicking at the base of the Lovell Telescope in honour of our First Move Festival. We heard Piers Bizony talk about the future of space flight (it's not what you think) and Brian Aldiss - éminence not-at-all grise of British sci-fi - reveal he'd been able, some years ago, to insert a little flourish into Stalin's biography (yes, really).

Faithful, faithful readers will recall that this time last year we used the Lovell to bounce a poem right to the Moon and back - alas, no such fun and games were possible this year because the Lovell was actually, well, working. I say “alas” - but this is merely a figure of speech. Remarkable as it was to hear a poet's voice travel to the Moon (one and a quarter seconds, the outward journey) and back (another one and a quarter for the return) it was, in truth, even more remarkable to see, just outside the festival marquee, the 250ft dish of the telescope turning, lifting and dipping. As we sat listening to our guest speakers, it was listening for pulsars - the dead remnants of exploded stars. Pulsars can weigh as much as the Sun and yet be only 20km across; they spin, many times a second, shining beams of radio waves across the Universe. The resulting beat is so uncannily regular (I know, I've listened) that when the first pulsar was discovered by Jocelyn Bell - later Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell - in 1967, it was thought that the origin of the signal could not be natural: hence the source's designation, LGM-1. That's LGM for Little Green Men.

So far - no actual LGMs, but the discoveries made by radio astronomers are no less astounding for that. Radio astronomers, visual astronomers, and, while we're at it here in the broad church of Books, all scientists everywhere - which is why we're so pleased to support this year's Big Science Read. Check out the website and choose from Bill Bryson and Iain M.Banks, Margaret Atwood and Oliver Sacks - whatever your tastes, you're bound to find something that will intrigue you.

It has been said, over and again, that we live divided between “two cultures”, the artistic and the scientific. It's worth saying, over and again, that there's no reason for this to be so, and the world would be a better place if we all do what we can to bring two into one.

www.bigscienceread.org

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