The parents at @bristol presented a really interesting opinion yesterday. They all seemed to say “So that guy is dressed as a robot that’s cool but now you’re telling me that everyone here is a real live scientist, that’s amazing!” Are we really such a secretive breed that our mere presence is enough to cause excitement. I’m not sure how to react to that, it’s either really depressing: a scientist simply talking to the public should not be a novelty.  Or it’s really exciting: people are genuinely interested in who we are and what we do.

 Anyway, as my academic carrer continues to roll along I really hope that public engagement with the sciences becomes the norm and not the exception. Walking with Robots is making a really valuable contribution to that ideal and I guess that this blog is a small consequence of that. As you can see from the previous posts Johnathan and Gia have put me through a bit of a blogging masterclass and hopefully I’ll find the time to keep things going. Ideally, I’d like to use this blog to both draw in my academic collegues, by posting my own research and the research that we discuss at Southampton, and to engage with the general public, by blogging about the many, truly amazing, recent scientific developments. The dream would be to get both sides (academic and public) talking to each other in the comment threads. Will I succeed, frankly I have no idea…