'Space Odyssey' Author Inspires Imagination Research Center
The creative mind behind the communications satellite and "2001: A Space Odyssey" — Arthur C. Clarke — has now inspired an academic center dedicated to studying imagination. From sci-fi speculation to neurophysiological analysis, the Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination will create and sponsor multidisciplinary investigations into great leaps of human thought.
The center launched in May at the University of California, San Diego, which will operate the center in conjunction with the Arthur C. Clarke Foundation, an organization dedicated to Clarke's legacy.
A series of skyward-looking events kicked off the center's activities last month, culminating in a symposium on long-term space travel called Starship Century. There, sci-fi heavyweights such as Gregory Benford and Neal Stephenson traded ideas about interstellar journeys with scientists Freeman Dyson, Paul Davies and others.