I just ran a blog search on Technorati and Google for more information about this interesting conference called DIVERSITAS currently (9-12th Nov.) taking place in Oaxaca, Mexico. Their tagline reads: "FIRST DIVERSITAS Open Science Conference – integrating biodiversity science for human well-being".
Biodiversity? What’s that? Wikipedia says:
Biodiversity is the variety of life: the different plants, animals and micro-organisms, their genes and the ecosystems of which they are a part.
Biological diversity has no single standard definition. (…) The 1992 United Nations Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro defined biodiversity as "the variability among living organisms from all sources, including, inter alia, terrestrial, marine, and other aquatic ecosystems, and the ecological complexes of which they are part: this includes diversity within species, between species and of ecosystems".
Awww…..okay.
And what about "open science"? What does that stand for? What’s so open on this one? What’s so open on this conference since it takes place in Mexico and the majority of participants still seem to be coming from the USA and Europe? Will there also be ppl live blogging from this event and podcasting debates / panel discussions?
Ati? Not sooooo open?
Is there any website out there that works as a plattform for all those nice and interesting conferences where interested people can just drop in and follow the discussions? There are so many smart people meeting all the time, exchanging ideas and inspiring each other – and yet the majority just can not afford going to all those places. I think there’s a need for that kind of information.
As for Diversitas – a friend of mine is there and just told me that out of 600 participants, about 8 (eight!) come from the African continent….go figure…
Yani, one day ME I :-) will open a shop and call it "Kikuyumoja’s Open Duka" (K.O.D.) to attract customers. I take it that the word "open" is just as sexy as "Debian" is for Nerds, "sustainability" is for environ. activists or "Web 2.0" is for web techies.
“I take it that the word “open” is just as sexy as “Debian” is for Nerds, “sustainability” is for environ. activists or “Web 2.0″ is for web techies.”
Great quote! I might steal it one of these days. :)