Michael John Gorman, director of the Science Gallery
What do you tell people you do at parties?
People who ask you what you do at parties are sometimes the ones to avoid. Having said that, if asked, I say I run the Science Gallery at Trinity College Dublin. I tell them it’s an amazing place where science and art collide and they should come along or check out sciencegallery.com
How did you get your job?
An ad in the paper. Trinity wanted to create the Science Gallery to explore the cutting edge of technology and the future of science and wanted a director. It sounded like a dream job. My background is in science (I studied physics and philosophy) and the rapid pace of change of science and technology is something I have always found exhilarating. I love the unanswered questions of science. I’m addicted to the excitement of starting up ambitious projects: the challenges, bringing together the right team, involving the best partners and seeing the whole thing come to life. The team in Science Gallery is truly amazing, they can make the impossible happen on a daily basis.
What’s the best thing about it?
You can never be bored. You meet fascinating people from around the world. Every exhibition is different.
What’s your favourite gadget?
I am heavily dependent on my iPhone. I once dropped it in a puddle, and it died, but I found a recipe on the internet for heating it very slowly in the oven with dry basmati rice to remove the moisture.
What’s the most amazing fact you know?
Only 10 per cent of the cells in our body are human; the remaining 90 per cent are mostly bacteria.
What breakthrough would you love to see in the next decade?
The school system urgently needs to be reinvented to cultivate creativity instead of rote-learning. Then we will be well prepared to solve the important problems of science and technology. Einstein once said that “imagination is more important than knowledge”.
