Blog

I want to break animals free

By James Dacey

First he was a physicist, then he turned rock star, then he penned some popular science books, so what next for Brian May?

Well, according to the Independent, Queen’s legendary guitarist is in the process of refiguring himself as an animal rights activist.

The newspaper report today that May has been lobbying the Conservatives, the UK’s main opposition party, over the issue of hunting. The Conservative leader, David Cameron, has allegedly said that he will repeal the Hunting Act of 2004 if his party win this year’s General Election.

“I’ve decided to take on a lot of work with animals this year,” May told the Independent.

May would not be the first rock star to speak out over animal rights. The particularly vocal include: Chrissie Hynde, lead vocalist in The Pretenders, and Morrissey of The Smiths.

In the world of professional science, clearly, animal rights issues are more relevant to the medical and bioscience communities, but I have done some digging around to see if any celebrated physicists have ever spoken out on the topic. All I could find is that, according to the Animal Liberation Front, Newton, Einstein and Edison all supported the idea of veganism.

Draw your own conclusions with that, but it would be interesting to know if any physicists have ever encountered these issues in their work.

Posted by James Dacey on Mar 4, 2010 1:36 PM | Permalink