I'd hardly call most sci-fi like Star Trek or Mass Effect educational, but it's amazing how much actual science and space knowledge you can pick up from sci-fi entertainment. I've heard of Wolf 359, one of our neighbouring stars, not because of physics classes back at school, but entirely because it's where the Federation fought the Borg in Star Trek: The Next Generation. Still, despite the occasional nugget of real information that sneaks through, it's fair to say that most movies, shows, and video games are better left to inspiring our interest in the stars and planets, rather than teaching us about them … but Frontier Developments is looking to change all that.
The developers of Elite Dangerous invited us down to the Science Museum in London for one of their 'Lates events' to attend a special live, guided tour of our solar system within the game, hosted by two of the senior staff at the Museum: Abbie MacKinnon, Curator of Space Technology, and Laura Joy Pieters, Curator of Mathematical Sciences.
