Song, er, Singh of the Nitpickers

[beamjockey]

The new issue of Symmetry hit the streets. In it is Simon Singh's account of the mock feud he got into with pop singer Katie Melua.

Originally, the song went:


We are 12 billion light years from the edge
That’s a guess
No one can ever say it’s true
But I know that I will always be with you.

Singh persuaded her to re-record the song with more scientifically accurate lyrics:

We are 13.7 billion light years from the edge of the observable universe
That’s a good estimate with well defined error bars
Scientists say it’s true, but acknowledge that it may be refined
And with the available information, I predict that I will always be with you.


He writes, "Thanks to my flippant spat with Katie, people who would never think of picking up my 500-page book on the big bang were getting a dose of cosmology. As a writer who wants to get people excited about science, the writing of the original article was probably the most productive hour of my career."

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

The changes make it a worse song. It will sound clumsy, and most listeners will associate the problems with the scientific content.

[alicebentley]

I would want to hear both versions before trying to come to a conclusion like that.