What is the most boring conversation you've had with someone at a conference?

well, I will just find an excuse and leave, say " sorry, I need to go the bathroom.."

The patter about delayed trains, the inclement weather, the catering.....

Other peoples children.

One geek I got stuck with told me about his attempts to calculate the size of carbon footprints of everyone at the meeting. He kept going on about it. Of course, I had the largest because I'd travelled the furthest and by plane. But he owns a four wheel drive and so does his wife! I don't drive and use the bus to go to work. So overall I think I win!

well hatethelab, i read somewhere once that one intercontinental flight is about as bad, carbon-footprint-wise, as a full year of driving your own car. so he might have been right...

i haven't been bored much at conferences so far. i've been excited, met interesting new people, i even met my supervisor for the first time at a conference. and i've been terribly disappointed by people who's work i had admired before i saw them for real. but never really bored.

I really enjoy conferences...
By the forth day of a recent conference I did get, not bored, but, well, struggled to maintain conversation with people and be vaguely sociable. I like my own space.
Also, I was in awe of a number of people giving papers, so when they started asking my about my research over breakfast I didn't quite know what to say as I've only just got started...

Oh. My. Oh. My.

You guys need to get a life!

I find that the conversations I have with people are fine... it's some of the presentations that I find unbelievably boring. I hate when you think a paper is going to be really interesting and then you go along and you're stuck there for 30 mins as someone goes "Uhhhhh.... and then I.... ummmmm.... Uhhhhhh....... did some....... Uhhhhhhhh.... research."

"i read somewhere once that one intercontinental flight is about as bad, carbon-footprint-wise, as a full year of driving your own car. so he might have been right..."

I actually have a question about this. I mean, I THINK the reasoning behind this as an argument is often flawed. We're talking about the carbon footprint of a whole plane, aren't we? Not about each passenger's? So, let's say we have a big plane (makes sense for an intercontinental flight) with about 500 passengers. That means that the carbon footprint for each passenger would be equivalent to 18 hours of driving approximately, right? (Or not? I s*ck at maths ).

Sorry, it's slightly off topic, but in case hatethelab meets another geek who likes to think of himself as more environment-friendly than others...

nadia, i don't have a source, unfortunately. so i can't tell for sure. i always assumed that it was more of "per person" than per flight.

however, any such sums are necessarily quite complicated if you're going to be precise. because you could always ask - if you didn't get on the plane, would it still fly? yes... so it makes no difference if you get on it or not. but if x people would not fly anymore, lots of planes would be half-empty, and airlines would, for economic reasons, reduce flights in the timetables. so it would make a difference. so how much difference does it actually make? what is YOUR footprint for taking that flight? no simple answer here...

Indeed Shani.

As a matter of fact, the same applies to 4x4 - the do emit much more CO2 per kilometre than, say, a Mondeo... but a lot less than lots of dream cars! I found a very interesting article here:

http://driving.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/driving/features/article1381139.ece

But I have not been able to find more about the plane thing yet, and I won't have time today as I must pack... I'm flying back to France for the week-end, lol.

However I always thought that the "per person" thing was more like a myth, derived probably from all those celebs who fly on their own?

I'll investigate this further when back!

I was recently seriously considering buying a used, white-coloured HUMMER H2, a 4x4 which is very thirsty and very big, loads of taxes and insurance and thus reasonably unreasonable. But I like it. I do wonder, though, if peoples' reactions would be hostile over here. If they were, I think hypocriticality would have reached its peak. See comparisons of plastic bag utilisation in Europe.