500 and Counting
e have spent the past 41.5 years—and 499 issues— reporting the success of the most prominent people in Hong Kong and around Asia. For our milestone 500th issue, we boldly go where no Hong Kong Tatler editorial team has gone before: into space with a philanthropist couple who are on mission to further science and lead the search for intelligence in the cosmos. Yuri and Julia Milner are the first recipients of the Global Unity Award, presented at this year’s Hong Kong Tatler Ball. This newly inaugurated award recognises individuals from outside of Hong Kong who are helping to build the bridge between the East and West and, by doing so, promote the notion that we are one planet, one civilisation.
The Milners, who were both born in Russia but have lived very cosmopolitan lives, are the founders of the Breakthrough Prize, a foundation that awards scientists with hefty cash gifts in recognition of outstanding achievements. This is their way of driving technology forward, technology that will aid their second, more extraordinary, mission: to find evidence of extraterrestrial intelligence. Discoveries of new, potentially life-harbouring star systems have been made in the past few years by the Kepler space telescope; as such, it is becoming increasingly difficult to believe that we are alone in the universe. Through the Breakthrough Initiative, the Milners fund—to the tune of several hundred million US dollars—projects designed to detect signs of alien civilisations.
I travelled to Australia and California to meet the Milners and find out exactly what their ambitious plans are—see my feature, Written in the Stars. Tatler has always strived to share big stories to inspire our readers and I truly believe that this does just that. I can see no better way to mark the completion of Tatler’s fifth “century.”