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| Friday, 23 March 2007 |
60 MATT RIDLEY Francis Crick: Discoverer of the Genetic Code 2.30 pm • £7.50 • Newman Rooms
In 1953, Francis Crick walked into a pub in Cambridge and announced that he and his colleague James Watson ‘had found the secret of life’. Indeed they had; they had worked out the structure of DNA, discovering its ‘double helix’ form, one which could replicate itself, confirming theories that it carried life’s hereditary information. Matt Ridley’s life of Crick begins with his birth in 1916, his early explosive experiments at primary school and his time developing torpedoes in the Navy. After his genetic code discovery, which won him the Nobel Prize, the scientist’s later work was rarely uncontroversial.
61 TONY JUNIPER, DIANA LIVERMAN, MARK LYNAS and ROBERT MAY How do we Change Climate Change? 4 pm • £7.50 • Marquee, Christ Church
We may dispute exactly how much the temperature will rise this century but anything over 2°C risks catastrophic climate change. Rich countries are responsible for 80% of the man-made increase in CO2 and the poor countries will bear the brunt of impact, although it will affect us all. Whose responsibility is it to act? Do carbon trading schemes work? Should we be planning to double air transport by 2020? How can we produce energy less dangerously? Is blaming China and India an excuse for inaction? What exactly are we going to do and are we willing to pay for it—before it’s too late? Discussing these issues are Tony Juniper, Executive Director of Friends of the Earth and author of How Many Lightbulbs Does it Take to Change a Planet, Mark Lynas, author of Six Degrees, and Robert May, Chief Scientific Advisor to the Government, 2000-05, chaired by Diana Liverman, Director of the Environmental Change Institute, Oxford.
LENNY SMITH Very Short Introduction Soapbox: Chaos 5.30 pm • free • Blackwell Festival Bookshop, Marquee, Christ Church
Chaos exists in systems all around us. Lenny Smith briefly draws on philosophy, literature, and mathematics to illuminate Chaos Theory, showing the variety of its fascinating applications in the real world—including technology, politics, and even gambling on the stock market.
Sponsored by Oxford University Press
69 NICHOLAS HARBERD Seed to Seed: The Secret Life of Plants 6 pm • £7.50 • Festival Room 2, Christ Church
Nicholas Harberd, one of the world’s leading plant biologists, tells of the changing seasons, taking as his focus one tiny thale-cress plant in an East Anglian churchyard. He describes both what can be seen with the naked eye and the hidden molecular mechanisms that underlie the visible events in the plant’s life. He also tells the story of the last ten years of scientific discovery in his own laboratory, as the team works to understand the genetic control of the growth of thale-cress—the fruit-fly of the plant world. Part field notebook, part sketchbook, part diary, Seed to Seed is a dazzling evocation of the beauty of the natural world and an exhilarating explanation of the secret workings of plants.
151 RICHARD DAWKINS and ROD LIDDLE with JOAN BAKEWELL The God Delusion 8 pm • £8.50 • Marquee, Christ Church
Does religious belief damage the health of a society, or is it necessary to provide the moral and ethical foundations of a healthy society? While Europe is becoming increasingly secularized, the rise of religious fundamentalism— whether in the Middle East or Middle America— is dramatically and dangerously dividing opinion around the world. How are states shaped, with or without religion, and is the mixing of religion and politics always lethal? Richard Dawkins, author of the highly successful The God Delusion discusses these issues with writer and broadcaster Rod Liddle, chaired by Joan Bakewell.
http://www.sundaytimes-oxfordliteraryfestival.co.uk/events_23march.htm#060
reposted from: richarddawkins.net
my: highlights / emphasis / key points / comments
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