Skeptics in the Pub Podcast - Cambridge
By Andrew N Holding
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Podcast Description
Skeptics in the Pub Podcast — Cambridge, aims to promote science, skepticism, rationality and critical thinking. We aim to interview as many people on the Skeptics in the Pub circuit as they pass through Cambridge as we can. The hope is to provide an alternative for those as who can't make the monthly meetings, as well as covering additional topics for the interest of those who do attend.
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1 |
Stephen Curry | Viruses are pathogens — germs — that afflict all forms of life. All they are looking to do is to reproduce but in doing so can cause diseases that vary enormously in severity. How do they work and what can be done to stop them? My research focuses on one small class of viruses that includes foot-and-mouth disease virus (FMDV), a pathogen that is well known in Britain thanks to the devastating outbreak in 2001. My talk will describe the approach that we take to understanding how FMDV works and how that might help us to tackle it in the future.But I am also interested in how scientific knowledge disseminates out from laboratories to 'infect' the wider population, hopefully in most cases with curiosity about what scientists are up to. However, sometimes legitimate concerns are raised and I would like to explore how these might best be addressed.Stephen Curry, a native of Northern Ireland, is a professor of structural biology at Imperial College London. That means he is interested in what biological molecules, such as proteins, look like and how they work. An active blogger, he has been writing about science (and making videos) at occamstypewriter.org/scurry for several years. He also takes a keen interest in scientific activism, most notably in supporting the Campaign for Libel Reform and as vice-chair of Science is Vital. | 25 1 12 | Free | View In iTunes |
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2 |
Denis Alexander | A recent trend by two different campaigning groups has been to propose a stark choice between 'creation' and 'evolution'. On one side the 'new atheists' wish to invest evolutionary discourse with a narrative of atheism, whereas on the other side the 'creationists' see Darwinian evolution as incompatible with their interpretation of sacred texts. The philosophy of science maintained by these polar opposite positions is rather similar: both maintain that scientific knowledge stands in some kind of opposition to religious knowledge. The traditional Christian doctrine of creation, however, supports neither position, and is more about ontology ("Why are we here?") rather than origins ("Where did we come from?"). Ever since 1859 (the publication date of Darwin's On the Origin of Species) many Christians have viewed evolution as the scientific account that describes the way in which the creator God has brought about all the biological diversity that we observe on this planet, both now and in the past. The term 'Christian Darwinian' was already in use by 1867. The earliest written religious response to On the Origin of Species, dated 18th November 1859, was from Darwin's friend the Revd Charles Kingsley, who wrote that "All I have seen of it awes me". It is suggested that the evolutionary narrative should continue to stimulate awe for its complexity, beauty and generation of emergent properties, reflecting a universe that is ordered, intelligible and finely tuned in a way that renders life possible, and perhaps inevitable.Denis Alexander is Director of the Faraday Institute for Science and Religion at St. Edmunds College. He was previously an open scholar at Oxford University where he read biochemistry before carrying out research for a PhD in neurochemistry at the Institute of Psychiatry, University of London. Following this he spent 15 years in academic positions in the Middle East, latterly (1981-86) as Associate Professor of Biochemistry at the American University of Beirut, Lebanon. Upon his return to the UK he worked at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund (now Cancer Research UK) and since 1989 at The Babraham Institute where he was Chair of the Molecular Immunology Programme and Head of the Laboratory of Lymphocyte Signalling and Development, before leaving in 2008. Dr Alexander has published numerous articles and reviews, particularly in his research field of lymphocyte signalling and development, most recently in the New England Journal of Medicine. He is also Editor of the journal Science & Christian Belief and contributes papers as part of the Cambridge Papers writing group. He is the author of the critically acclaimed book Rebuilding the Matrix - Science and Faith in the 21st Century (Oxford: Lion, 2001) which provides a general overview of the science-religion debate. | 3 12 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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3 |
Prof Wade Alison | For more than half a century the view that radiation represents an extreme hazard has been accepted. This talk challenges that view by facing the question How dangerous is ionising radiation? Briefly the answer is that radiation is about a thousand times less hazardous than suggested by current safety standards.For many this will come as a surprise. Why are people so worried about radiation? Should we choose nuclear power or face climate change? Education, understanding and simple scientific fact, not popular fear inherited from the days of the Cold War, are essential to mankind's survival on Earth. Professor Wade Allison is a nuclear and medical physicist at the University of Oxford. | 28 10 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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4 |
Cambridge Hands-on Science | Lia Chappell from Cambridge Hands-on Science (CHaOS) joined us at Skeptics in the Pub to show us some of CHaOS' best and most entertaining science demonstrations. CHaOS are known for large explosions, lots of liquid nitrogen and a vacuum bazooka! Lia will be picking some of her favourite experiments and perhaps even teach you something new along the way - if not, we can guarantee it will be fun!Probably Skeptics in the Pub's most explosive night yet! | 30 9 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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5 |
Julian Huppert | Julian grew up here in Cambridge. He went to both school and University here, and stayed on to do a PhD in biological chemistry, eventually becoming a research scientist. Cambridge has always been his home and he now lives with his long-term girlfriend, between Newmarket Road and Stourbridge Common. Julian's work in science involved research into the structures of DNA. His team were developing a new understanding of how cancer works, which helped to produce new anti-cancer drugs.Julian was elected MP for Cambridge in May 2010. During his maiden speech he spoke about Cambridge's scientific history, his intention to bring an understanding of science to Parliament and how the scientific method can be used across all areas of public policy. | 21 9 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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6 |
Alice Bell | The last two and a half decades has seen much hang-wringing over something called the 'Public Understanding of Science' (PUS). Simply put, the PUS movement of the 1980s worried that the public had stopped listening to science (if they ever did) and that this was dangerous, not only to the status of the scientific community, but to public health, even democracy. If only the public knew more and listened more attentively, the world would be a better place. This approach was speedily criticised, however, as somewhat of an unhelpful red herring. A newer approach emerged, known usually as 'Public Engagement with Science and Technology' (PEST) which stressed discussion and more respectful mutual learning between science and society (although many people still worry about PUS). Dr Alice Bell is Senior Teaching Fellow in Science Communication at Imperial College and a freelance science writer. She blogs at http://alicerosebell.wordpress.com | 31 8 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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7 |
Trystan Swayle | Who are the people that spend their weekends sat in haunted buildings hoping to capture evidence of an after life or a snapshot of a ghost? From academics to housewives, Trystan Swale blows the whistle on the profiles, methods, means, deception, poor research and bad science of the people who continue to shape popular culture and perception of ghosts.Trystan Swale is a folklore hobbyist and between 2004 and 2009 was an active member of two paranormal investigation teams in southern England. He is a serving officer with educational charity ASSAP and has investigated a range of phenomena including ghosts, unidentified flying objects and out of place animals. When not busy pieceing together and co-hosting Righteous Indignation podcast, Trystan is a teacher by profession. | 28 7 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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8 |
Simon Perry | Simon is an active campaigner against nonsense. Using the ASA, Trading Standards, other regulatory bodies and even gaining help from MPs, his campaigns have helped shut down dodgy allergy test services, prevented traditional chinese medicine salesmen from claiming to cure cancer and exposed psychic scams. His largest involvement in a campaign, coined the "Quacklash" by Jack of Kent involved almost 600 separate letters being sent to trading standards to report claims to treat childhood diseases with a back rub. 60 of the letters gained 500 signatories. Further complaints were issued with the General Chiropractic Council. Simon will be explaining the techniques he's used to fight woo, what works and what doesn't and tell stories about some of the crazy nonsense he's encountered along the way. Simon runs Leicester Skeptics in the Pub, blogs at http://adventuresinnonsense.blogspot.com and writes a skeptical column in the Leicester Mercury. You can follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/Simon_Perry. | 31 5 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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9 |
Dr Evan Harris | Dr Evan Harris, was educated at the Blue Coat School in Liverpool and qualified in medicine from Oxford University in 1991. He was the Liberal Democrat MP for Oxford West and Abingdon from 1997-2010. During his time as an MP – and since – he has campaigned strongly for free speech, human rights, equality, science, evidence-based policy, secularism and much else besides. He was the Lib Dem Science Spokesman and served on the Joint Committee on Human Rights, the Science and Technology Select Committee.He was responsible for the abolition of the blasphemy law and criminal defamation As Parliamentary lead on the Libel Reform campaign, he advised English PEN , Index on Censorship and Sense About Science on strategy and worked to build a coalition in Parliament to reform Britain's outdated libel system. He has also campaigned for better Parliamentary scrutiny of the Government, as part of the Parliament First group and was elected to the “Wright” Committee on the Reform of the House of Commons. He is a patron of Dignity in Dying, a Vice-President of the BHA and an Honorary Associate of the National Secular Society. He is a long-standing member of the BMA's Medical Ethics Committee. | 7 5 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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10 |
Dr Edd Edmondson | Edd works in astronomy at the University of Portsmouth, trying to handle the large amounts of data from some of the current and upcoming surveys of the sky. He's worked with surveys such as the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), and on the 'citizen science' project Galaxy Zoo which lead to the discovery of 'Hanny's Voorwerp'. As someone in the field of cosmology, he's in the somewhat unusual situation of often having to tell people that most of the universe is actually invisible and intangible and that it's perfectly rational to believe that. Having spent too much time worrying about how to turn data into answers to questions, he talks about the mathematics behind thinking skeptically (but not so many equations that you can't follow him after a pint or two). What should we mean when we say we believe something? How do you know when you have enough evidence for your beliefs, and when should you change your mind when faced with facts that don't fit your preconceptions? And what does this all mean when we're faced with the task of assessing whether that claimed psychic really can do what they say? | 26 4 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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11 |
Dr Belinda Brooks-Gordon | Dr Belinda Brooks-Gordon C.Psychol, is a Reader in Psychology and Social Policy at Birkbeck, University of London. A chartered psychologist with a PhD from the University Law Faculty, Belinda's research focuses on the safety, health, welfare and human rights of vulnerable workers. Belinda's book The Price of Sex: Prostitution, Policy and Society was short-listed for the British Society of Criminology Book Prize 2007. Other books include: Death Rites and Rights; Law and Psychology: Current Legal Issues; and Sexuality Repositioned: Diversity and the Law. She also writes in the mainstream broadsheet press and sometimes on legal blogs. | 6 4 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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12 |
Dean Burnett | Andrew N Holding caught up with Dean Burnett at TAM London last year. Dean was our speaker at Skeptics in the Pub Cambridge last month, and they talk about his journey into Skepticism, Dr Who and his stand-up comedy. | 7 3 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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13 |
Gia Milinovich | Andrew N Holding managed to catch up with Gia Milinovich at TAM London 2010 where he was able to talk about her Guardian article earlier that year "The lady vanishes: Invisible Wife Syndrome". | 16 2 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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14 |
Prof Simon Blackburn | Simon Blackburn is the Professor of philosophy at the University of Cambridge, a Fellow of Trinity College, and a Research Professor at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. From 1969 to 1990 he was Tutorial Fellow at Pembroke College, Oxford. He has held visiting appointments at many places in the USA and worldwide. His books include: Reason and Prediction, 1973, Spreading the Word 1984, Essays in Quasi-Realism 1993, The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, 1994, Ruling Passions 1998, Think 1999, Being Good 2001, Lust 2004, Truth: A Guide 2005, Plato's Republic 2006, How to Read Hume 2008, The Big Questions of Philosophy, 2009. He is a Fellow of the British Academy and of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. | 28 1 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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15 |
Andy Lewis | Andy Lewis developed the web site quackometer.net that explores the pseudo-medical claims of alternative medicine web sites and their impact on society. Despite his detractors' claims, he does not own a yacht in the South of France paid for by Big Pharma. He has yet to secure a single penny from such sources for his work. | 16 1 11 | Free | View In iTunes |
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16 |
Dr Aubrey de Grey | It may seem premature to be discussing the elimination of human aging as a cause of death, when so little progress has yet been made in even postponing it. However, two facts undermine this assessment. The first is that aging happens throughout our lives but only causes ill-health after middle age: this shows that we can postpone that ill-health without knowing how to prevent aging completely, but instead by molecular and cellular repair. The second is that the typical rate of subsequent, incremental refinement of big technological breakthroughs is usually fast enough (so long as public enthusiasm for them is strong) to change those technologies almost beyond recognition within a natural human lifespan. In this talk I will explain, first, why therapies that can add 30 healthy years to the remaining lifespan of typical 60-year-olds may well arrive within the next few decades, and, second, why those who benefit from those therapies will very probably continue to benefit from progressively improved therapies indefinitely and will thus avoid debilitation or death from age-related causes at any age. | 23 12 10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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17 |
Richard Wiseman | For over 20 years, psychologist Richard Wiseman has delved deep into the mysterious world of the paranormal, carrying out high profile, and often controversial, investigations into the impossible. Psychologist Professor Richard Wiseman started his working life as a professional magician and currently holds Britain's only Professorship in the Public Understanding of Psychology at the University of Hertfordshire. He frequently appears on the media, and has written over 60 academic articles and several books, including The Luck Factor, Quirkology and 59 Seconds. | 14 12 10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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18 |
David Aaronovitch | David Aaronovitch is a writer, broadcaster and commentator on culture, international affairs, politics and the media. A former television researcher, producer and programme editor, he has previously written for The Independent, The Guardian and The Observer, winning numerous accolades, including Columnist of the Year 2003 and the 2001 Orwell prize for journalism. He has appeared on Have I Got News For You, presented a number of radio and television series and programmes on current affairs and historical topics. His first book, and account of a journey by kayak on the rivers and canals of England, Paddling to Jerusalem, was published in 2000 and won the Madoc Prize for travel writing. In 2009 he published Voodoo Histories, a book on conspiracy theories, which will be the subject of his talk. | 2 12 10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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19 |
Geek Calendar | Andrew N Holding interviews Louise from the Geek Calendar. Geek Calendar showcases the UK's geek heroes in ways you will have never seen before. This is not a 'pin-up' calendar in the traditional sense (and no, they are not naked), instead it features interesting photos of intriguing people, reminding us of each person's ideas, achievements and creativity.Some of our geeks are famous, some are not, some are scientists, some are artists. All are nerds to the core.“Geeks are fascinated by the tiniest and yet most wonderful things. I'm a geek. I used to spot buses.”- Professor Brian Cox Get your Geek Calendar at http://www.geekcalendar.co.uk or at our next 'Skeptics in the Pub - Cambridge' meeting on November 30th from 7pm at the Maypole Pub, Cambridge. | 22 11 10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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20 |
Ian Ridpath | According to one estimate, around 100 UFOs are sighted worldwide every 24 hours – that's one every 15 minutes. What's causing all these reports? Are they, as believers claim, evidence that we are being visited by aliens from other planets? Or is there a more prosaic explanation? This hard-hitting talk by Ian Ridpath, astronomy writer and UFO sceptic, traces the growth of the flying saucer myth since the first sighting in 1947, and demonstrates some of the most common causes of UFO reports. The talk will discuss the implication of formerly top-secret government documents recently released under the Freedom of Information Act, and will end with Ian's first-hand account of his own researches into the Rendlesham Forest incident, a major event outside a US Air Force base at Woodbridge in Suffolk, still widely regarded as among the best UFO cases ever.Ian is a science writer and found fame for his investigation into the 'Rendlesham Forest Incident', often called 'Britain's Roswell'. For further reading on the subject Ian's website provides a good starting point to find more out about him and his talks. | 27 10 10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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21 |
Prof. Andy Parker | Andy Parker is a Professor of High Energy Physics at Cambridge University, with over 160 publications on aspects of particle physics. His current research interests involve experiments to reveal new physics in the Tera-electron-volt energy regime. He is a founder of the ATLAS experiment for the Large Hadron Collider, and for 6 years he was the project leader for the ATLAS Inner Detector, the most complex detector system so far created at CERN. He is also involved in large-scale distributed computing grids, used for various scientific projects. He was awarded the Pilkington Prize for excellence in teaching in 1997. | 29 9 10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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22 |
Rebecca Watson | Rebecca Watson is editor of the Skepchick blog which she describes as: "a group of women (and one deserving guy) who write about science, skepticism, and pseudoscience. With intelligence, curiosity, and occasional snark, the group tackles diverse topics from astronomy to astrology, psychics to psychology." Skepchick is an important part of the wave of science and skeptics sites that have spread across the internet in the last few years. Suddenly it's hip to be a nerd. This is good news, but is it also a defensive response to an increasing trend against science and medicine in society? Originally from Massachussetts, Rebecca is living in the UK at the moment and she has very kindly agreed to come and speak to us about her adventures over the last three years of blogging, organising and campaigning. | 2 9 10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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23 |
David Spiegelhalter | David Spiegelhalter is Winton Professor of the Public Understanding of Risk at the University of Cambridge and Senior Scientist in the MRC Biostatistics Unit. His background is in medical statistics, particularly the use of Bayesian methods in clinical trials, health technology assessment and drug safety. He led the statistical team in the Bristol Royal Infirmary Inquiry and also gave evidence to the Shipman Inquiry. | 28 7 10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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24 |
Nick Pope | Nick Pope used to work at the Ministry of Defence, where from 1991 to 1994 he was posted to a division where his duties included investigating UFOs. Initially sceptical, his official research and investigation convinced him that the UFO phenomenon raised important defence, national security and flight safety issues. He was particularly interested in cases where the witnesses were pilots or where UFOs were tracked on radar. Nick is now recognised as a leading authority on UFOs and the unexplained. | 1 7 10 | Free | View In iTunes |
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25 |
Prof. Chris French | Professor Chris French is the Head of the Anomalistic Psychology Research Unit in the Psychology Department at Goldsmiths, University of London. He is a Fellow of the British Psychological Society and the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. He has published over 100 articles and chapters covering a wide range of topics within psychology. His main current area of research is the psychology of paranormal beliefs and anomalous experiences. He frequently appears on radio and television casting a sceptical eye over paranormal claims. He is the editor of The Skeptic and writes a regular column for the Guardian's online science pages. | 2 6 10 | Free | View In iTunes |
| Total: 25 Episodes |
Customer Reviews
Essential listening for poorly skeptics!
This is quite a young podcast, but the depth and breadth of knowledge that is behind it shines through. I've been too physically poorly to get out in the evenings yet, so I really appreciate getting a taste of the amazing speakers that have been invited to Cambridge. They are brief, but they have given me a good overview of a topic and have inspired me and provided me with the information to take action. Much appreciated.
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