Launched January 2000

Back to top of page

Back to top of page

Back to top of page

Back to top of page

 

Date:	September 27th 2004
Title:	'Does Darwinism Have a Politics?'
Speaker:	Steve Fuller
Description:	Philosopher Peter Singer once urged the Left to replace Marx with Darwin as its philosophical foundation.   Historically, Social Darwinism has been associated with right wing ideologies.  What are the political implications of Darwinism?  Formerly at the University of Durham, Steve is now Professor of Sociology at the University of Warwick and has published widely in the sociology and philosophy of science.

 

Date:	October 18th    2004
Title:	'Digging up bones: scientific justification and ethical considerations'
Speaker:	Charlotte Roberts
Description:	Archaeologists have excavated thousands of bodies over the years from all over the world. Why are we so fascinated with corpses? Why should we continue to recover our dead and what can we learn about our past? Charlotte started out as a nurse and is now professor of palaeopathology at the University of Durham.  Her many publications include accessible books on the history of disease.

 

Date:	November 15th
Title:	'Alcohol: bad for the young but good for the old?'
Speaker:	Oliver James
Description:	The government has seems to have given up on its promise to provide a national alcohol strategy.   Perhaps we should sympathise, given that alcohol health messages are increasingly complex.  Alcohol is arguably responsible for more deaths, injuries and unhappiness in under thirty year olds than anything else.  But, “moderate” alcohol consumption reduces the risk of cardiovascular death or stroke and may reduce the risk of dementia and type II diabetes.  Oliver is Head of the School of Clinical Medical Sciences, University of Newcastle, has been treating patients with alcoholic cirrhosis for 30 years, and is an enthusiastic wine amateur.

 

Date:	January 17th 2005
Title:	'Designer babies: Born and Made'
Speaker:	Sarah Franklin
Description:	What is a designer baby and how do we know what we think of them? How can the desires of individual parents be reconciled with the need for limits to reproductive intervention? Are humans increasingly made as well as born?  Has this always been the case?  Sarah has conducted ethnographic research on new reproductive and genetic technologies in Britain for over 20 years, including two years of fieldwork with two of Britain's leading centres of preimplantation genetic diagnosis.  She is based at the BIOS Centre at the LSE.

 

Date:	February 21st
Title:	'Pollution and health risk: How much do we have to accept?'
Speaker:	Tanja Pless-Mulloli
Description:	Chimneys, shipyards and coal mines are the legacy of the industrial past of the North East. In recent decades, there have been drastic changes in pollution levels; in evidence about links between pollution and human health; in the distribution of pollution amongst the rich and the poor; and people’s acceptance of pollution. Tanya will explore the past, look at the present and gaze into the future of these interrelated factors impacting on our quality of life.  Tanja is an environmental epidemiologist at the University of Newcastle.

 

Date:	March 21st
Title:	'Right at the beginning ... of the Universe'
Speaker:	Carlos Frenk
Description:	Cosmologists have learned more about our Universe in recent decades than in the rest of human history. Using astronomical data in tandem with virtual universes constructed in supercomputers, we are now beginning to understand how the universe evolved from the early simplicity of the Big Bang to the present-day structured complexity. We can confidently trace back cosmic history to about a micro-second after the Big Bang and possibly beyond.  Carlos is Ogden Professor of Physics and Director of the Institute for Computational Cosmology, University of Durham.

 

Date:	May 16th
Title:	'Atkins: the sugar industry gets it in the gut'
Speaker:	Eric Brunner
Description:	The low carbohydrate Atkins diet forbids soft drinks, crisps, sweets, chocolate and biscuits, and is an effective way to lose weight. Atkins advocates a high protein, high fat diet. But high fat is linked with cardiovascular disease, and there is not enough protein from animals, fish and seafood to feed six billion. Surely deep-fried tofu is not the only way forward?  Come and graze on some indigestible contradictions.  Eric is a Reader in Epidemiology at UCL, and has previously worked at the London Food Commission.

 

Date:	June 20th
Title:	'The appliance of Science'
Speaker:	Arlene Judith Klotzko
Description:	Arlene is a bioethicist and lawyer.  Author of A Clone of Your Own, she has contributed to several US and UK broadsheets, and now writes the regular “Science Matters” column for the Financial Times.   She has been writer in Residence at the Science Museum, London and Visiting Scholar in Bioethics at the Windeyer Institute, University College, London.  She will be talking about morally fraught areas of biomedicine.

 

Date:	July 18th
Title:	'Big Brother versus the Internet'
Speaker:	Ian Brown
Description:	Computer voting?  Electronic patient records?  Copyright… data encryption… Information security, surveillance and privacy are major issues of our time.  Based at UCL, Ian is the Director of the Foundation for Information Policy Research, chairman of Privacy International, and has consulted for the financial services industry.

Date:	Monday 17th October 2005, 7.30 pm
Title:	'Aren’t we all neurotic? Why the antidepressant controversy won’t go away'
Venue:	Atrium, Central Square, Forth Street (behind Newcastle Central Station)
Speaker:	Dr Michael Barr (Bios Centre, LSE)
Description:	.Dr Michael Barr (Bios Centre, LSE) asks: Are antidepressants good medical care or just good business? Who should be prescribed such drugs? Can biochemistry explain and treat an existential crisis? Is there a future for psychotherapy? Formerly of PEALS, Michael moved to the LSE in 2004 to explore these and related questions. So come and join the debate on an issue that has recently attracted international attention.

Date:	Monday 21st November 2005, 7.30 pm
Title:	'Fuel Cells & the Hydrogen Economy - Tees Lights The Way Forward'
Venue:	Atrium, Central Square, Forth Street (behind Newcastle Central Station)
Speaker:	Ben Mayo
Description:	Ben Mayo introduces us to fuel cells, the new energy alternative: engines which are twice as efficient as internal combustion, silent, and emit little more than water. Over the next few years we will be starting to use them to power everything from laptops to buses. Our region has most of the attributes required to be right at the forefront of this exciting new technology.  A Tees light house will be using fuel cells in the near future. Ben is the Director of the Fuel Cell Applications Facility at the Centre for Process Innovation on Teesside.

Date:	16th January 2006
Title:	A New Year: A New You: 2006
Speaker:	Amelia Lake (Newcastle University)
Description:	Amelia Lake (Newcastle University) gets to grips with those seasonal resolutions about diet and health.  Are you all going to take out gym membership and set optimistic goals?  Will you eat those five fruit and veg? Are you all going to take out gym membership and set optimistic goals?  Is behaviour change at this time of year really a good idea, and do we need to change our behaviour?

Date:	Monday 20th February 2006
Title:	Uncanny Valley: Living with Living Machines
Speaker:	Richard Evans
Description:	For the last forty years, scientists around the world have been working towards realising the dream of creating humanoid robots. Now, as walking, thinking and even feeling robots and androids take their first tentative steps into reality, writer Richard Evans outlines the latest robotics research and discusses the far-reaching ethical and social implications of the coming world of artificial helpers, friends and lovers.  Richard researched his acclaimed futuristic thrillers Machine Nation and Robophobia at MIT, sponsored by Arts Council England

Date:	Monday 6th March, 7pm
Title:	Artificial Life and Virtual Reality
Speaker:	Steve Grand
Description:	To celebrate the AV Festival, an evening with acclaimed programmer Steve Grand (job: Digital God), whose innovative work on the Creatures game and Lucy the robot is described in his books Creation: life and how to make it and Growing up with Lucy. Can something that happens inside a computer ever be really alive, or really real? What does this imply for our traditional understanding of reality?

Date:	Monday 15th May
Title:	Why memes?
Speaker:	Mary Midgley
Description:	One of Britain’s most renowned and best-loved thinkers, Mary has written about animals, about Darwinism and about the Gaia hypothesis. We are delighted to welcome her back to raise more questions about science and society.

Date:	Monday 19th June
Title:	How gay are your genes?
Speaker:	Lisa Matthews
Description:	Twin studies suggest that sexuality may partly be influenced by genetics. Dean Hamer famously identified a region of the X chromosome which may be involved.  For the last two years, writer Lisa has been working with the region’s lesbian, gay and bisexual community to explore their attitudes and responses to genetics, and their views on sexuality.

Date:	Monday 17th July
Title:	SmartHEALTH diagnostic technology: earlier and more effective treatments of cancer
Speaker:	Calum McNeil, Professor of Biological Sensor Systems, Newcastle University and Coordinator of the SmartHEALTH programme
Description:	SmartHEALTH is an innovative European healthcare technology - in the early stages of development - which aims to make cancer diagnosis, treatment and monitoring more effective. In miniaturizing a laboratory into a hand-held device, testing could be moved from remote laboratories to local clinics, GPs surgeries or even your home. Waiting for test results could be reduced from days to minutes. To support more accurate and personalised diagnosis, these miniature systems will also allow GPs to access patients’ electronic records - held anywhere in the country - using mobile phone or wireless internet technology. The prototypes systems under development are for breast, cervical and colorectal cancer. This event aims to raise a diversity of issues, including questions such as: • What diseases would we choose to test with our GP or in our own homes? • Who will have access to this new technology? • What are the challenges of introducing complex Information technologies into the healthcare system for patients, GPs and the wider public?

Date:	Monday, September 18th
Title:	Freedom to shape the future?
Speaker:	Bano Murtuja and Tom Wakeford from the new Right 2B heard network
Description:	Do we trust experts to decide about genetics, nanotechnology and biotechnology?  Is it realistic for non-specialist citizens to control policy on science and technology?

Date:	Monday, October 16th
Title:	Free energy or a nuclear state?
Speaker:	Bridget Woodman, energy analyst, Warwick Business School
Description:	How should UK reduce carbon emissions while keeping the lights on?  Through renewables, or through another generation of nuclear reactors?

Date:	Monday, March 5th 2007
Title:	Patient choice or patient responsibility?
Speaker:	To be confirmed
Description:	Current UK health policy makes the patient central to choosing where and how to be treated but this implies freedom without responsibility. Is there now a dangerous imbalance between doctor and patient?

Date:	Monday, May 21st
Title:	Body parts - free, or for sale?
Speaker:	Naomi Pfeiffer, London Metropolitan University
Description:	Since slavery was abolished, it has been illegal to buy and sell human bodies and body parts. However, scientists, biotech companies and tissue banks profit from human tissue given freely by patients and members of the public. Naomi Pfeffer asks whether a market in human body parts should be allowed to develop.
Date:	Monday September 17th
Title:	Do Animals Feel Pleasure?
Speaker:	Jonathan Balcombe
Description:	Jonathan Balcombe, animal behaviourist and author of Pleasurable Kingdom: Animals and the Nature of Feeling Good will argue that animals have deeper emotions than conventional science accepts. For Balcombe, behaviours are not just about adaptation, they're about feeling good.
Date:	Monday October 15th
Title:	Our Future Human Body?
Description:	As part of the Cyborg Future exhibition at the Discovery Museum, we take a look at the shrinking divide between us and the technology we use, from prosthetic body parts to smart textiles and wearable body extensions. Tobie Kerridge and Ian Thompson (Biojewellery) and Peter and Carla Allen (KnoWear) will be discussing whether this is the future we want with Sabine Seymour.

Date:	Monday 19th November
Title:	For Whom the Roads Toll
Speaker:	Phil Blyth
Description:	What challenges face us in delivering a robust and sustainable road transport system fit for purpose in the twenty-first century? Phil Blyth, Professor of Intelligent Transport Systems at Newcastle University argues that we will need to change the way we travel if we are to manage and optimise our use of roads and alternative forms of public transport. He will explore the options for paying for road use as well as looking at the additional impacts and benefits of such as scheme as the technology involved will lay the foundation for future intelligent infrastructure for transport.

Date:	Monday 7th January 2008
Title:	Cafe Philosophique - Theory Slam!
Speaker:
Description:	If you're looking for a festive alternative with intellectual zing, come and pitch ideas at the first Tyneside Theory Slam. All comers will be offered three minutes each to sell us their theories - serious, silly, conspiracy - and the audience vote will select the winner. Email us in advance at info@cafeculturenortheast.org.uk if you have a pet theory you want to share. Theories put forward so far include Is the Pope a Catholic? and The Truth of Existence. These, and others, will be shared.

Date:	Monday 21st January
Title:	King Coal rides again: restoration of the monarchy?
Speaker:	Paul Younger
Description:	In this era of low-carbon ambitions, could it remotely make sense to talk of a renaissance of energy production from coal?  Geologist and environmental engineer Paul Younger, HSBC Professor of Energy & Environment at Newcastle University, argues that it's time we disinterred Old King Coal and restored him to his throne but this time under a new constitution that will limit his powers to lord it over his subjects.

Date:	Monday 18th February
Title:	Climate change: fact or fiction?
Speaker:	Hayley Fowler
Description:	The science of climate change has become heavily politicised, with 'beliefs' intertwined with scientific fact. Hayley Fowler, NERC Research Fellow in the Water Resource Systems Research Laboratory at Newcastle University, will explore the myths surrounding climate change science, explain what impacts we may expect in the future and how interventions may help to reduce these.

Date:	Monday 17th March
Title:	Where can we go with stem cells?
Speaker:	Lyle Armstrong
Description:	Will scientists soon be able to re-programme embryonic stem cells to create tissues for transplantation? Is cloning a way to avoid problems of immune rejection, or would it be better to use the technique to understand how to re-programme adult cells to make them like embryonic stem cells? Cutting edge insights from Lyle Armstrong , a member of the world-beating team at Newcastle's Centre for Stem Cell Biology and Developmental Genetics.
Date:	Monday 16th June
Title:	Should we try to save premature babies?
Speaker:	David Archard
Description:	Should you try to give intensive care to the earliest babies when their chances of survival are so slim? At what point might an older baby's life become so intolerable that you should consider letting them die? Should doctors ever actively end a baby's life? David Archard is Professor of Philosophy and Public Policy at Lancaster University and served on the recent Nuffield Council on Bioethics working party on premature babies. He will be joined by a neonatologist. The event will be chaired by Professor Erica Haimes, also on the Nuffield working party.

Date:	Monday 15th September
Title:	Giving Away Our Lives: Internet 2.0
Speaker:	Paul Bernal
Description:	Drawing on his LSE research at the interface of law, computing and sociology, Paul Bernal will discuss how the new internet economy uses the personal information we unknowingly provide to allow businesses to shape and control both our online and offline lives.

Date:	Monday 6th October
Title:	What Works With Families?
Speaker:	Joel Yoeli, NHS clinical psychologist, & Liz Todd, Newcastle University educational psychologist
Description:	From government to the media, everyone blames the family, seen as responsible for children’s health, behaviour, educational achievement and emotional adjustment. So, is parenting in crisis? Could parenting education be the answer? Or can we blame other factors for social problems? Joel Yoeli, NHS clinical psychologist, and Liz Todd, Newcastle University educational psychologist, will debate current attitudes to the family, and discuss the role of professionals.

Date:	Monday 20th October
Title:	How Studying Children’s Minds Leads to Big Ideas
Speaker:	Charles Fernyhough, Durham University
Description:	For Charles Fernyhough, author and psychologist at Durham University, the birth of his daughter Athena was an opportunity to re-evaluate much of what he had learned as a lecturer and researcher in developmental psychology. The Baby in the Mirror, his account of how children develop in their first three years of life, is written with a father’s tenderness and a novelist’s empathy and style.

Date:	Monday 17th November
Title:	The Physics of Star Trek: Can Anti-Matter Power the Enterprise?
Speaker:	Ruth Gregory, Durham University
Description:	There is something about anti-matter that always seems to be the stuff of science fiction, but anti-matter is very much scientific fact. Professor Ruth Gregory will discuss what it is, how it was dreamed up, and what use we can put it to today. There may also be time for a good natured critique of the Enterprise’s warp drive.

Date:	Monday 19th January
Title:	Standing up for fatigue: the biological basis of CFS/ME
Speaker:	Julia Newton, Newcastle University
Description:	Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS/ME) affects approximately two per cent of the UK population, impacts on quality of life and affects a sufferer’s ability to work and live their life. Despite this, there is no diagnostic test for CFS/ME and no effective biological treatment., researches the autonomic nervous system, which controls subconscious activities that occur in the human body, such as respiration, bladder and bowel function, and also maintains heart rate and blood pressure. Autonomic dysfunction and particularly low blood pressure, hypotension, are a frequent finding in people with the symptom of fatigue

Date:	Monday 16th February
Title:	Heavens above! From Northumberland to the Red Planet
Speaker:	Gary Fildess, Chief Astronomer, Keilder Observatory & Pete Edwards, Durham University
Description:	Gary Fildess, Chief Astronomer at the new Kielder Observatory, will introduce the project and explain the importance of amateur astronomy, while Pete Edwards from the Ogden Centre, Durham University, will describe the latest results from the Phoenix mission, explaining why there is so much interest in Mars and how this might help answer the question ‘Are we alone in the universe?’.

Date:	Monday 16th March
Title:	Is There a Right to IVF? The Ethics and Politics of Infertility
Speaker:	Alison Murdoch
Description:	One in seven couples have difficulty conceiving, and approximately one per cent of all births involve assisted conception. With the rationing of NHS treatment, going private is the only option for many. Professor Alison Murdoch is Head of the Newcastle Fertility Centre @ Life, a member of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, and a former president of the British Fertility Society. She will explore the social and clinical complexities of assisted conception.

Date:	Monday 16th June
Title:	Non Proliferation and Nuclear Renaissance
Speaker:	Wyn Bowen
Description:	Nuclear energy is often offered as a partial solution to energy and climate security concerns. But the global spread of nuclear capabilities may undermine non-proliferation challenges if technologies and materials are diverted to military use. Professor Wyn Bowen is Professor of Non-Proliferation and International Security in the Department of War Studies at King’s College London. He has worked as a consultant to the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna and served as a weapons inspector on several missile teams in Iraq with the UN Special Commission during the late 1990s. Wyn also served as a Specialist Advisor to the House of Commons’ Foreign Affairs Committee inquiries into the Iraq war and weapons of mass destruction.

Date:	Monday 6th July
Title:	Waves
Speaker:	Gavin Pretor-Pinney
Description:	Waves seem to be everywhere, from ocean breakers pounding the shore, to the tiny, musical pressure fluctuations produced by a string ensemble, from reverberations of an earthquake circumnavigating the globe, to the electromagnetic rays emanating from a lamp, from brainwaves to Mexican waves, gravitational waves to royal waves. In fact, at a subatomic scale, anything and everything seems to behave as a wave. Gavin Pretor-Pinney, Cloud Spotter and Idler and absinthe importer, asks what exactly are waves and why are they so universal?

Date:	Monday 19th October, 7-9pm
Title:	Genesis Machines: Computing with the Code of Life
Speaker:	Martyn Amos
Description:	From his book, Genesis Machines, Martyn Amos, computer scientist from Manchester Metropolitan University, will explain how scientists are turning away from silicon chips and instead are using real, wet, squishy, perhaps even living biology to build machines that could change the world forever. He will explain how cells, gels and DNA strands are the ‘wetware’ of the 21st century. He says revolutionary applications may be widespread within 10 years and asks what breed of computer does the future hold?

Date:	Monday 16th November 2009
Title:	Disability and bioethics: stand-off or dialogue?
Speaker:	Jackie Leach Scully
Description:	Disability is a central topic in biomedicine, especially the new genetic and reproductive medical technologies, and so it is of major interest in bioethics as well. But relations between bioethics and disabled people, especially the disability movement, have been fraught. Bioethics is sometimes accused by disability activists of having a eugenic goal; in turn, disability activists are accused of being unrealistic and unrepresentative. In her book Disability Bioethics: Moral Bodies, Moral Difference, Jackie Leach Scully argues for a better dialogue between disability and bioethics, with greater recognition of the diversity of experience of disabled people.

Date:	Monday 15th February 2009
Title:	From Stem Cells to Sperm Cells
Speaker:	Karim Nayernia
Description:	Karim Nayernia trained in Germany as a molecular biologist, working on germ cells and cancer cells, moving to Newcastle University in 2006 as Professor of Stem Cell Biology. Karim will talk about how it is possible to use stem cells to create sperm in the laboratory, with the aim of understanding the biology of male infertility

Date:	Monday 15th March 2010
Title:	Putting your head through the screen
Speaker:	Bill Thompson
Description:	Pervasive networks, easy access to the internet and social network tools like Twitter, Facebook and Seesmic are blurring the boundary between being online and being offline, while geolocation tools mean your friends – and stalkers – can track you in the real and the virtual worlds. Technology guru Bill Thompson will ask what implications this has for our sense of identity, and how can we know who we are when many of the people we spend our time with are only electronically available?