"Religion and Democracy: Antagonists or Allies?" is the topic of the 2008 Seymour Martin Lipset Memorial Lecture.

The author of "Everything is Miscellaneous: The Power of the New Digital Disorder", David Weinberger, delivers a lecture entitled "Knowledge at the End of the Information Age". In this talk Weinberger argues that the internet is both profoundly weird, and deeply familiar. He claims that, by changing the way we receive information from the broadcast era's one-way monologue into a multi-directional conversation, the internet has humanized information.

Barlow argues that access to safe drinking water should be a basic human right and makes a compelling case for why the global water crisis will be the greatest environmental and human crisis of this century.

Lewis Lapham laments the state of the American education system.

Internationally renowned author and philosopher, Umberto Eco, gives "An Illustrated Presentation on the History of Beauty and Ugliness", based on his two recent books "On Beauty" and "On Ugliness".

Author Margaret Atwood delivers the 2008 Massey Lecture, "Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth".

Dr. Ernesto Spinelli delivers a lecture "Exploring Death Anxiety" at an International Conference on Personal Meaning

Dr. Kirk Schneider explores therapeutic approaches to the mystery of being in a lecture delivered at an International Conference on Personal Meaning.

Author and scholar, Thomas Homer-Dixon, explores the convergence of natural, social, and economic stresses that could lead to the breakdown of world economies and political systems.

Political science professor Ron Deibert looks at the issue of internet censorship and surveillance around the world.