Gresham College Lectures

This lecture will consider the current reality of AI in education and its transformative potential.

Professor Luckin will introduce what we mean by the term AI and how the development of increasingly smart technologies in the workplace and home requires us to change how and what we teach and learn. It will be explained how AI is already supporting the teaching and learning process, with speculation about the possible futures that AI might provide in order to help us tackle our greatest educational challenges.

A lecture by Rose Luckin, University College London 9 April 2019

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/ai-education-reality-potential

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

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In the 50 years since the hospice movement started, lessons from research have revolutionised care of the dying in the UK and in many places around the world. Yet the cruel myth that opioids shorten the lives of those with severe pain from cancer and other diseases leaves many denied the treatment they deserve. Those watching the person they love die carry the memory for the rest of their lives.

The concept of a 'good death', and how it can be achieved will be discussed, including the importance of open conversations with children being bereaved. Discussion will also tackle some of the issues around physician- assisted suicide and euthanasia.

A lecture by Baroness Finlay of Llandaff, Independent Crossbench member of the House of Lords 9 April 2019

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/dying-today

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

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Location shooting was a feature of 'new wave' film around the world in the 1960s. In Britain, it meant that British filmmakers broke out of the studio to find new subjects among the young, fashionable and disadvantaged, seen in their natural habitats - not only in the North and Midlands, but in unfamiliar parts of London.

A lecture by Ian Christie, Visiting Professor in the History of Film and Media 8 April 2019

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/new-wave-british-cinema-1960s

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

Support the show

As music gets quiet, so too must listening. But what do the contexts and ideologies of quiet music and quieter listening mean? From different eras, and radically opposed musical traditions, Richard Wagner’s innovations in his theatre at Bayreuth (forcing his audience to sit in near-total darkness and silence) have striking similarities to theories and practices of listening developed by modernist and post-modernist composers, from Karlheinz Stockhausen to Pauline Oliveros and her Deep Listening Band. What’s happening to our listening bodies in these deep listening contexts?

A lecture by Tom Service, Gresham Professor of Music 25 March 2019

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/deep-listening-quiet-music

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk

Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

Understanding changing relationships between human and non-human animals is central to our world today.

This lecture starts by looking at early-modern understandings of the nature of ‘animal’ and ‘human’ life, before turning to the rise of ‘rights of animals’. It concludes by investigating late twentieth and early twenty-first century thought about evolution, the Great Apes, and liberationist and ecology movements.

A lecture by Joanna Bourke, Visiting Professor of History 21 March 2019

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/cruelty-to-animals

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk

Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

The Protestant Reformation set out to purge Christianity of error. But once you have started, how do you know when to stop? Some radicals tore up layer upon layer of tradition in the tireless search for deeper truths, proving their faith by their refusal to believe.

This lecture will track these radical quests and show how they could lead to positions like those of Baruch Spinoza or Thomas Hobbes: God may still exist but is almost wholly out of reach.

A lecture by Alec Ryrie, Gresham Professor of Divinity 4 April 2019

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/spiritual-quest-against-religion

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

Support the show

The English Aristocracy is often seen as a rural elite concentrating its patronage of art and architecture in the countryside.

This lecture questions this view and shows how, from the sixteenth century, aristocratic families deployed their collections and commissioned their buildings in both town and country in order to further their political and dynastic ambitions.

A lecture by Simon Thurley, Visiting Professor of the Built Environment 20 March 2019

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/art-power-english-aristocratic-house

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk

Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

At the time of writing, it appears that Britain will leave the European Union on 29th March at 11 pm British time, 12 midnight Continental time. How will Britain fare outside the European Union? And how will Brexit affect British politics? Will the Britain of 2020 become like the Britain of 1972, the year before we joined the European Community, precursor of the European Union - or has our 46 year membership of European institutions led to irreversible changes in our constitution and system of government?

A lecture by Vernon Bogdanor, Emeritus Professor of Law 13 March 2019

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/brexit-future-of-britain

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk

Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

The fourth lecture in this series considers Britain's unique cultural development and how the changing balance of power and wealth between the aristocracy and the monarchy from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century has fundamentally influenced today's national cultural landscape of art and architecture.

A lecture by Simon Thurley, Visiting Professor of the Built Environment 3 April 2019

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/crown-country-cultural-supremacy

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege

Support the show

Machine Learning has had several excitements over the years with machines that are modelled on the human brain. The invention of the perceptron and artificial neural networks were followed by intense scientific activity and excitement, then by disappointment at a number of unappreciated deficiencies. The latest craze are deep neural networks.

In this lecture, we will explore how deep learning works, what it can do and if neural networks are a modern miracle or yet another false dawn.

A lecture by Richard Harvey, IT Livery Company Professor of IT 19 March 2019

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/deep-learning

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk

Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greshamcollege

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/greshamcollege