Gresham College Lectures

Information plays a huge role in the modern world, with vast amounts of data literally at our finger tips. The Internet is leading to an ever-increasing amount of data, leading to the 'challenge of Big Data', in which we have to deal with huge amounts of data of direct relevance to people's lives. Without mathematics, we would be unable to store, transmit, interpret, process or understand any of this. The rise of Big Data is associated not only with major technological challenges, but also with significant ethical and privacy issues, and has major policy implications.

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/the-challenge-of-big-data

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 1,900 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
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Professor Joseph Silk FRS embarks on an illustrious journey through the universe to explain the paradigm shift in today’s scientific view on the physical expansion of space http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/the-expanding-universe

It was once inconceivable that the universe could be expanding. The static universe survived three thousand years of analysis and observation, to become enshrined as a cosmological solution to the equations of Einstein’s theory of general relativity. Only after three decades into the twentieth century did a paradigm shift occur. This was based on observational data, but it was to take decades before the recession of the galaxies was accepted as the conceptual proof of the physical expansion of space. I will recount how the recession of the galaxies was first discovered and eventually accepted as a physical model for the expansion of the universe.

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

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

Human-induced climate change has been identified by scientists and politicians as the greatest threat encountered by humanity. Deserts, oceans, forests, icecaps, shorelines and reefs all seem threatened, with catastrophic consequences for human life. The lecture will investigate the latest evidence about what is happening to the global climate, speculate on the environment that our children could face in 2100, and discuss some strategies that might be used to make a difference.

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/hotting-up-meeting-the-challenges-of-climate-change-in-the-twenty-first-century

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 1,900 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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The English Civil Wars of 1642-8 began as the last of Europe's wars of religion and ended as the first modern revolution. Parliamentarians had been fighting for the chance to finish England's Reformation, but the experience of war convinced some of them that thr mere reshaping of the establishment was not enough. To be true to their religious vision, something more searching and profound was needed. This restless spirit manifested itself in various sects and fellowships, united by a loathing of complacency and hypocrisy, which both supported and helped to undermine the republican experiment.

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/the-republic-of-king-jesus

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 1,900 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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From Leonardo da Vinci to the Brothers Grimm our fascination with hair has endured in art and science. We love it for its "body" or "volume", the fluffiness and elasticity that comes from its random waves and curls. But apart from a purely tactile response, can we take a more quantitative approach to hair, to explain these macroscopic properties in terms of the behaviour of individual hairs? We know that the important physics governing hair involves the interplay of its elasticity, weight, and curliness, but it is only recently that these have been synthesized into a mathematical theory. This talk will cover the mathematics involved, focusing on the important historical developments of elasticity theory due to Euler and Bernoulli and the determination of energy-minimizing shapes through the calculus of variations.

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/leonardo-rapunzel-and-the-mathematics-of-hair

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 1,900 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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Examples of disease as shown in artworks will be examined, from the medical and surgical point of view as well as the historical and artistic ones, particularly visual loss as portrayed by artists from pre-historic times. The special mystery in the story contained within Van Eyck’s The Virgin with The Canon (1436) will then be discussed, providing a fascinating religious, legal, medical and sociological explanation for the Canon’s blindness and contemporary attitudes towards it.

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/van-eycks-the-virgin-with-the-canon-visual-disability-and-societal-attitudes-as-depicted-in-the-northern-renaissance

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 1,900 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

Edward VII had an instinctive understanding of the human side of monarchy. Both at home and abroad, he sought to conciliate, and was known as Edward the Peacemaker. He helped to create the good feeling with France which prepared the way for the Entente Cordiale of 1904. At home he faced a constitutional crisis when the House of Lords rejected the budget in 1909. The crisis remained unresolved at Edward's death in 1910.

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/king-edward-vii

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 1,900 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

London at one time was the largest port and industrial city in the world. Bermondsey, Deptford, Blackwall and Greenwich were all major centres for shipbuilding. This lecture will look at the industrial river and consider the changing needs of shipping with the transition from sail to steam and its impact on London as a port.

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/from-sail-to-steam-londons-role-in-a-shipbuilding-revolution

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 1,900 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

In dialogue with Professor Alister McGrath, Lord Harries (Emeritus Gresham Professor of Divinity) will discuss his new book. Life is at once so wonderful and so appalling. We glimpse something of God in the beauty of the world, but then this seems to be contradicted by the evil and suffering. Drawing on the insights of the Christian faith how can we live with this contradiction?

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/the-beauty-and-the-horror-searching-for-god-in-a-suffering-world

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 1,900 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 heart beats continuously to sustain life. Its basic rhythm is well known, and has been used as a soundtrack to evoke romance, tension and horror. In this lecture, Professor Elliott will describe how the rhythm is generated. With the help of a percussionist (Nick Buxton of La Shark) and a dancer, he will demonstrate the evocation of those emotions, and what happens when the rhythm of the heart goes awry.

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/the-rhythm-of-life-the-beat-and-dance-of-the-heart

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 1,900 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