The age of zero carbon is coming, but the question remains: will it be fast enough to mitigate the worst impacts of the climate crisis?  

While politics in Australia is still struggling to accept this much needed energy shift, there is cause for hope when we look to our fast-moving industry leaders, researchers and innovators. The pace at which things are changing is genuinely jaw-dropping. There is the plummeting cost of solar power, which has happened decades ahead of previous estimates; a similar trajectory now forecast in the wind power and battery storage fields; and the view of hydrogen on the horizon. And in all these things, investors are voting with their money. But is the hype getting ahead of the science and technology? What are the big-ticket items that could hasten a zero carbon future? What are the risks and rewards of this new age?  

Join passionate expert Emma Herd for a discussion with Sarah Dingle where they seek to answer these questions and more. 

Presented by the UNSW Centre for Ideas and UNSW Engineering, and supported by Inspiring Australia as a part of National Science Week.

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The age of zero carbon is coming, but the question remains: will it be fast enough to mitigate the worst impacts of the climate crisis?  

While politics in Australia is still struggling to accept this much needed energy shift, there is cause for hope when we look to our fast-moving industry leaders, researchers and innovators. The pace at which things are changing is genuinely jaw-dropping. There is the plummeting cost of solar power, which has happened decades ahead of previous estimates; a similar trajectory now forecast in the wind power and battery storage fields; and the view of hydrogen on the horizon. And in all these things, investors are voting with their money. But is the hype getting ahead of the science and technology? What are the big-ticket items that could hasten a zero carbon future? What are the risks and rewards of this new age?  

Join passionate expert former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull for a discussion with Sarah Dingle where they seek to answer these questions and more. 

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Presented by the UNSW Centre for Ideas and UNSW Engineering, and supported by Inspiring Australia as a part of National Science Week.

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Living Greatly in the Law: Law and Progressive Social Change 

Throughout his life and career, the late Professor Hal Wootten encouraged law students to think about “living greatly in the law”: living and working with a passion for justice, seeing the law in its social context and ensuring that the law serves those most in need. Hal understood that the law can create positive social change and encouraged lawyers to seek out opportunities “to give a little nudge that sends the law along the direction it ought to go”, which – in turn, he wrote – “can affect where the world goes”. 

In this lecture, Jen Robinson reflects on Hal’s legacy and the role of law in protecting human rights, addressing the climate crisis and contributing to progressive social change. Drawing on examples from her own practice and experience around the world, Jen will share her own journey, how she came to share and espouse Hal’s view about “living greatly in the law” and why it is more relevant now than ever before.

Presented by the UNSW Centre for Ideas and UNSW Law & Justice. 

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Are e-cigarettes the magic bullet? 

Whilst the vast majority of people, all around the world, know that smoking can be catastrophic for their health, cigarettes remain a powerful and enduring motif in popular culture. 

E-cigarettes have slipped quietly and quickly into the lives of many smokers, promoting themselves as a much healthier option to dirty old cigarettes. But are they the silver bullet they claim to be or is it more sinister than that? Where’s the research to back up the benefits? Are there any harms? Should we be worried about the increasing trend of young people taking up e-cigarettes? 

In this wide-ranging discussion, public health and behaviour experts Hayden McRobbie and Alys Havard discuss the merits of e-cigarettes and whether they are a legitimate tool to break addiction, or just a smoke screen. 

Presented by the UNSW Centre for Ideas and UNSW National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre (NDARC).

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How can we nurture innovation and creativity to rise to the challenges of the 21st century, and allow space for creative thinking? Hear from visionary teacher, education activist and play advocate Pasi Sahlberg with Sarah Dingle to discuss how they use creative problem solving to meet challenges in their life and work, and explore what creativity means to us all?

Internationally renowned author and Professor of Education Policy at UNSW Sydney, Pasi Sahlberg’s work looks at the importance of play in learning. 

Presented by the UNSW Centre for Ideas and the Faculty of Arts, Design & Architecture.

Artwork: Lynette Wallworth, Coral: Rekindling Venus, 2012

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How can we nurture innovation and creativity to rise to the challenges of the 21st century, and allow space for creative thinking? Hear from visionary author, poet, feminist and critic Jessie Tu with Sarah Dingle to discuss how they use creative problem solving to meet challenges in their life and work, and explore what creativity means to us all?

Jessie Tu’s debut novel A Lonely Girl is a Dangerous Thing won the 2021 ABIA award for Literary Fiction Book of the Year. 

Presented by the UNSW Centre for Ideas and the Faculty of Arts, Design & Architecture.

Artwork: Lynette Wallworth, Coral: Rekindling Venus, 2012

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How can we nurture innovation and creativity to rise to the challenges of the 21st century, and allow space for creative thinking? Hear from visionary artist and filmmaker Lynette Wallworth with Sarah Dingle to discuss how they use creative problem solving to meet challenges in their life and work, and explore what creativity means to us all?

Emmy award-winning Australian filmmaker Lynette Wallworth works on the cutting-edge of media technology. In 2016, Wallworth was named one of Foreign Policy magazine’s 100 Leading Global Thinkers. 

Presented by the UNSW Centre for Ideas and the Faculty of Arts, Design & Architecture.

Artwork: Lynette Wallworth, Coral: Rekindling Venus, 2012

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Nobel Prize winning psychologist and bestselling author of Thinking, Fast and Slow Daniel Kahneman, joins Ben Newell, Professor of Cognitive Psychology at UNSW Sydney, to discuss his work ahead of the release of his latest book. A psychologist whose work on the foundations of behavioural economics was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics, Daniel Kahneman has had an enormous impact on our understanding of how we think, and the process behind how and why we make good and bad decisions.  

In his new book, Noise: A Flaw in Human Judgement, Kahneman (with Olivier Sibony and Cass Sunstein) explores our susceptibility to ‘noise’ – the random factors and mental distractions that interfere with the judgement and decisions of organisations and individuals. Although we now try to acknowledge the impact of bias, ‘noise’ is even more common, but there is little awareness of it. Can we reduce both noise and bias to make better decisions?

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Capitalism is in crisis. Inequality is rising and climate change means we need to make drastic changes to the way we do business. The COVID-19 pandemic, too, has exposed numerous flaws in our current systems.  

But is capitalism dead, or can we re-imagine it in a way that will keep society prosperous, promote social justice and re-green our planet? 

As calls for radical change grow, French economist Philippe Aghion believes that we don’t need to throw the baby out with the bath water. He argues it’s possible to create a better capitalism by harnessing the power of creative destruction – the process by which new innovations continually emerge and render existing technologies obsolete. 

Listen to Philippe Aghion in conversation with UNSW economist Richard Holden as they discuss how the transformation of capitalism can achieve a more sustainable and inclusive prosperity, and how this might impact on politics and democracy.

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