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BRLSI News: July - December 2009
Click here for latest BRLSI News
Ending the year with Dr Johnson
Tuesday December 15th:
The last BRLSI lecture of the year, and a reminder that while Darwin and Beyond has been the major focus of 2009, the 'regular' lecture programme has not only continued but flourished around it, accounting for two-thirds of the year's 150+ events. Tonight it was the turn of the Literature and Humanities Group, with Convenor Dr Robert Blackburn introducing Christine Rees (left), Research Fellow at the University of London, to speak on Samuel Johnson, That Great Cham of LIterature.
'Cham' turned out not to be a mis-spelling of 'Sham', but the title of the Sovereign of Tartary, and a contemporary allusion to Johnson's position as the Monarch of Literature. Johnson himself, meanwhile, turned out to be a surprisingly modern character, anti-racist and anti-sexist (if still fairly snobbish), with a distrust of rampant consumerism and a belief that language belonged to its speakers, and that dictionaries (including his own monumental work) should concentrate on description rather than prescription.
The lecture wasn't intended as a beginner's guide to Johnson; at one point Christine Rees apologised for explaining the plot of his novel Rasselas (published in 1759) 'for those who haven't read it for some time'. Such was Ms Rees' skill as a speaker, however, that even those whose only knowledge of Johnson was his dictionary and famous 'tired of London, tired of life' quote came away with a much broader sense of the man and his times, while those more familiar with him (the majority of the audience, from the long and erudite list of questions asked afterwards) had a hour packed with the fine detail and insight that can only come from a true scholar. It was, in short, a typical BRLSI event.
The BRLSI runs a programme of public lectures all year round (except August). For details of forthcoming events
see our What's On page.
Is evolution over? - it is now...
Friday December 11th: The BRLSI's year-long Darwin and Beyond programme began last December with 2008's Victor Suchar Christmas Lecture, Prof Brian Charlesworth FRS on the Causes of Evolution. Fittingly, it ended* with 2009's Suchar Lecture, as eminent geneticist, journalist andf TV presenter Prof Steve Jones (pictured right) of University College London, posed the rather apt question Is Evolution Over?
The biggest audience the BRLSI has ever seen (filling the Elwin room plus overspills in the Murch, Duncan and Lonsdale rooms) heard Prof Jones say that human evolution is, indeed, over - at least in the form that Darwin understood it, and our recent ancestors practised it.
After a primer on natural selection (white skin was selected, fairly recently, as a way of getting even a half-sufficient amount of vitamin D from sunlight at non-tropical latitudes), he described how modern human behavioural patterns, from relatively brief periods of parenthood to the invention of medicine and the bicycle, have conspired to negate three driving forces of evolution: mutation, selection, and (perhaps surprisingly) the survival of variation due to inbreeding in small populations.
With older dominant males (the most prolific suppliers of mutated genes) no longer topping the paternity tables, medical science and improved living conditions reducing infant mortaility (here at least) from nearly 50% in Darwin's time to less than 1% today, and people no longer obliged to find a partner in the same village (often with the same surname), newly-evolved characteristics are fewer, and even when advantageous don't get 'selected' by the death of others, and are getting lost in homogenised wide-area gene pools instead of taking root in local ones.
Along the way there were plenty of the Professor's trademark humorous observations (Darwin's cousin, Francis Galton, rated Australians just above dogs in a table of racial ability), and striking facts (17% of men in Galway still carry the Y chromosome of King Niall of the Nine Hostages). It's Prof Jones' particular skill to make quite complex science seem accessible while he's talking about it, and if some of the arguments didn't, perhaps, seem quite so straightforward once he'd finished, it didn't detract from what had undoubtedly been a stimulating and informative lecture. Most importantly, the audience loved it. It had been a fitting climax to an astonishingly successful year.
* Tonight wasn't quite the end of Darwin and Beyond, as the series will have two reprises in 2010, both from the Philosophy Group. On Tuesday 5th January the group will show the film Darwinian Reverie (in French with English subtitles) introduced by its maker, Olivier Pagini, and on Tuesday May 4th Dr Tim Lewens of Cambridge University will speak on Darwin and Philosophy, in a lecture postponed from last September.
Out of Africa - the evidence of human evolution
Friday November 27th: Prof Chris Stringer FRS (pictured above) of the Natural History Museum, London, took on the task of presenting the penultimate Science talk in the BRLSI's year-long Darwin and Beyond series. His topic, The Origin Of Our Species, formed a natural progression from the preceding talks by Dr Steve Dorus, on natural selection in apes and modern humans, and Dr Momna Hejmadi on cerebral evolution.
Charles Darwin addressed the subject of human evolution when he published The Descent of Man in 1871. Prof Stringer comprehensively addressed Darwin’s ideas on the subject, as well as those that were subsequently developed as fossils were discovered all over Africa, and the implications of later specimens such as The Hobbit from Asia and Neanderthals from Europe, the evidence all pointing to an out of Africa origin.
Professor Stringer considered the topic of human evolution in two stages. First was a pre-human phase in Africa more than 2 million years ago, during which time a bipedal stance had evolved, but otherwise very ape-like in body and brain. During a second, more recent human-like phase, brain size increased relative to body size, dietary range increased and greater complexity of behaviours are evident.
Professor Stringer went on to discuss how recent advances in science and technology have contributed to our understanding of this topic, especially the accurate dating of fossil materials. Advances in the analysis of genetic data are also of great importance, and this talk was particularly topical as the scientific community await the publication of the Neanderthal genome sequence.
- Vicky Hunt
A birthday cake for the Origin, and memories of Darwin's greatest friend
 Dr Tim Hooker (left) cuts a birthday cake marking the 150th anniversary of the publication of On The Origin Of Species. With him is Martin Sturge, BRLSI Darwin and Beyond Programme Manager. |
Tuesday November 24th: Today was the 150th anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin's On The Origin Of Species, and the BRLSI celebrated with a 150th birthday cake (with slightly fewer than 150 candles). Before that we were treated to an absorbing talk by BRLSI member and botanist Dr Tim Hooker, who spoke of his great-great grandfather Sir Joseph Hooker, Charles Darwin's greatest friend.
That Darwin and Hooker were, indeed, great friends is clear from the correspondence between them, which amounts to over 1,500 known pages plus the occasional new item, such as one found recently by Tim Hooker's father down the back (literally) of a sofa. What began as a mentoring relationship between Darwin, veteran of the Beagle, and the younger Hooker, himself about to embark on travels to Antarctica and India, matured into a friendship of equals as Hooker, now a botanist of international stature, succeeded his father as Director of Kew Gardens, and became Darwin's principal sounding-board during the development of his theory of evolution.
Tim Hooker read from many examples of their correspondence, including the famous "it's like confessing murder" letter in which Darwin first admitted that he thought species might be mutable after all. There was more personal communication too, as the men offered consolation to each other after the death of their young children. And there was humour - none more so than in Hooker's confession that his children had inadvertently used pages of Darwin's Origin manuscript as drawing paper.
Sir Joseph Hooker lived on until 1911, by which time he'd accumulated a staggering 203 degrees from universities around the world. His family were offered a burial in Westminster Abbey near his friend Darwin, but Hooker had already stated that he wished to be buried in his beloved Kew; they put a plaque in the Abbey instead. Tim Hooker's talk was a fascinating insight into the personalities of two of the 19th century's greatest scientific figures - and the cake was very good too!
North and South at BRLSI
Saturday 21st November: Most BRLSI lectures are on weekday evenings, but we do have the occasional Saturday afternoon event. Today's was the first of what will hopefully become a regular collaboration with the Gaskell Society, as Dr Gillian Ballinger of the University of the West of England came to speak on North and South and the Condition of England Novel.
Dr Ballinger spoke of turbulent times in 19-century England, the explosive growth of Manchester's population (40% between 1821-31) and the effect that seeing its living and working conditions (average age at death was 17) had on Elizabeth Gaskell. Accused of class betrayal by reviewers of her novel Mary Barton, and pushed by her publisher (one Charles Dickens) to cram North and South into weekly instalments (she managed to negotiate an extra two weeks, but complained that the ending still had to be rushed), she nevertheless produced a milestone in social commentary.
Dr Ballinger's commentary was much appreciated by a good-sized audience who'd braved some very wet and blustery weather to be there. For details of more Saturday afternoon lectures (including more co-events with the Gaskell Society), keep an eye on our What's On page. Advance notice - another joint event is being held on April 20th 2010, this time with Bath Shakespeare Society, to celebrate Shakespeare's birthday.
Remembrance at Bath Poetry Café
Poets at Bath Poetry Café’s evening of poems on the theme of Remembrance
Judith Young writes:
Wednesday November 18th: The Duncan Room was filled for Bath Poetry Café’s themed evening of poetry on the subject of Remembrance. Twenty poets, from as far afield as Taunton, Glastonbury, Colerne, Stroud, Devizes, and Bristol, each read one of their poems. Between groups of poems there were excerpts from Gorecki’s Symphony No 3, Op. 36 (Symphony of sorrowful songs).
Remembrance, expressed in these different voices, showed widely different subjects, from feelings about war and disasters to very individual experiences and memories. There were poems containing stories passed down through families, such as the very young WW1 soldier in France who was sure his life was saved when a shell missed him as he searched for his glasses, which had fallen off into the mud. One poem was inspired by a coat hanger bearing the service number of a lost brother. A poet remembered being a school-girl picking apples in Kent, watching the Battle of Britain being fought in the sky above. In a house in France called Remember an old woman chops vegetables with a rat a tat tat sound, though no one else now remembers why the house carries that name.
Another poem honours a friend who went to the help of the injured on 9/11, and was himself killed. There are memories of a father returned from a prison camp in the Far East, suffering from nightmares, reluctant (like others returning home in these poems) to speak of his experiences. Poems recalled Belsen, the floating bodies of nurses killed when the troop ship that was carrying them was torpedoed, those who died in the flu epidemic after returning from WW1, those who are returning in coffins from the Middle East today, those who survived but whose lives were changed by loss, the displaced, the many we should not forget..
Readers included a number who have not read in the Café before. All the poems, though so various, were impressive and moving. The evening began with a reading of Wilfred Owen’s poem Futility, and ended with A Lament, by Wilfred Wilson Gibson, followed by a minute’s silence. Remembrance Café was arranged by Frances Anne King, Caroline Heaton and Tracey Wall.
How our brains evolved
Wednesday 18th November: Charles Darwin proposed that the human brain was subject to natural selection, and that it shared a common ancestry with other animals. Today we know a lot more about how the human brain developed, and in an extra Darwin and Beyond event Dr Momna Hedjmadi (above), lecturer in biology at the University of Bath, addressed the BRSLI audience on the subject of Cerebral Evolution, including the question of whether it's the evolution of a multi-layered brain cortex that makes us the humans we are today, capable of language and higher intelligence.
Whilst the adult human brain weighs roughly 2% of our overall body weight, around 20% of our energy is required to power it. Throughout the talk, diagrams of the brain structure, along with the neurons and glial cells also found in nervous tissue, clearly demonstrated the complex composition of the brain. This was further highlighted by the fact that there are a quadrillion (1015) synapses found in the human brain!
Despite sharing common neural functions with other groups, it is only mammals which have developed a multi-layered cortex. This, and specifically the development of the neocortex, a part of the brain which is especially evident in higher primates, scientists believe to be responsible for the increased intelligence we associate with human beings. Uniquely, humans have evolved a complex language consisting of symbols, rather than the signals used by other primates to, for example, signal the presence of land or aerial predators.
Dr Hejmadi used the Stroop test - a series of colours spelt out in lettering differing in colour to that portrayed by the word - to demonstrate how our brains are able to handle mixed and somewhat complex messages, and presented evidence from across the field of neurobiology to substantiate what distinguishes and characterises our brain as humans. Overall, a fascinating talk on the evolution of the brain, and a clear demonstration of which of its features are associated with the evolution of the characteristics we infer as making us uniquely human.
- Vicky Hunt
First meeting for newly-elected BRLSI Trustees
The BRLSI's Board of Trustees meeting under the Lonsdale Room Plesiosaur.
Clockwise from bottom left: Liz Vincent, Richard Guthrie, Betty Suchar (Vice-Chair, obscured),
John Garrett (Secretary), Julian Vincent (Chair), Rodney Tye (attending for Finance Sub-Committee),
Don Cameron, David Giles, Evelyn Lewis, Paul Stephens, Marie-Louise Luxemburg. (Pic: Martin Sturge)
 Vice-Chair of Trustees Betty Suchar (obscured in main photo) |
Thursday 19th November: The BRLSI's Board of Trustees met for the first time since October's AGM and the election of three first-time Trustees. Two meetings were, in fact, held - the AGM of the Charity (which agreed the accounts) and the regular quarterly meeting of the Board. Items approved included an increase in the BRLSI's publicity budget for a trial period, and the acquisition of a (strictly controlled) company credit card to facilitate purchases from the increasing number of suppliers who are not geared up for accepting cheques.
All eight elected Trustees attended the meeting, plus one of the nine nominated members (Bath University nominee Prof Julian Vincent, Chair of Trustees). A representative of Bath Spa University attended as an observer with a view to possibly joining the Board. Two BRLSI members (Geoff Catchpole and Martin Sturge) also attended as observers.
The Board of Trustees meets four times per year, and the next meeting is on Thursday 18th February 2010 at 7.15pm. All BRLSI members are welcome to attend as observers (please bring your membership card). Agendas and minutes (once approved and signed at the next meeting) are posted in the members area of this website.
Transition Bath make a day of it with the Big Event at BRLSI
Martin Sturge writes:
November 14th: Motivated by the twin challenges of peak-oil and climate-change, Transition Bath is part of a nationwide movement to help cities and towns to less dependence on the world economy and more reliance on local produce and enterprise - the local economy.
Their all-day multifacetted Big Event staged a tight rolling programme of well attended presentations in four of our rooms, whilst the Duncan Room provided children's activities, with non-stop refreshments and delicious snacks, all locally produced, which also were enjoyed by Institution Saturday morning regulars.
Subjects included The Water Challenge, How to Inspire Change, Garden Share and Community Orchard, Energy and CO2, Compacting - Buy Less:Live More, and The Vital Role of Entrepreneurs. The opening lecture, by Patrick Whitefield, was on Permaculture, and echoed an important lecture by Professor Amir Kassan of the University of Reading, in the BRLSI World Affairs programme, on 'Save Our Soils'. The event was initiated and overseen by Jenny Mackewn (right), a Trustee of Transition Bath, and was informative, very enjoyable, and attended by all ages. The general atmosphere of relaxed enthusiasm was complemented by Duncan Cameron’s compelling exhibition of Very Small Things in the ground floor Jenyns Room, which runs until 28th November. Take good specs!
One good deed leads to another for BRLSI speaker
BRLSI Darwin and Beyond Programme Manager Martin Sturge
(pictured right) recently did his bit for the Institution's Adopt-a-Book scheme by sponsoring the rebinding of a rare volume of Lady Anna Miller's Poetical Assemblies. Since then he's become so interested in the elusive 18th century Bath hostess that he's giving a lecture on her life and times at Bath University on Wednesday 18th November.
Lady Anna Miller (1741 - 1781) was well-known for holding "poetical assemblies" in Batheaston, inspired by her experiences in Italy and France. They were designed to offer refuge from the vulgarities of Bath Society, and quickly became a feature of the Bath Season, on one occasion attracting no less than four Duchesses. Her introduction of 'Bouts-Rimés', a poetic game, started a fashion that found favour in the homes of novelist Jane Austen and poet Christina Rossetti, and swept well beyond England.
The lecture, which runs from 5.15 - 6.15pm, is part of Bath University's GULP (General University Lecture Programme) series, and will be held in Lecture Theatre 8 West 1.1 ('8W 1.1') on the main campus at Claverton Down. Everyone is welcome, and admission is free.
Tapping into Severn tides
Tuesday November 10th: It's beginning to sink in that we really do have to find ways to generate electricity that don't depend on fossil fuels, and one obvious possibility is to tap into the tidal power of the Severn Estuary, which has the third largest tidal range (rise and fall) in the world. The government is running a feasibility study, and BRLSI's Transport and Built Environment Group managed to get James Colcome, Project Manager of the study, to come to Bath to give a presentation on the five short-listed options.
First Mr Colcombe gave some background details on tidal power, including the fact that there are two distinct types - range (which the Severn has) and stream (speed and volume of water flow), at which the Pentland Firth in Scotland is UK champion. Range systems depend on 'differential head' (height of water) across the generating turbines (basically the same as a hydro-electric dam system), and there are three ways of implementing them, with varying effects on generating times in relation to tides and water levels upstream of the barrage - and on silting and other environmental impacts.
Of the five contenders for the Severn, only three are barrages that cross the entire waterway; two (seen in the picture above) are lagoons along the side of the estuary, which don't affect the upstream river, but generate less electricity. Although Mr Colcombe was scrupulously even-handed in his comments, it looks as if the current front-runner is the Cardiff to Weston-super-Mare (actually Lavernock to Brean) barrage, whose 216 turbines would generate the most electricity (14% of our renewables target) at the lowest unit cost.
It's not a done deal yet though, and a long list of potential issues, from wildlife habitats to salinity affecting ship buoyancy, showed that the decision is unlikely to be a quick one. And one statistic showed that other considerations may yet apply - in a table of costs per Megawatt/hour of electricity, nuclear power came in at £38, against the cheapest tidal figure of £110. There's certainly more discussion to come.
Mouse Bones and Golden Beetles:
The Collector as Artist
at BRLSI
Back in February artist, collector and diver Duncan Cameron (pictured below) gave a lecture in the BRLSI's Darwin and Beyond season on Collecting as Art. Now he's back
with a collection of his art, for an exhibition running until Saturday 28th of November.
"The works assembled together in this show are the culmination of a series of pieces that explore themes of collection and loss," he told us. "I've collected natural history specimens since growing up as a child in Norfolk, and in these works items such as boards of found insects, pickled shrimps and test-tubes are collected together into boxes with painted details, intricate labels and field notes."
Each work responds to a particular time or place, and alongside the finished boxes and collage works, Duncan will also be showing work in progress and ideas that are still being developed.
"Themes of shipwreck and salvage meet cabinets and cages that might remind you of things seen in museums that feel familiar," he says, "yet on closer inspection they're perhaps strange, and I hope memorable. Corroded surfaces, mouse bones and golden beetles convey a powerful sense of time passing and of the inveitable life and death struggle in the world around us".
Following a very well-attended preview on Friday 6th November, the main exhibition will run from the 7th to the 28th November, 10am - 4pm excluding Sundays. Admission is free.
Copenhagen - another chance for climate control agreement
With the current Kyoto agreement on climate change lacking the support of some key nations (including the world's largest source of greenhouse gas emissions), all eyes are now on the Copenhagen Conference in December as the best chance to create a concerted effort to stabilise the world's climate.
On Thursday Nov 19th at 7.30pm Green Light on Bath presents a talk entitled Countdown to Copenhagen, with Eliot Whittington (pictured), Senior Advisor to Christian Aid's Climate Justice Initiative.
As with so many things, the poorest communities in the world are the most vulnerable to climate change. They tend to suffer first from its effects on agriculture, from flooding and from sea level changes, with hundreds of thousands of deaths a year already attributed to climate change. Eliot Whittington's role is to help get the best possible deal for poor people from the Copenhagen agreement, and on the 19th he'll consider what a fair agreement would look like.
Poets Remember at BRLSI
Sue Boyle writes:
On the evening of Wednesday 18th November (note - 7pm) there will be a very special Poetry Cafe in the Duncan Room at BRLSI. Twenty poets from the Bath Poetry Cafe will be reading their own poems on the theme of Remembrance. Passages from Gorecki's Symphony of Sorrowful Songs will act as preludes and interludes in the readings and there will be a one minute silence at the readings' end.
This Cafe has been organised by three founder members of the Bath Poetry Cafe – Caroline Heaton, Frances-Anne King and Tracy Wall – and we are all especially pleased that so many Cafe poets will be taking part. As well as many of the Cafe's regular poets, we are delighted to be welcoming new readers John Terry, Bill Beck, Alana Farrell, Gary Rowland and Peter Charters. We are also very pleased that poets are now coming from so far afield to read at the Bath Poetry Cafe. This month, as well as our Bath poets, we have readers from Bristol, Stroud, Colerne, Taunton, Devizes, Glastonbury and Frome. Bath Poetry Cafe is supported by Arts Council England.
Click here to download the programme for this event as a PDF file.
Three new Trustees elected at BRLSI AGM
 Vice-chair of Trustees Betty Suchar giving the annual report at the BRLSI's AGM |
October 21st: The BRLSI held its Annual General Meeting, chaired by Betty Suchar, Vice-Chair of Trustees. With no great issues to be debated or major decisions to be taken it was a relatively quiet affair, with a moderate-sized audience hearing that things are, indeed, running smoothly.
With the Chair of Trustees, Prof Julian Vincent, unavoidably occupied overseas, Betty Suchar read the annual report. This mentioned, among others, the great success of the Darwin and Beyond Programme (including the Darwin's Fishes exhibition) and progress in areas such the website and the creation of the new reception area. Finance committee Chair Sue Criddle reported that, despite the harsh economic climate, the Institution's position had remained strong, with a remarkable recovery in the value of its investments since Spring.
Special mention was given to the second Worldwide Mechanics Institutes Conference, held at the end of September, which had been a huge success and reminded everyone that the BRLSI is part of a worldwide movement of Institutes, Athenaeums and Independent Libraries. Members were invited to raise their own items from the floor, and a discussion took place on the best way to commemorate Don Lovell, the long-standing and much-admired BRLSI member who died earlier this year.
Members were then shown a video of the Mechanics Institutes conference (click here to view it online) before the announcement of the results of the election for four seats on the Board of Trustees, which had been conducted by postal ballot and voting earlier that evening. The sole current Trustee standing, Don Cameron, was re-elected, along with three new Trustees: Richard Guthrie, Paul Stephens and Elizabeth Vincent. Betty Suchar congratulated them all, and then it was close of business until October 2010.
At home with Darwin
Christoper Robbie as Charles Darwin in Sean Street's play The Wildlife of a Gentle Man
October 17th: The BRLSI's Darwin and Beyond programme presented its second live theatre event of the year, as Christopher Robbie played Charles Darwin in his acclaimed one-man show The Wildlife of a Gentle Man.
Darwin was, by all accounts, an easy-going, sociable character, and this is how Robbie portrayed him - a jovial grandfather at home in his study at Down House, looking back over a life and career that included one of history's greatest scientific discoveries, but also a fair share of love lost (and found), chance opportunities, friendships made (and sometimes foundered), domestic contentment and tragic bereavement.
For seasoned Darwin and Beyond-goers this was familiar territory, but with the new twist of hearing it as if from the man himself, while for those less acquainted with Darwin's life it put the momentous science in the context of an initially slightly aimless (though highly privileged) young gentleman who was invited on a voyage because he'd be good company for the captain, and ended up shaking the world's belief systems to their foundations as a result.
Sean Street's script skillfully intertwined Darwin's personal experiences with his growing awareness that the true origins of the species he encoutered on his travels might not be those described in the story of creation, with an anecdote about his shock at seeing the 'savages' of Tierra del Fuego later underpinning his most shocking conclusion of all, that humans are just another mutable species on the same tree of life as other creatures. This was, generally speaking, the orthodox version of Darwin's life and work, for example concurring with Dr John van Whye's view that the 20 year delay in publishing the Origin of Species was caused by overwork rather than fear of a religious backlash, and not with Roy Davies' that Darwin stole Alfred Wallace's correct interpretation of the evolutionary process.
Christopher Robbie's performance was nothing less than a tour de force; alone on stage for over 90 minutes (plus an interval) he held the audience in rapt attention as "Darwin" recounted the loss of his first love Fanny Owen (he neglected to ask her to wait for him while he went off on the Beagle, so she didn't), the joy of finding love with his cousin Emma, the urging of his friends Lyall and Hooker to publish before Wallace did, the heartbreaking loss of his daughter Annie at just 10 years old. It had, indeed, felt like an encounter with history.
Poetry Cafe Update
Sue Boyle writes:
On Wednesday 7th October, the Bath Poetry Cafe met in the Duncan Room for their Discussion Cafe on 'Poetry and Politics'. chaired by Caroline Kay, Chief Executive of the Bath Preservation Trust. Ten poets presented a wide range of work with political themes and discussed issues arising from their poems with the thirty strong audience. As well as the contributions from regular Cafe poets, we were very pleased to have first readings from Alana Farrell, Jonathan Hope and Sheila Simmons.
The next Poetry Cafe takes place on Wednesday 18th November and will focus on poems of Remembrance. Caroline Heaton, Frances-Anne KIng and Tracy Wall are organising this Cafe and will be very pleased to hear from any poets who would like to submit original work on themes associated with war – the memory, the loss, the sorrow, the pity and the tragedy. Meanwhile, the BRLSI Poetry Workshop held in the Murch Room on the first Wednesday of every month is flourishing with all available 2009 places fully booked. Please contact the workshop organiser Sue Boyle via admin@brlsi.org if you would like to go on the waiting list.
Ellsewhere in Bath, Forward Best Collection prizewinner Don Paterson will be reading at Toppings in the Paragon on 30th October and Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy will be reading at St Mary's Church Bathwick on 24th February. All Cafe poets and audience members are warmly invited to attend.
Did Darwin do it?
October 6th: One of the great mysteries of Darwinian scholarship is why Charles Darwin waited 20 years after his voyage on the Beagle before publishing the Origin of Species. Back in July, in his lecture Darwin's Secret, Dr John van Wyhe gave a disarmingly simple explanation; Darwin was busy doing other things. In tonight's Bath Natural History Society lecture, entitled The Darwin Conspiracy, author and TV producer Roy Davies (pictured above) presented an altogether darker reason; Darwin only wrote the Origin after stealing its central ideas from Alfred Wallace a year earlier, and deliberately covering his tracks.
Mr Davies' main argument was that Darwin got it wrong about evolution for most of the 20 year period, believing that species only evolved after sea-borne migration to new environments. Mounting scientific evidence to the contrary (much of it from Wallace, a professional collector who travelled to South America and Indonesia) made Darwin increasingly uncertain - and reluctant to publish - until suddenly, in 1857-8, he 'discovered' the ideas of survival of the fittest and in situ evolution, and quickly wrote them into the Origin, published in 1859.
It's no secret that Wallace wrote to Darwin outlining his ideas; Darwin himself acknowledged it, commenting that it was remarkable that they had independently reached the same conclusions. Mr Davies, however, produced research showing that Wallace's letters may have reached Darwin a little earlier than Darwin later claimed. During one such period in 1858 Darwin filled 66 pages of his notebook with evolutionary theories which he'd never mentioned before, but which corresponded exactly with Wallace's.
As Mr Davies said, this isn't a popular theory to hold about one of science's most revered figures, and despite an impressive record in TV (including seven years as editor of the BBC's Timewatch series) he's been unable to persuade any broadcaster to take it up. He remains convinced nevertheless, and stood firm in the face of some vigorous questioning from the Elwin room audience. He's also written a book on the subject, which you can order, or download for free, from here. Decide for yourself!
The BRLSI John Wood Architectural Lecture 2009:
Balancing priorities in Bath
Bath is a World Heritage City admired internationally for its architectural beauty. This reputation requires careful attention to be paid to changes that might affect its character - a difficult job in the face of economic pressures, green issues and Bath’s dependence on tourism for many jobs.
The man in B&NES Council responsible for this balancing act is David Trigwell, Director of Planning and Transport, and this year he’ll be delivering the BRLSI John Wood Architectural Lecture, entitled Balancing Priorities in Bath, on Tuesday October 13th at 7:30pm. Whether you favour growth and development, or you put preservation as your top priority, this should be a revealing and interesting lecture with time for discussion and questions afterwards.
Victor Suchar started the John Wood Architectural Lectures, which have seen a series of internationally renowned architects and landscape designers speak. This year’s lecture lecture will be the first on town planning, and was organised by the BRLSI Transport and Built Environment Group.
The Second Mechanics Institutes Worldwide International Conference held at BRLSI
Friday 24th - Monday 28th September: The BRLSI hosted the second Mechanics Institutes Worldwide International Conference, with delegates from Australia, the USA, the UK and elsewhere representing Athenaeums, Independent Libraries, Mechanics Institutes and other bodies. The conference followed the first event held in Melbourne, Australia in 2004, with this year's theme "Self Help", to mark the 150th anniversary of the publication of the hugely popular self-improvement book of that name by Samuel Smiles.
Delegates heard papers on subjects ranging from Samuel Smiles in Leeds to The Second Wave and Self-Help: The Schools of Arts of the Suburbs and the Rural Towns of New South Wales, with a good helping of Bath-related topics including the lives of the Herschel family and Isaac Pitman. Other events included a civic reception at the Roman Baths and a lunch attended by Lady Gass, Lord Lieutenant of Somerset. The UK's Association of Independent Libraries (AIL) also held its Annual General Meeting as part of the conference on Saturday. The conference's organisation was led by BRLSI members Bob Draper and Dr Peter Ford, with help from a team of BRLSI volunteers.
For a full lllustrated conference diary, visit our Mechanics Institutes Worldwide mini-site.
New - watch the video of the conference.
September 29th - your chance to quiz the Trustee Election Candidates
Pictured right is Simon Tyler, the BRLSI's Election Manager, holding the clock he'll be using to time candidates' speeches and members' questions at the BRLSI Trustee Election Hustings meeting at 7.30pm on Tuesday September 29th.
BRLSI Trustees are elected for three-year terms, with a third of seats coming up for election each year. Four places are available this year, and there are five candidates standing. Each candidate gets 10 minutes to speak at the Hustings, with a further five minutes for questions from the audience (candidates aren't allowed to question each other). Simon Tyler is ultra-strict on the timings, in order to be fair to everyone.
The actual election will take place at the BRLSI's AGM on October 21st, athough members also have until October 16th to vote by post. Either way, you can only vote using the official ballot paper (which has statements by the candidates on the back) - these were sent out to members a few weeks ago, so if you haven't received yours, contact the BRLSI office (01225 312084) staight away.
The BRLSI is a registered educational charity, and its Trustees (some elected, others appointed by bodies including B&NES and Bath's universities) are ultimately responsible for its conduct, and have ultimate control over everything it does. The five candidates standing are:
Don Cameron
Richard Guthrie
Paul Stephens
Martin Sturge
Elizabeth Vincent
Entry to the Hustings and AGM is limited to BRLSI members only - please bring your membership card.
The Red Queen and resistant males
Friday September 11th: Back in April Prof Laurence Hurst
of Bath University gave a Darwin and Beyond lecture on The Importance of Genetics In the Understanding of Evolution. Tonight it was the turn of his brother, Prof Greg Hurst of Liverpool University (right), with Tales of the Red Queen—Why Parasites Can Be Particularly Important Drivers of Evolution, which told how the genetic makeup of a species can evolve very quickly indeed when faced with a sufficiently dire threat.
The Red Queen of the title was the character in Alice in Wonderland who organised a race in which it was necessary to run hard just to stay in the same spot. As Prof Hurst explained, parasites and their hosts are engaged in a similar race around an endless cycle in which the parasite gains ascendancy and starts to kill its host, then the host evolves a defence mechanism that starts to thwart the parasite. It's no sideshow, either - 50 percent of evolution is thought to be parasite driven, and much apparently random behaviour, such as the preference of female birds for males with bright plumage or long tails, is driven by a perception that such characteristics indicate a healthy resistance to parasites.
Prof Hurst's specialisation is a species that's shown lightning-fast evolutionary response to a particularly lethal (if you're male, at least) microbe. The Blue Moon butterfly of Samoa was attacked by a parasite that killed almost all males, with the result that the ratio of females to males hit 100:1. When a male evolved a gene that protected it, the ratio recovered to near 50:50 in less than five years, as anti-parasite resistance spread to successive generations by natural selection, exactly as Darwin would have predicted. Prof Hurst and his team are now busy in the South Seas and elsewhere, using 'Waking the Dead' techniques to examine the genetic makeup of butterflies from various stages in the process, in order to learn more about how resistance evolved and spread. One day it could be us, rather than butterflies, who benefit from that knowledge.
Haunting visions launch BRLSI's autumn lunchtime poetry season
The BRLSI's Uni-verse lunchtime poetry programme starts its autumn season on Wednesday 9th September with readings of works by Georg Trakl, the Austrian poet who died, aged just 27, in 1914.
Born in Salzburg, Trakl trained as a pharmacist and served in the Austrian army, but also wrote poetry from the age of 13. His poems reflect his sensitive and introspective nature, as well as the horrors he encountered as an army medic, which eventually drove him to suicide. Trakl's patrons included the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, who said said that his poems had "the tone of true genius."
The reader on September 9th will be Duncan Tweedale. A poet himself, Duncan has translated over 100 of Georg Trakl's poems, and will be reading some of his own translations as well as those by others. Uni-verse sessions run from 12.30pm until 2.00pm; soft drinks are provided, and you're welcome to bring your own sandwiches. Entrance costs £4, or £2 for BRLSI members and students.
• The Uni-verse programme continues through the autumn and into the new year, meeting on the second Wednesday of each month. On October 14th Uni-verse organiser Nikki Bennett presents Trans-Siberian Train Travels and Mongolian Poetry, and on 11th November there's Chinese poetry read by Yu Yan Chan and Caroline Heaton. Full details are on the Uni-verse web page - click here to visit it.
Low Carbon Cars? It depends on the source.
Thursday September 3rd: The BRLSI's autumn lecture season got off to a fine start as a good-sized audience braved a blustery September lunchtime to hear Colin Axon, Deputy Director of Oxford University's James Martin Foundation for Carbon and Energy Reduction in Transport, speak on Low Carbon Cars - Fact, Fiction or Folly?
Mr Axon's theme was that building electric and hydrogen-powered cars won't solve the problem of climate change if the electricity and hydrogen they use is still produced in carbon-emitting plants such as coal-fired power stations. As he succinctly put it, 'the source is everything', and we're still dragging our feet in converting from old and relatively easy (but dirty) sources to genuinely clean ones such as wind and wave power.
Things will have to change though, as some fairly terrifying climate change predictions, which included the remote but nevertheless real possibility of a life-extinguishing 20 degree rise in UK temperatures by 2080, demonstrated (as Mr Axon pointed out, even the much more likely rise of 6 - 8 degrees is bad enough). Meanwhile we'll have to break our dependence on oil, because we're using it up - 90 percent of all the oil used in human history has been used since 1958, and 'peak oil' - the point at which reserves and production start declining - could come as early as 2012. Using less energy would help, but with total passenger/light goods vehicle mileage reaching 500 billion km/year in Britain alone, and the (energy-sapping) weight of the average car 14% higher than in 1995, we don't seem to be heading in the right direction there either.
Like all energy/climate change presentations, this one didn't offer any instant, or even definitive, solutions (if they existed, we wouldn't need the presentations). In Colin Axon's view any effective solution will have to include an element of legislation, which is sometimes the only way to change old habits (as it has done, for example, in preventing us from burying highly recyclable tyres in landfill). Tough choices will have to be made, but the alternatives are even tougher.
• BRLSI lunchtime talks, organised by Geoff Catchpole, continue through the autumn - check our What's On page for details.
Easterling arrives a day early
Angela Easterling's lecture to introduce her BRLSI exhibition Shape Shifters has been brought forward a day, from Tuesday 15th September to Monday 14th September at 7.30pm. In the lecture, which is part of the BRLSI's Passions in Botany series, Angela will explain how she uses the camera-free photogram process to create to create striking images of plant life. The Shape Shifters exhibition, combining Angela's images from the Eden Project in Cornwall with material from the BRLSI Collection, runs from Saturday 19th September to Saturday 31st October (except Sundays) 10am to 4pm.
Meanwhile Dr Tim Lewens' lecture Darwin and Philosophy, due to take place on Friday September 1st, has been postponed due to family reasons. We hope to reschedule it later in the year - watch this page and our Darwin and Beyond mini-site for details.
The Simple Truth about Darwin's Delay
Click on the image above to see a video extract from Dr John van Wyhe's lecture
July 24th: In these headline-driven days it takes a certain bravery to say that a controversial story isn't really controversial at all, but that's what Dr John van Wyhe (above), Director of Cambridge University's Darwin Online project, did in his lecture Darwin's Secret, which rounded off the first half of the BRLSI's year-long Darwin and Beyond programme.
Dr van Wyhe subtitled his lecture Was the Theory of Evolution really held back for 20 years?. His answer was "Yes, but not for the reasons everyone seems to think". Charles Darwin began formulating his ideas on evolution around 1839, but waited until 1859 to publish On the Origin of Species. Today's conventional wisdom is that it took him that long to summon up the courage to go public, in the face of what would undoubtedly be fierce (and perhaps even life-threatening) opposition to an idea that wrote God out of the story of creation. Dr van Wyhe, however, had a much simpler explanation.
First, he set about demolishing the idea that Darwin kept his theory of Evolution secret during those 20 years, showing that, in fact, he wrote openly about it to family, friends and fellow scientists. Nor were the ideas of Evolution, and the Earth being more than a few thousand years old, quite as radical as some of today's commentators claim (a certain Prof Dawkins was singled out in this respect). Even Darwin's supposed references to fear of being murdered were't quite what they seemed - his correspondence shows that he was (perhaps surprisingly) given to a "the wife'll murder me for this" turn of phrase, and almost certainly didn't mean it literally.
So why did Darwin wait 20 years to publish what many consider the most important book of all time? Dr van Wyhe answered this in three short words - he was busy. From his return on the Beagle in 1836, Darwin was occupied first with the preparation of five volumes of the Zoology of the Beagle (including Fishes, sub-contracted to BRLSI member Leonard Jenyns), then the Geology of the Beagle (another three volumes) and over 20 shorter works. At one point he had the Origin penciled in for completion by 1856, but barnacles got in the way - Darwin, the world's leading authority on them, was persuaded to write the world's most complete reference on them, and it soaked up another three years.
Today we see the Origin as one of the great milestones in human understanding, published in a context of stifling religious conformity. Darwin, however, saw it as just another item on the monumental to-do list he brought back on the Beagle, in a scientific and social climate that was already changing, and which held few real fears for a gentleman scientist of independent means. With no publisher breathing down his neck, and no TV crews camped on hs lawn, he simply took his time.
Venice: The City Behind The Myth
July 22nd: Members of the Bath Poetry Cafe joined the BRLSI Poetry Group in the Duncan Room in a sequence of readings on the theme of "Venice: looking for the city behind the myth."
The audience of forty heard pieces which ranged from a fourteenth century description of the Venetian Arsenal by Dante Alighieri (read in the original Italian as well as in the recent version by Belfast poet Ciaran Carson) to works by English, American and Italian poets of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. All offered their different perspectives on the beautiful, doomed city which seems to have, in poetry at least, so many of the characteristics of a myth.
The reading of Robert Browning's A Toccata of Galuppi's by Paul Feldwick, accompanying himself on the BRLSI piano with a performance of Galuppi's Sonata Number 5 (see video link below), was one of the highlights of the evening, as was Richard Ingham's closing performance of lines by Victorian poet and traveller Arthur Hugh Clough which had become in rehearsal, a little irreverently, a piece for voices and guitar retitled Gondola Talking Blues.
Sue Boyle
• Click here to see a video of Paul Feldwick reading and playing A Toccata of Galuppi's (opens in new window).
Six days in August...
 Double Play by Stephen Webster (2008)
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From Monday August 3rd - and for six days only – there'll be an opportunity to see and buy work by Bath-based artist Stephen Webster (below) at the BRLSI. Born in Scotland in 1951, Stephen's attachment to the Bath area began in 1969, 
when he first studied at Corsham. After Leeds University and Chelsea School of Art he returned to Corsham in 1976 for a Fellowship in Painting, and has lived in or near Bath since then.
Stephen's paintings have an emotional and sensuous impact akin to music, his other great love. Royal Academician John Wragg has written that he ‘has a gift for colour which is nearly the equivalent of perfect pitch in music. His deep love of music can be seen weaving its way into his paintings, creating harmonies and discords and at times becoming almost symphonic.’
Stephen says that this will be a 'colourful, life-enhancing exhibition, giving the visitor the chance to enjoy a wide range of varied work and including some paintings from the 1970’s which have not been seen in public for thirty years.' The exhibition will be open from August 3rd to 8th, 10am to 6pm, and entrance is free. In the meantime to see more paintings, a full biography and more information visit www.stephenwebsterpaintings.co.uk.
A visitor from the past
 Photo: Simon Tyler |
July 25th: It's not often (at all) that a visitor to 16-18 Queen Square announces "I was the BRLSI", but Diana Hawkes (pictured left) did just that when she popped in during a visit to Bath from her home near Guildford.
Diana was joking, of course, but like all good jokes there was more than a grain of truth in it. From 1985-88, as Diana Smith, she was Curator of Bath Geology Museum, which, along with Bath Reference Library, occupied the BRLSI building (you can still see 'Museum' above the No. 18 entrance). In that role, and with a fair degree of personal intitiative, she helped to keep both the Collection and the flame of knowledge alive until the BRLSI itself came back to life in the early 1990s.
One of Diana's tasks was to engage with local shools, and she recalled being unexpectedly successful on one occasion. "I organised a field trip to a coal tip in Midsomer Norton, where there were lots of plant fossils', she told us, "I was expecting 25 children but we got around 100, so it was a bit fraught. One child slid down the tip and gashed his leg - unfortunately there was no first aid kit, but a parent cleaned him up and he was fine." It just wouldn't happen that way today.
• The story of how the BRLSI building became a Geology Museum began in 1940, when the Admiralty requisitioned it for war use. By the time they handed it back, in 1959, there was no BRLSI left to accept it, so the local council took it instead. For a full chronology of the BRLSI, starting in 1777, click here.
Members Exhibition put back to April
Exhibits at last year's BRLSI Members Exhibition. More
The BRLSI Members Exhibition, scheduled to open on 28th August, has sadly had to be cancelled. The absence of organiser Rex Valentine due to ill-health, and the unavailability of the Jenyns Room until August, when the BRLSI's other public activities are taking their summer break, contributed to the decision. Instead the 2010 Members Exhibition will take place in early April (date to be announced). If you've already submitted a work for August, please contact Jonathan Taylor on 01225 312084, or admin@brlsi.org.
A Day Out With BRLSI
16th July: BRLSI members and friends are seen here on a trip to Down House, Charles Darwin's family home in Kent, which is now managed by English Heritage. The trip was organised by Geoff Catchpole and was blessed with glorious sunny weather (unlike Bath, where it rained). An extremely good time was had by all. (Click here to see a larger version of the picture).
• Geoff tells us that the trip, which attracted 41 participants, was such a success that he's now considering others to interesting sites not commonly visited by tourists, but which might well be attractive to BRLSI members and friends. If you've got any suggestions, please let Geoff know via the BRLSI office. The trip also made a small profit, which has, of course, been donated to BRLSI funds. Keep an eye out here for news of future trips!
Bath University's Images of Research at BRLSI
July 15th: The University of Bath chose the BRLSI's Elwin Room as the venue for Images of Research, a photographic exhibition and competition which showcased the work of its researchers.
The event's main aims were to engage the public in academic research, particularly the breadth of research taking place at the University of Bath, and to give researchers and opportunity to communicate often complex research to non specialists. The certainly got the chance, with over 100 visitors attending including the Mayor of Bath, Cllr Colin Barrett, who spent over an hour in conversation with exhibitors.
The prize for Best Photorgaph went to Collapse of a dry stone retaining wall by Chris Mundell (Dept of Architecture and Civil Engineering), while Best Abstract was Ghostly clouds by Kerry Day (Dept of Electronic and Electrical Engineering). The Public Vote went to View from a mathematical discussion by Prof. Andreas Kyprianou (Dept of Mathematical Sciences) and the Exhibitors Vote went to Young Pakistani girls in their new school outside Karachi by Dr Kelly Teamey (Dept of Education).
This was the first event of its kind to be held by the University, and was judged a great success. Professor Jane Millar, Pro Vice Chancellor for Research, who judged and awarded the prizes said: 'This was an innovative way to highlight the wide range of research at the University. The photographs were beautiful and interesting and I also particularly enjoyed talking to the researchers, who described their research with eloquence, enthusiasm and clarity.' The most succinct accolade, however, was left in the visitor's book: "'Top stuff, I want to go back to school!".
Images of Research exhibition organisers Dr Jeanette Muller (left)
and Dr Tracey Stead with the Mayor of Bath, Cllr Colin Barrett.
BRLSI speaker elected to Academia Europaea
July 16th: Prof Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell FRS, who visited the BRLSI earlier this month, has been elected to the Academia Europaea, Europe’s prestigious Academy of Sciences, Humanities and Letters. This year's new members from the UK also include Prof Stephen Hawkin, Sir Tim Berners-Lee and Sir Martin Evans, as well as Prof Barry Potter, Head of Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Bath, whose work has included the development of a new class of anti-cancer drugs.
The Academia Europaea is a non-governmental academy with a membership of over 2000 scientists and scholars, including 42 Nobel Laureates. It aims to promote a wider appreciation of European scholarship and research, and plays an important role in influencing European science policy.
It's all in the genes
 Prof Chris Ponting of Oxford University shows a map of 10,000 bases (letters) from a strand of human DNA. Only the ones in white are different in chimpanzees. |
July 14th: These days we're constantly reading about scientists at the cutting edge of genetic research, a field which we're told is going to change the world. At the BRLSI you can meet some of those scientists in person, hear them talk about their work and ask them questions afterwards, something not many people outside the world's leading universities and research institutes get to do. Our case in point this week was Professor Chris Ponting of Oxford University, who came to speak on The HIdden Treasures of Genomes - Adventures in DNA Archaeology as part of the BRLSI's year-long Darwin and Beyond series.
Prof Ponting's speciality is the evolution of genes - how species have ended up with the genomes they have - and what contribution (if any) each part of the genome makes to the functionality of the organism. First though, he gave us some background on Darwin, who knew about inheritance but not genes, and who started out as a Lamarckian, believing that 
offspring could inherit characteristics acquired during their parents' lifetimes, before comprehensively disproving the idea in the Origin of Species. He also put the human species firmly in its place; far fewer active genes that originally thought (19,000 against 20,000 for a mouse), and residing, with the rest of the animal kingdom, on a branch of the tree of life between slime moulds and fungi.
Moving on, Prof Ponting made it clear that we're still learning about genes, and there's undoubtedly a lot left to discover. 90% of the human genome is now considered to be non-functional 'junk', while just 1% is known to code for proteins, leaving 9% as 'dark matter' whose function isn't clear. Those genes that do create proteins often create a lot of them - up to 30,000, in fact, with the same region of DNA re-read in different directions and sub-region combinations. Thanks to the sequencing of the genome of Monodelphis domestica (a short-tailed Opossum from Brazil) it's known that gene mutation tends not to occur at random locations within chromosomes, but is biased towards the ends. Some organisms are also more resistant to gene mutation than others, with repair mechanisms that can make them resilient even to radiation.
Very little, it seems, is as yet absolutely certain in the science of genes, and to prove it Prof Ponting questioned one of the basic genetic 'facts' that everyone knows, namely that we carry an identical set of chromosomes in (almost) every cell of our bodies. Is the DNA in a brain neurone really the same as that in your big toe? Prof Ponting thinks it probably isn't, but it'll be a while before we know for certain.
• There's plenty more to come on genetics in the second half of the Darwin and Beyond season, including The New Science of Evo Devo with Prof Peter Holland FRS (September 18th), and leading geneticist Professor Steve Jones posing the question Is Evolution Over? in the Victor Suchar lecture on December 11th. Everyone is welcome, and entrance costs just £4 on the door (£2 for students and BRLSI members). For full details, see our Darwin and Beyond Science Programme.
Poetry and song from NYC
 David Francis |
Wednesday 8th July: There was a small but select attendance at the Uni-verse International Poetry Series, as we welcomed David Francis with Utterance and Hum: The Difference Between Poem and Song’. David's poems covered lovers, mother and baby, multi-tasking, mobile phones and the social problems in New York City, among other topics. His songs included the ‘Anthem for Green England’. The discussion was around poetry v. prose v. song lyric and ‘the music of poetry'. One of his reviews says ‘David Francis lives in New York, yet his classy songs and impeccable pop instincts evoke memories of the best of British in the ‘60’s … but there is much more to this wise and slightly bemusing New Yorker'. At BRLSI we found him intriguing and beguiling, with a wealth of knowledge and wisdom for discussion.
Nikki Bennett
Convenor,
Uni-verse International Poetry Group
Mark Sayers writes: ‘I much enjoyed the session with David Francis and found it most stimulating, as well as that discussion on 'What is a poem?', which was fascinating. However, I know how saddened you were (and I) to see the poor turnout. This was obviously one that should have appealed to the student generation, let alone the American tourists etc. I was even inspired to write a Pantoum. Thank you for organising such an excellent occasion!’
Don Lovell remembered at the BRLSI
Sunday July 5th: Don Lovell, who died in June aged 86, was a key founder of the modern BRLSI. Family, friends and colleagues gathered in the Elwin Room for a celebration of his life.
Full Story
Eminent Astrophysicist pays a return visit to BRLSI
Friday 3rd July: BRLSI Herschel Astronomy Group Convenor Dick Phillips raises a glass with Prof Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell FRS after Prof Bell Burnell had introduced a showing of the TV programme A Northern Star, about her life and work as an astrophysicist. Prof Bell Burnell is the co-discoverer of the Pulsar, and the film covered her work at Cambridge which led to the discovery, as well as the controversy that erupted when the Nobel prize for the achievement was awarded solely to her supervisor. It was also a story of tremendous achievement in an era when women's participation in science wasn't so much opposed as simply not considered an option - a process that started when she was one of just three girls whose parents insisted that their daughters should study real science, rather than the domestic variety, at school.
A former Dean of Science at Bath University, Jocelyn Bell Burnell is no stranger to the BRLSI, having been involved in both Astronomy and Poetry events here in the past. Proving the point that the most eminent academics are often the most approachable, she joined the audience for drinks (and plenty of further questions) in the BRLSI's courtyard garden after the showing. As she pointed out, this wouldn't have been possible had the event taken place on its original date - that was in back in February, and had to be called off because of heavy snow. More..