Julia Marton-Lefèvre, environmentalist and academic, delivers the final lecture in the 2015 Our Changing World series. This lecture is also part of our Enlightenment Lecture series. In this lecture Julia Marton-Lefèvre will compare the profound changes that took place in the 18th century European Enlightenment, emphasizing reason rather than tradition, with the need for a new enlightenment to face the stark challenges posed by an unprecedented loss of biodiversity, a rapidly changing climate...

Professor Emilios Avgouleas, Chair in Banking Law, delivers the eighth lecture in the 2015 Our Changing World series, entitled From Speculative Finance to Sustainable Finance. In this lecture, Professor Avgouleas will discuss in a free thinking mode, a number of possible solutions to the seemingly intractable problem of how to turn speculative finance into sustainable investment. Recorded on 17 November 2015 at the University of Edinburgh's George Square Lecture Theatre.

Dr Meriwether Wilson, Lecturer in Marine Science and Policy, delivers the seventh lecture in the 2015 Our Changing World series, entitled "Ocean Futures: Balancing Blue Growth and Conservation". This talk explores how the concepts of 'blue capital', blue growth and ecosystem services, which are typically anthropocentric, can be viewed with a broader interpretation in which the diverse marine species resident in our global oceans can be fully taken into account as well. Recorded on 10 November...

Professor Peter Higgins, Personal Chair in Outdoor and Environmental Education, and Professor Charles Hopkins, UNESCO Chair of Education for Sustainable Development, deliver the sixth lecture in the 2015 Our Changing World series. By October 2015 world leaders will have adopted the new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that will guide global development until 2030. In implementing these SDGs, Learning for Sustainability (LfS), will play a key role. This lecture will reflect on global LfS...

Dr Andrew Kerr, Executive Director, Edinburgh Centre on Carbon Innovation, delivers the fifth lecture in the 2015 Our Changing World series. All countries face difficult choices when seeking to deliver clean, affordable and secure supplies of energy to their citizens. Recent years have seen extraordinary – disruptive – changes and innovation in many aspects of energy generation and use around the world (in markets, technologies, regulations, social acceptance, and geopolitics). This lecture...

Emeritus Professor Stephen Hillier delivers the fourth lecture in the 2015 Our Changing World series entitled, Fertility Futures in a Changing World. As total population increases fertility (number of children per woman) falls and expectations change, especially in more developed regions of the world. Medical, educational and societal norms encourage people to control how many children they have and when to have them. Options are opened by assisted reproductive technology based on in-vitro...

Professor David Robertson, Professor of Applied Logic, School of Informatics, delivers the second lecture in the 2015 Our Changing World series, entitled The Data Revolution in Global Healthcare. Over the next decade, data science will change dramatically the practice of healthcare and it’s basis in medicine. This lecture will give a view of what it might mean to combine medical drivers with global data opportunities. Recorded on 6 October 2015 at the University of Edinburgh's George Sqaure...

Professor Sethu Vijayakumar, Professor of Robotics, delivers the first lecture in the 2015 Our Changing World series, entitled Sharing Autonomy (and responsibility): The robots are ready, are you? Learning and self-adapting robots have finally arrived. This lecture will look at technological advances in robotics that have made this leap possible, and open a discussion on the trade-off between autonomy and control that we are willing to admit to reap maximal benefits. Recorded on 29 September...

Professor Sir John Beddington, Former Government Chief Scientific Adviser, and Edinburgh alumnus, delivers the Enlightenment Lecture entitled Legacies of the 20th Century and Challenges for the 21st. This lecture also forms part of the 2014 Our Changing World lecture series. Recorded 19 November 2014 at the University of Edinburgh's McEwan Hall.

Professor Mark Rounsevell, Professor of Rural Economy and Sustainability, delivers the eighth lecture in the 2014 Our Changing World series, entitled Climate Change: Where Are We Going? This lecture maps out the progression of climate change impact and adaptation studies with a focus on land-based sectors. It highlights that single-sector studies risk either over- or under-estimating the effects of climate change, and the capacity of society to cope and adapt to such changes. Recorded on 11...

Professor David Battisti delivers the seventh 2014 Our Changing World lecture, entitled Climate change and Global Food Security. This lecture is also a Carnegie Centenary Professorship public lecture. David Battisti is Professor of Atmospheric Sciences and Director of the Joint Institute for Study of the Atmosphere and Ocean at the University of Washington. This lecture explores the likely impact of climate change and volatility on food production and availability in the foreseeable future....

Professor Charlie Jeffery, Senior Vice Principal and Professor of Politics delivers the sixth 2014 Our Changing World lecture entitled Scotland - After the Referendum. This lecture explores the fallout of the referendum vote and asks 'what next?'. It looks at the challenges of the political timeline - with a UK election fast approaching - but also at the differing views of people in Scotland and England about how their nations' relationship should develop. Recorded on Tuesday 28 October at...

Dr Alice Street, Chancellor's Fellow in Social Anthropology delivers the fifth 2014 Our Changing World lecture entitled Rethinking Infrastructures for Global Health. This lecture was previously advertised as "Rethinking Infrastructure and Development: What We Can Learn From “Off-the Grid” Living". Recorded 21 October 2014 at the University of Edinburgh's Appleton Tower.

Professor Chris Speed, Chair of Design Informatics, presents the fourth lecture in the 2014 Our Changing World series, entitled "Dancing with Data". This talk speculates upon a future time in which objects will begin to interact with us in different ways. Such an enquiry is part of what is being described as an Internet of Things. The term, Internet of Things, refers to the technical and cultural shift that is anticipated as society moves to a ubiquitous form of computing in which every...

Michele Belot, Professor of Economics and Director of the Behavioural Laboratory at the University of Edinburgh (BLUE), presents the third lecture in the 2014 Our Changing World series, entitled "Behavioural Economics and Health Behaviours". The last century has seen a dramatic increase in "lifestyle" diseases, such as cardiovascular diseases, cancer and diabetes. The rapid change we have experienced in modern technologies and availability of food has led to substantial changes in our...

Professor David Newby, Director of the Edinburgh Clinical Research Facility, presents the second lecture in the 2014 Our Changing World series, entitled "Air Pollution and Heart Attacks". Air pollution is one of the leading causes of heart attacks and death world-wide. This is principally caused by nano-particles generated by the combustion of fossil fuels and vehicle engine emissions. Although the highest levels of air pollution are seen in developing countries, even modest levels of air...

The discovery and clinical application of antibiotics is one of the amazing human success stories of the 20th century. Many of the terrifying bacterial diseases have been kept in check and hundreds of millions of lives saved. However, our heavy use of these amazing molecules has come at the cost of selecting resistant strains so that treatment of infections can fail with the first and second line antibiotics chosen. This lecture will introduce antibiotic action and how the adaptability and...

Broadcaster and journalist Jon Snow examines the impact of digital technology, social websites and citizen journalism on the second-oldest profession. Recorded on Friday 19 November 2010 at the University of Edinburgh's McEwan Hall. Listen to podcast

Professor David Hume, Professor of Mammalian Functional Genomics, Director of The Roslin Institute and Research Director, Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies, University of Edinburgh, presents "The Genes in our Food". There are very few "natural foods" and if we relied on them as a sole source of nutrition, the current world human population would collapse. Almost everything that we eat is GM as a result of human intervention. Modern technologies have revolutionised the ways in which we...

Professor Michael Northcott, Professor in Ethics, presents "Fair Trade or Free Trade? Competing Moral Economies in a Changing World". In this lecture Professor Michael Northcott explains how the ideas and methods of Adam Smith and other political economists underwrite the global 'free trade' project. He contrasts these with the principles and practices of 'fair trade', and in particular the ethical emphasis in fair trade on transparency in producer-consumer relationships and on traceability...

Professor Sir Ian Wilmut, Professor Emeritus at the University of Edinburgh and Chairman of the Scottish Centre for Regenerative Medicine, presents "The Quest for New Therapies by Stem Cell Research". Research with stem cells can be expected to lead to new therapies in several different ways. It is now possible to take a few cells from the skin of a patient and simply by the introduction of four specific proteins give those cells the potential to form all of the different tissues of the body...

Dr Liz Grant, Deputy Director Global Health Academy, presents "Palliative Care: A Global Development Challenge". Palliative care is a global challenge that with enormous impact on us all, in economic and in human terms. This lecture is part of the University's "Our Changing World" public lecture series, which examines the global challenges facing society, and the role of academia in meeting these challenges: http://www.ed.ac.uk/about/edinburgh-global/academies/changing-world This lecture was...

Professor Lord Robert Winston delivers an Enlightenment Lecture entitled "Medicine, Ethics and Society". This lecture also forms part of this year's Our Changing World series. www.ed.ac.uk/news/2013/enlightenment-131013 Recorded on Monday 21 October at the University of Edinburgh's McEwan Hall.

Professor David Finnegan, Head of the Institute of Cell Biology, presents "The Human Genome: Everybody Has One". Despite the complexity of the human genome, we inherit about 3 billion precisely ordered units of information from each parent, it is now possible to determine individual genome sequences rapidly and at low cost. This lecture discusses the implications of this for us as individuals, and for society as a whole. This lecture is part of the University's "Our Changing World" public...