New technologies have always provoked panic about workers being replaced by machines.

In the past, such fears have been misplaced, and many economists maintain that they remain so today. Yet in A World Without Work, Daniel Susskind shows why this time really is different. Advances in artificial intelligence mean that all kinds of jobs are increasingly at risk.

Susskind will argue that machines no longer need to reason like us in order to outperform us. Increasingly, tasks that used to be beyond the capability of computers – from diagnosing illnesses to drafting legal contracts – are now within their reach. The threat of technological unemployment is real.

So how can we all thrive in a world with less work? Susskind will remind us that technological progress could bring about unprecedented prosperity, solving one of mankind’s oldest problems: making sure that everyone has enough to live on. The challenge will be to distribute this prosperity fairly, constrain the burgeoning power of Big Tech, and provide meaning in a world where work is no longer the centre of our lives.

This talk will be followed by a drinks reception, book sale and signing, all welcome.

Alice Kettle will discuss her works at the opening night of her exhibition at the Business School with Brandon Taylor, after which there will be a tour.

Our new exhibition showcases Alice Kettle’s unique practice; textile works which employ a combination of stitch techniques, bringing together the use of antique machines from early last century with hand stitch and contemporary digital technology.

Unleash your inner witch or wizard as you venture into H-ox-warts – a magical place filled with fantastic beasts, ingenious puzzles and creative workshops. Create lumos wands with some simple circuitry and elec-trickery, magic up some musical code, and dissect owl pellets. Alohomora – or unlock – the Exploration Zone, where our house elves are on-hand to help as you complete the challenges – listen to music through your teeth, turn temperature into colour, and play Guess What with dragon poo. If you dare, venture into the forbidden woodlands in search of the Quidditch pitch and elusive golden snitch… and don’t forget to accio – or summon – a free colour-changing cocktail at the bar!

A great science-themed evening for grown-up muggles and mudbloods everywhere. Wizarding outfits are encouraged. Held in celebration of Harry Potter Book Night on (7th February).

This term’s topic of the popular St Hilda’s ‘Brain and Mind – from concrete to abstract’ series of workshops is ‘Art and the Brain’.

Professor Chrystalina Antoniades (Oxford University), Dr Richard Jolley (University of Staffordshire), and Dr James Grant (Oxford University) will address this topic from the points of view of neuroscience, psychology and philosophy respectively.

There will be an interval with refreshments.

St Benet’s Hall marks a special exhibition of The Rule of St Benedict MS. Hatton 48, fols. 14v-15r at the Weston Library, with a series of lectures on aspects of the mediaeval Benedictine contribution to scholarship, libraries and spirituality.

The lecture programme takes place at the Weston Library, Broad Street, Oxford, OX1 3BG

14:30-15.30
Living the Rule of Saint Benedict in England, from the Middle Ages to the Reformation
Professor James Clark, Professor of History, University of Exeter

15.30-16.20
Benedictine Libraries in Medieval England: a Changing Perspective
Professor Richard Sharpe FBA, Hon. MRIA, Professor of Diplomatic, Wadham College, University of Oxford

16.30-17.20
The Rule as a Living Document
The Very Rev. Oswald McBride, OSB, Prior, St Benet’s Hall, University of Oxford

A drinks reception follows the final lecture, from 17:30 to 18:10.

Booking is essential, for each lecture.

Those attending the lectures are welcome to join Vespers at St Benet’s Hall, 38 St Giles, OX1 3LN at 6.30pm.

All the lab’s a stage, and nowhere more so than at the heats of FameLab Oxford 2020! Each contestant has just three minutes to explain a concept on science, mathematics or engineering without the use of Powerpoint – armed only with their wit and a few props. If you are interested in science and looking for a fun night out, this is for you! Previous FameLabbers have included astrophysicists, teachers, magician-turned-psychologist and a toga-wearing mathematician. As always, the 2020 heats will bring together the brave and the bold, the hilarious and awe-inspiring to charm and astonish you and battle each other for entry through to the FameLab Regional Final in March.

FameLab is an international competition to find the new voices of science and engineering. The regional final will take place at the Science Oxford Centre, Stansfeld Park, Headington on the 6th March 2020.

All the lab’s a stage, and nowhere more so than at the heats of FameLab Oxford 2020! Each contestant has just three minutes to explain a concept on science, mathematics or engineering without the use of Powerpoint – armed only with their wit and a few props. If you are interested in science and looking for a fun night out, this is for you! Previous FameLabbers have included astrophysicists, teachers, a magician-turned-psychologist and a toga-wearing mathematician. As always, the 2020 heats will bring together the brave and the bold, the hilarious and awe-inspiring to charm and astonish you and battle each other for entry through to the FameLab Regional Final in March.

FameLab is an international competition to find the new voices of science and engineering.
The regional final will take place at the Science Oxford Centre, Stansfeld Park, Headington on the 6th March 2020.

Sir Martin will review the theory and practice of genuine gender equality in the workforce, including personal experience of leadership challenges in implementing gender balance leadership.

Martin was appointed President of Boeing Europe and Managing Director of Boeing UK and Ireland in June 2019. He was permanent secretary at the Department for International Trade from 2016 to 2017, and before that he spent six years as permanent secretary at the Department for Business, Innovation & Skills.

Speaker: Dr Neil Armstrong (Stipendiary Lecturer in Social and Cultural Anthropology at Magdalen College)

This paper uses ethnographic material of NHS mental healthcare to raise some questions about autonomy, risk and personal and institutional responsibility.

My research investigates mental health. I am particularly interested in how the institutional setting shapes so much of mental healthcare. My research aims to find ways that we might improve healthcare institutions rather than just focussing on developing new healthcare interventions. I am also concerned with methodological questions: how anthropological work can be of clinical value, and how best to produce anthropological knowledge in an inclusive way.

‘Job insecurity at the end of the 20th century has given way to income insecurity at the start of the 21st.’ – Andy Haldane, July 2019

Join us for a stimulating morning of talks exploring the current challenges of income insecurity, with keynote speaker Andy Haldane, Chief Economist at the Bank of England. We will discuss labour market precarity, pay volatility and income insecurity issues in the UK and more widely, and their implications for the labour market and the structure of the social security system.

Programme:

Welcome and introduction by Charles Godfray, Director, Oxford Martin School
Keynote address: Andy Haldane, Chief Economist at the Bank of England
‘Pay volatility and income insecurity: what role for social security?’ by Jane Millar, Professor of Social Policy, University of Bath
‘Measuring economic insecurity: Why and How?’ by Matteo Richiardi, Professor of Economics and Director of EUROMOD, University of Essex, INET Associate
Panel discussion and Q&A: chaired by Brian Nolan, Professor of Social Policy at Oxford, with speakers and Fran Bennett, Senior Research and Teaching Fellow, Department of Social Policy and Intervention, University of Oxford
This event is free, but registration is essential to ensure your place.

You are welcome to bring lunch with you.

This series of talks is organised by the Oxford Martin School, Department of Social Policy and Intervention & Institute for New Economic Thinking, University of Oxford

Blackwell’s are delighted to announce that we will be joined by award-winning science writer and broadcaster, Marcus Chown, who will be talking about his new book, The Magicians:The Visionaries Who Demonstrated the Miraculous Predictive Power of Science.

How does it feel to know something about the universe that no one has ever known before? And why is mathematics so magically good at revealing nature’s secrets?

This is the story of the magicians: the scientists who predicted the existence of unknown planets, black holes, invisible force fields, ripples in the fabric of space– time, unsuspected subatomic particles, and even antimatter.

The journey from prediction to proof transports us from seats of learning in Paris and Cambridge to the war-torn Russian front, to bunkers beneath nuclear reactors, observatories in Berlin and California, and huge tunnels under the Swiss– French border. From electromagnetism to Einstein’s gravitational waves to the elusive neutrino, Marcus Chown takes us on a breathtaking, mind-altering tour of the major breakthroughs of modern physics and highlights science’s central mystery: its astonishing predictive power.

Marcus Chown is an award-winning science writer and broadcaster. Formerly a radio astronomer at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, he is now cosmology consultant for the New Scientist. He is the author of Solar System for iPad, which won a Bookseller Award for Digital Innovation. His acclaimed books include What a Wonderful World, Quantum Theory Cannot Hurt You, We Need to Talk about Kelvin and The Ascent of Gravity, which was a Sunday Times Science Book of the Year.

This is a free event, but please do register if you plan on attending. This event will be held in our Philosophy Department, which is accessible via a small flight of stairs. Seating is unallocated, so please arrive early if you would like a chair. For more information, please contact our Customer Service Department on 01865 333 623 or email events.oxford@blackwell.co.uk

Join us as we hear from Prof Martin Bureau (University of Oxford) about his research on Supermassive black holes.

‘Supermassive black holes are now known to lurk at the centre of most
galaxies. They are also believed to play a key role in the evolution
of galaxies, by regulating the supply of the gas necessary to form
stars. Here, I will present key results from the mm-Wave
Interferometric Survey of Dark Object Masses (WISDOM), a high
resolution survey of molecular gas in galaxy nuclei. I will first show
that carbon monoxide (CO) can be used to easily and accurately measure
the mass of these supermassive black holes. I will then discuss
substantial ongoing efforts to do this, and present many new
spectacular measurements from the Atacama Large
Millimeter/sub-millimeter Array (ALMA), the largest ground-based
telescope project. This effort opens the way to literally hundreds of
measurements across galaxies of all morphological types, both active
and non-active, with a unique method. It thus promises to
revolutionise our understanding of the co-evolution of galaxies and
black holes.’

FREE entry

Drinks and snacks provided. (Non-alcoholic and vegetarian/vegan dietary requirements provided for. For other diets please get in touch in advance)

For more information email emil.ostergaard@stcatz.ox.ac.uk. There is wheelchair access. There is padded seating, and an accessible toilet. There is blue badge parking by request at the event.

Elevating science from the lab to the stage, we bring you the FameLab Regional Final. Our brave and brilliant finalists tread the boards to electrify us with their scientific stagecraft: they have just three minutes to explain a scientific concept or idea without the use of Powerpoint – armed only with their wit and a few props. Previous topics have included climate change, neuroscience and particle physics. There’s not a moment to be missed at the FameLab Oxfordshire Regional Final as our challengers aim for the performance of their lives and compete to represent Oxford at the UK final.

Famelab is an international science communication competition designed to find the talented new voices of science and engineering.

This talk will focus on the disruptive ingredients and recipes at the heart of Ocado’s ongoing journey of self-disruption and reinvention.

One of these recipes relates to growing, manufacturing and delivering our food in much more efficient, scalable and sustainable ways. This is going to require some much bigger thinking.

Part of the Oxford Martin School Lecture Series: ‘Shaping the future’

The world faces many challenges, climate change, systemic racism, a crisis of leadership and the pandemic. As governments, business and organisations pivot to survive can the social impact sector do the same? What’s changed and what hasn’t in this vitally important space?

We have brought together experts in the field to share their experience and shine a light on the way forward. To reflect on any changes to their approach to social impact work, to share what they are seeing around the world, what’s worked and what the future holds for those who work in this area or are about to embark on a career in it.

Join Marya Besharov and our panel of experts for an interesting discussion.

Marya Besharov – Professor of Organisations and Impact, Saïd Business School

The panel:

• Shivani Garg Patel, Chief Strategy Officer, Skoll Foundation
• Meng Zhao, Associate Professor, NTU Singapore
• Francois Bonnici, Director and Head, Schwab Foundation
• Marc Ventresca – Associate Professor of Strategic Management, Saïd Business School

Jointly organised by the Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics and the Anscombe Bioethics Centre. This unusual online event will see Alberto Guibilini and David Jones adopting the other’s position on conscientious objection, arguing for the opposing view in an attempt to explore not only the subject, but the very nature of disagreement and discussion. Audience members will be encouraged to explore their views on conscientious objection in the same way.

Leadership in Extraordinary Times: SmartSpace: the new frontier

How will the commercialisation of space impact our everyday lives?

The world faces many challenges, climate change, racism and the pandemic. There are also many great opportunities that will benefit us all. How can business harness the enormous potential the commercialisation of space offers, and what will it deliver in terms of benefits here on earth?

We have brought together experts in the field to share their experience where business, innovation and entrepreneurship meet. They will look at what the future holds for those who work in this area or are about to embark on a career in it.

The event will be hosted by Marc Ventresca, Associate Professor of Strategic Management and the panel will be moderated by Lucas Kello, Associate Professor of International Relations at Oxford and an expert in space, and cyber governance.

Panel

Eamonn Molloy, Associate Fellow Oxford, expert in major programs
Renee Rottner, Assistant Professor UC Santa Barbara, expert in NASA innovation
Dan Sola, Space entrepreneur and Oxford Said alumni
Lucy Edge, Chief Operating Officer of Satellite Applications Catapult
Greg Autry, Vice President of Space Development, and Board member at the National Space Society

Visit https://www.sbs.ox.ac.uk/oxford-answers/smartspace-new-frontier at the specified time to watch the live stream. A recording will be posted on the website when the broadcast finishes.

Professor Buchanan introduces his latest book ‘Our Moral Fate: Evolution and the Escape From Tribalism’. Is tribalism-the political and cultural divisions between Us and Them-an inherent part of our basic moral psychology? Many scientists link tribalism and morality, arguing that the evolved “moral mind” is tribalistic. Any escape from tribalism, according to this thinking, would be partial and fragile, because it goes against the grain of our nature. In this book, Allen Buchanan offers a counterargument: the moral mind is highly flexible, capable of both tribalism and deeply inclusive moralities, depending on the social environment in which the moral mind operates.0We can’t be morally tribalistic by nature, Buchanan explains, because quite recently there has been a remarkable shift away from tribalism and toward inclusiveness, as growing numbers of people acknowledge that all human beings have equal moral status, and that at least some nonhumans also have moral standing. These are what Buchanan terms the Two Great Expansions of moral regard. And yet, he argues, moral progress is not inevitable but depends partly on whether we have the good fortune to develop as moral agents in a society that provides the right conditions for realizing our moral potential. But morality need not depend on luck. We can take charge of our moral fate by deliberately shaping our social environment-by engaging in scientifically informed “moral institutional design.” For the first time in human history, human beings can determine what sort of morality is predominant in their societies and what kinds of moral agents they are.

The FinCEN Files investigation, coordinated by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, exposed more than $2 trillion in suspicious deals.

Criminals, politicians and others sent money through the world’s major banks, which initially ignored red flags or reported the money as potentially dirty after weeks, months or years of delay. Billions of dollars in suspicious deals moved from Africa into Europe, the United States, the Middle East and secretive tax havens, including payments to and from politicians and family members, state-owned oil and gas companies, arms companies and many others.

Join William Fitzgibbon and Augustin Armendariz, International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, and Taiwo Hassan Adebayo, Premium Times Nigeria, as they discuss with Professor Ricardo Soares de Oliveira what the FinCEN Files investigation has uncovered and the implications.

How do you build inclusion from the ground up?

People with albinism face discrimination across the globe but are often left out of activist efforts around diversity and inclusion.

In this episode, we speak to representatives of Sesame Street Workshop, who have been championing diversity for years. With a breadth of expertise in the art of embracing diversity, this insightful look into the world of Sesame Street gives us new ways of approaching our goals. Supermodel and activist Diandra Forrest also joins the conversation. Fellow guest speaker Stephan Bognar, Executive Director of New York Dermatology Group Foundation, completes the line-up. They worked together previously on the Colorfull campaign, which was conceived by NYDG to highlight the prejudice that albinism attracts.

Daniel Burt presents the board games created — and played with the public — during the Literary History of Medicine project, looks at the wider process of creating games, and reveals how they can be used to engage everyone with what we discover through academic research.

What can we call a science? And what makes it science? Dr Taha Yasin Arslan of Medeniyet University, Istanbul challenges us to rethink the history of science, proposing new definitions for the term “science”.

Join us — and share your ideas.
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‘Microscopy and Magnetic Materials: Exploring Energy Landscapes at the Nanoscale’ by Professor Amanda Petford-Long FREng (Argonne National Laboratory and Northwestern University.

The Department of Materials is delighted to host this virtual event by our alumna, Professor Petford-Long. Please email communications@materials.ox.ac.uk to register, and to receive the Team Live link to log-on to this free event.

The first discussion in the Oxford Net Zero Series, hosted by the Oxford Martin School, hones in on the fundamental motivation of the research programme: ‘Why net zero?’.

Join the Oxford Net Zero Initiative’s Research Director, Professor Sam Fankhauser; Director, Professor Myles Allen; Net Zero Policy Engagement Fellow, Kaya Axelsson as they discuss with the Chair, Executive Director. Dr Steve Smith, the meaning of the word ‘net’ in net zero, reviewing what is needed to mitigate global warming, as and before we fully phase out activities that generate greenhouse gas emissions.

The discussion will explore the framing opportunities and challenges that the term ‘net-zero’ offers for science, policy, and advocacy informing effective climate action, as well as the innovation required at scale to achieve the global goal.

To register and watch this talk live: www.crowdcast.io/e/net-zero-when-and-how

The talk will also be streamed via YouTube here: https://youtu.be/z6049wR0tfE, but please note you will not be able to take part in the interactive Q&A session unless you join the talk on CrowdCast.

Covid-19 killed around two million people in 2020. At the same time, the social and economic impact of the pandemic led to an 8% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, the biggest one-year decline on record.

As the pandemic is brought under control from 2021 onwards, by supplementing current control methods with vaccination, there are big opportunities to sustain the benefits of lower emissions for health and well-being. The direct benefits are fewer droughts, floods, heatwaves, storms and wildfires, and cleaner air. Indirect health benefits are expected from better nutrition, safe sanitation, energy-efficient health services, and jobs in the green economy, among others.

In this conversation, Sir Andy Haines (Professor of Environmental Change and Public Health, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine) and Chris Dye (Professor of Epidemiology, University of Oxford) consider how better health and well-being are an both argument for, and a consequence of, making progress towards “net zero” carbon emissions.

To register and watch this talk live: www.crowdcast.io/e/building-back-healthier

The talk will also be streamed via YouTube here: https://youtu.be/xy3xkB9q8Ds, but please note you will not be able to take part in the interactive Q&A session unless you join the talk on CrowdCast.

The failure to stem the tide of biodiversity loss, or to address the deeply related issue of climate change, demands we quickly find more ambitious and more coherent approaches to tackling these challenges.

Nature-based Solutions (NbS) are one such family of approaches that has recently gained prominence in international policy and business discourse. Broadly defined as actions that involve working with nature to address societal goals, NbS are being widely hailed as a win-win for addressing biodiversity loss and climate change. However, this win-win scenario is not guaranteed.

Some NbS – particularly those involving planting trees in naturally treeless habitats – can have negative outcomes for climate change mitigation, biodiversity and local peoples’ livelihoods. There are also critical questions around the timeframes over which NbS can help tackle the biodiversity and climate crises given the negative impacts of warming on the health of the biosphere.

In the second discussion in the Oxford Net Zero Series, hosted by the Oxford Martin School, Professor Nathalie Seddon, will bring together interdisciplinary researchers and practitioners to explore the value and limits of working with nature to address climate change and why NbS must both support biodiversity and be implemented with, by and for people, if they are to provide benefits over the longterm.

To register and watch this talk live: www.crowdcast.io/e/nature-climate-change

The talk will also be streamed via YouTube here: https://youtu.be/Ka7Sc5d1v3k, but please note you will not be able to take part in the interactive Q&A session unless you join the talk on CrowdCast.

Amanda Oates (Executive Director of Workforce, Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust) and Dr Kristina Brown (Senior Lecturer, Newcastle Business School, Northumbria University) will be speaking on the story of the Just and Learning Culture at Mersey Care NHS Trust.

In recent years, Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust has undergone a radical shift in workplace culture and organisational procedures. They have gone from a blame culture to a culture where staff feel empowered and supported to learn from incidents. Numbers of disciplinary and suspension cases went down, staff reporting of adverse incidents went up, and there were positive effects on staff retention and levels of sickness absence.

Restorative justice was integral to these changes, termed the ‘Just and Learning Culture’. Amanda Oates and Kristina Brown will reflect on the impact of the restorative just culture at Mersey Care and help us to understand how other organisations can adopt a similar approach.

This event will be held online via Zoom (link TBA). Please contact joy@minthouseoxford.co.uk for more information.

You can register for this this event on Eventbrite: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/restorative-just-culture-the-story-of-mersey-care-nhs-trust-tickets-146564629753