ThinkLONG
The Oxford Martin School Blog
Entries by type: Events
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Planetary boundaries as millenarian prophesies
The idea that we are collectively on the brink of overstepping “planetary boundaries” that will render civilization unsustainable has been prominently propounded by a group of scholars around Johan Rockström of the Stockholm Resil... Read More »
Nano: avoiding toxic shock
How do you regulate for the unknown? In the field of nanotechnology this has become a crucial question. We can currently buy on the open market a variety of products using silver nanoparticles…but scientists have recently discovered the tox... Read More »
Climate control
As a lad poring over his ‘Boys’ Book of Science', Professor Steve Rayner, Co-Director of the Oxford Geoengineering Programme, was thrilled by the technological optimism which gave rise to visions of futuristic looking cities under ... Read More »
A game of risk
Garry Kasparov, the world’s greatest ever chess player, is a man who knows a lot about risk. “If you want to win you have to take risks…which means you can fail,” he told an audience of over 450 people at Oxford’s Ex... Read More »
The Secret Life of Plants
As we struggle to feed the world’s growing population is it ethically wrong not to use all the tools at our disposal to help increase food production? To help the world’s poorest out of poverty, does it not make sense for them to farm ... Read More »
Medical ethics on trial
How do you balance the risks and benefits from trialling a new drug? After all, the people with the most to gain from a successful new vaccine for HIV or Hepatitis C are often those who are most vulnerable in the first place. Clinical trials are e... Read More »
Necker Meets Oxford
We have just spent a few very inspiring days at Necker Meets Oxford, one of Virgin Unite’s leadership gatherings. We brought together some of our dear friends and supporters from the Unite community with a group of stellar academic... Read More »
Targeted Killing on Trial
The past few weeks have seen a flurry of activity aimed at achieving greater transparency and accountability with respect to the U.S. government’s practice of “targeted killing” (primarily through the use of drones). To begin... Read More »
Robot Wars
Imagine you are a sentry patrolling in Afghanistan. There is an explosion and a group of people run towards you. One is a man carrying a gun. The others are frightened women with young children. Are they all running for safety? Is ther... Read More »
Leading a horse to water...
When a physicist comes to talk to you about the ethics of resource stewardship, you know you have a challenge that goes beyond the scientific issues and into a realm that is much more complex. That’s what Myles Allen wanted to explain and ex... Read More »
Walk the line
Imagine a world where we could correct climate change with a scientific procedure; we could fight cancer using nanoparticles to target malignant cells; we could comfortably feed our growing population with disease and drought resistant crops; we c... Read More »
Electric Dreams
“If you can show people there is a way, there is plenty of will” Elon Musk told the 800 strong audience who flocked to Oxford’s Sheldonian Theatre to hear his inspirational lecture on the Future of Energy and Transport. Showing t... Read More »
- Alexander Leveringhaus
- Alison Stibbe
- Andrew Pontzen
- Caspar Henderson
- Clare Heywood
- David Rodin
- Devi Sridhar
- Eric Beinhocker
- Gilles Giacca
- Gillian Petrokofsky
- Guy Houlsby
- Hein de Haas
- Hugo Slim
- Ian Goldin
- James Marrow
- Javier Lezaun
- Jennifer Welsh
- Julia Banfield
- Julian Savulescu
- Justin Bishop
- Kazem Rahimi
- Lucy Crittenden
- Maria Villares Varela
- Marian Dawkins
- Mathias Czaika
- Megan Lynagh
- Natalie Day
- Nigel Moore
- Oliver Bakewell
- Peter Taylor
- Phil Renforth
- Quentin Sattentau
- Rafaela Hillerbrand
- Richard Branson
- Richard Reschen
- Richard Willden
- Serena Sharma
- Sophie Hackford
- Steve Rayner
- Stuart Armstrong
- Sunetra Gupta
- Susan Curran
- Takafumi Nishino
- Tim Kruger
- Toby Ord
- Tom Aubrey-Fletcher