Advertise on podcast: Gresham College Lectures

This episode of the Gresham College Podcast features a conversation between two Gresham Professors: Melissa Lane, Gresham Professor of Rhetoric and Ronald Hutton, Gresham Professor of Divinity.   Together they explore the gods of ancient Greece: where deities come from, why the same god could have several different parents, stories and personalities, and why the Greeks never expected their gods to be good. Ronald explains why Greeks addressed their deities as "sir and madam" rather than "Lord God", how blood sacrifice worked more like a community barbecue, and how ordinary people struck deals with the gods for help with toothache, childbirth or a safe voyage.    Melissa traces how philosophers from Xenophanes to Plato began to question the poets' badly behaved gods, and how religion collided with Athenian democracy, from the law courts to the trial of Socrates. The conversation then turns to the mystery religions, from the Eleusinian Mysteries to the women-only rites of Dionysus, the role of blindfolds and ordeal in initiation, and the gold leaves buried with initiates as calling cards for the underworld. It closes with the Greek view of the afterlife, and the story of the goddess Athena, evicted from the Parthenon, knocking at the philosopher Proclus's door.    Further Viewing:  Watch Ronald Hutton's Gresham College lecture, Mithras: Master of Mystery: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/god-mithras    Watch Melissa Lane's Gresham College lecture, Cicero In and On Political Crises: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/cicero    Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds.    To support Gresham's mission, please consider making a donation: https://gresham.ac.uk/support/  Website: https://gresham.ac.uk  Twitter: https://twitter.com/greshamcollege  Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege  Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Support the show

In this lecture, Professor Marion Turner explores ‘ordinary women’ in English literature, arguing that Chaucer’s 14th-century Wife of Bath was the first such woman: a middle-aged, sexually active working woman who tells the outrageous story of her own life. Zadie Smith’s 21st century translation of her story demonstrates the ongoing relevance of thinking about the space we have for women’s voices in theatre, poetry and public life. This lecture discusses the historical context for the emergence of the voices of ‘ordinary women’ in literature and considers what has and hasn’t changed across time. This lecture was recorded by Marion Turner on the 30th of September 2026 Marion Turner has published several award-winning books including Chaucer: A European Life  (Princeton, 2019) and The Wife of Bath: A Biography (Princeton, 2023). She curated a major exhibition at the Bodleian Library, Chaucer Here and Now, in 2024.  She is deeply committed to public engagement, working regularly with schools and with adult education as well as talking at literary festivals such as Hay on Wye, the Edinburgh festival, the Cheltenham festival, and the Oxford literary  festival, and on the radio, e.g. Start the Week, the Today programme, Women’s Hour, You’re Dead to  Me, Ian Hislop’s Oldest Jokes. She holds the senior chair in medieval literature at the University of  Oxford – the J.R.R. Tolkien Professorship of English Literature and Language.  The transcript of the lecture is available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/women-bath Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham College's mission, please consider making a donation: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today   Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk X: https://x.com/GreshamCollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/greshamcollege.bsky.social  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@greshamcollege Support Us: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Support the show

AI systems are increasingly positioned as supports for anxiety, loneliness, and distress. This lecture examines large language models trained to simulate therapeutic dialogue alongside biofeedback systems that modulate physiological states. We distinguish responsiveness from empathy, asking where AI may scaffold reflection and where automated comfort subtly displaces responsibility. This lecture was recorded by Professor Matt Jones on the 29th of September 2026 at Barnard’s Inna Hall, London Matt Jones is a computer scientist at Swansea University - and a Fellow of the British Computer Society - who works alongside colleagues from many other disciplines and directly with everyday folk across the world to explore the future of digital technologies. Over the last 30-plus years, this human-centred approach has led to novel approaches for, amongst other things,  mobile phone-based information searching and browsing, pedestrian navigation, voice assistants and deformable displays.  Much of his work has been driven by intense and sustained engagements with “low resource” communities from informal settlements in India, South Africa, and Kenya. Through their generous and gracious participation, these extra-ordinary users with the fresh and diverse perspectives have stimulated insights into the future of digital technologies for everyone, globally. In all this work, Matt works as part of a long-standing collaborative team with Jen Pearson, Simon Robinson and Thomas Reitmaier (from Swansea) and colleagues in India (including Dani Raju) and South Africa (including Minah Radebe). His work has been supported by the UK’s science funders (EPSRC and UKRI). Currently, this funding includes a Fellowship to explore the future of interactive AI and leadership roles in responsible AI and inclusive digital technologies. This funding has led to a series of impactful publications, talks and influences on people, policies, and practices. Matt has collaborated with private, public and third sector organisations, including Microsoft, the NHS, Google, IIT-B, the BBC and IBM. He is a member of the Foreign and Commonwealth Development Office’s Research Advisory Group and Welsh Government’s AI reviews. The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/ai-therapist Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham's mission, please consider making a donation: https://gresham.ac.uk/support/ Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk Twitter:  https://twitter.com/greshamcollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Support the show

Where are the stories of great queer love in the Shoah? There are almost none. Anna Hájková explains why the history of same-sex desire in the Shoah, that is, queerness among Jews persecuted by the Nazis for their race, has been excluded and marginalised, and how its return to our understanding of the Holocaust can offer an inclusive and feminist history of this genocide. Based on original and extensive archival research, this lecture offers a concise insight into the queer history of the Holocaust. This lecture was recorded by Dr Anna Hájková on 28th of September 2026 at Barnard’s Inn Hall, London. Dr Anna Hájková is Reader for modern European continental history at the University of Warwick, where she co-directs the Centre for Global Jewish Studies.  Her first book, The Last Ghetto: An Everyday History of Theresienstadt, came out in 2020 with Oxford University Press. Her second book People Without History are Dust: Queer Desire in the Holocaust (University of Toronto Press, 2025) was awarded the National Jewish Book Award 2026.  She is a pioneer of queer Holocaust history and her work has been awarded the 2020 Orfeo Iris Prize.  The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/queer-shoah Support the show

Carbon used to be something that was only mentioned in school chemistry classes, but now it seems to be everywhere: on the news, in political debate, in discussions on health, and as a framework for thinking about our civilisation’s future. But the carbon that’s the focus of most of that debate is what’s in the atmosphere, and that’s only about 2% of the accessible carbon on Earth. This lecture puts that 2% in context, showing how the whole carbon cycle works, how we’re affecting it, and looks at the proposed strategies for deliberately manipulating carbon reservoirs in the future. This lecture was recorded by Helen Czerski on the 24th of September 2026 Helen Czerski is a physicist and oceanographer with a passion for science, sport, books, creativity, hot chocolate and investigating the interesting things in life.  She is a Professor at the Department of Mechanical Engineering at University College London and her research focus is the physics of breaking waves and bubbles at the ocean surface. These bubbles change underwater sound and light, help transfer gases from ocean to atmosphere (helping the ocean breathe) and also eject ocean material into the air. She has spent months working on research ships in the Antarctic, the Pacific, the North Atlantic and the Arctic, and is an experienced field scientist.  Helen has been a regular science presenter on the BBC for 15 years, covering the physics of the natural world in BBC2 landmark documentaries (including ‘Orbit’, ‘Operation iceberg’ and ‘Supersenses’), and the physics of everyday life in a range of BBC4 documentaries (including ‘From ice to fire: The incredible science of temperature’, ‘Sound waves: The symphony of physics’, and ‘Colour: The spectrum of science’, along  with many others). She currently co-hosts BBC Radio 4’s flagship climate and environment programme Rare Earth.  Helen's first book Storm in a Teacup won the Italian Asimov Prize and the Louis J. Battan Author prize from the American Meteorological Society. Blue Machine won the Wainwright Prize for Conservation Writing. She was awarded the Institute of Physics Gold Medal in 2018 for her work on physics communication, and an Honorary Fellowship of the British Science Association in 2020. She was a Trustee of Royal Museums Greenwich from 2018-2026, and was one of the 2020 Royal Institution Christmas Lecturers, giving her Lecture on the topic of the ocean. The transcript of the lecture is available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/carbon Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham College's mission, please consider making a donation: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today   Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk X: https://x.com/GreshamCollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/greshamcollege.bsky.social  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@greshamcollege Support Us: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Support the show

Our expanding Universe only makes sense if, early on, it expanded rapidly in a period of cosmic inflation. In this lecture, we consider the evidence for this apparently arbitrary idea, and asks whether we are on the brink of finding inflation’s signature in our observation. As the story moves from theorist's blackboards to desert observatories, and from the cosmos’s first moments to the far future, we question the nature of the Universe, its eventual fate and even the form of scientific enquiry itself. This lecture was recorded by Chris Lintott on the 23rd of September 2026 Professor Chris Lintott is a Professor of Astrophysics at the University of Oxford, and a Research Fellow at New College. Having been educated at Magdalene College, Cambridge and University College London, his research now ranges from understanding how galaxies form and evolve, to using machine learning to find the most unusual things in the Universe, to predicting the properties of visiting interstellar asteroids. He was the founder of the Zooniverse citizen science platform, which provides opportunities for more than two million online volunteers to contribute to scientific research, and which was the topic of his first book, 'The Crowd and the Cosmos’. His latest book is ‘Our Accidental Universe’. Professor Lintott is best known for presenting the BBC's long-running Sky at Night program, and as an accomplished lecturer. Away from work, he cooks, suffers through being a fan of Torquay United and Somerset cricket, and spends time with a rescued lurcher, Mr Max. He can often be found at the helm of Oxford’s science comedy night, ‘Huh, That’s Funny’. The transcript of the lecture is available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/cosmology-mad Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham College's mission, please consider making a donation: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk X: https://x.com/GreshamCollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/greshamcollege.bsky.social TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@greshamcollege Support Us: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Support the show

This lecture was recorded by Daniel Susskind on the 23nd of September 2026 Dr Daniel Susskind is a writer and economist. He explores the impact of technology, and particularly AI, on work and society. He is the Mercers’ School Memorial Professor of Business at Gresham College. He is also a Digital Fellow at the Stanford Digital Economy Lab, a Senior Research Associate at the Institute for Ethics in AI at Oxford University, an Associate Member of the Economics Department at Oxford University, and a Research Professor at King’s College London. He is a member of the UK Government’s Expert Panel on AI and the Future of Work.  His new book, Growth: A Reckoning (2024), was chosen by President Obama as one of his ‘Favourite Books of 2024’ and was a runner-up for the Financial Times Business Book of the Year 2024. He is also the author of A World Without Work (2020), described by The New York Times as "required reading for any potential presidential candidate thinking about the economy of the future” and a runner-up for the Financial Times Business Book of the Year 2020, and co-author of the best-selling book, The Future of the Professions (2015). His TED Talk, on the future of work, has been viewed more than 1.7 million times.  His next book, What Should My Children Do? How to Flourish in the Age of AI, will be published in 2026. And his first novel, The Basilisk Stare, will be published in 2027.  Previously he worked in various roles in the British Government – in the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit, in the Policy Unit in 10 Downing Street, and in the Cabinet Office. He was a Kennedy Scholar at Harvard University.  The transcript of the lecture is available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/future-creativity Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham College's mission, please consider making a donation: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today   Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk X: https://x.com/GreshamCollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/greshamcollege.bsky.social  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@greshamcollege Support Us: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Support the show

The Lammy plan to eliminate half of U.K. criminal jury trials has provoked a rebellion among many lawmakers. Recent Palestine Action cases highlight the jury’s moral role, with several “perverse verdicts” acquitting activists despite clear evidence. Yet those charged with the lesser offence of “supporting” PA have been denied a jury trial and the chance of acquittal. Compared with U.S. constitutional protections, including impartial juries, vicinage rules, challenges to biased pools, and post‑trial juror inquiry—the U.K. system appears increasingly problematic. In this lecture, Professor Clive Stafford Smith makes the case for stronger jury protections. This lecture was recorded by Clive Stafford Smith on the 17th of September 2026 Clive Stafford Smith JD OBE is a dual UK-US national, the founder and director of  the Justice League a non-profit human rights training centre focused on fostering the next generation of advocates.  He was the Senior Prefect at Radley College, where he studied maths and science; then a Morehead Scholar at the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill), where he took a degree in Politics; and a Stone Merit Scholar each of his three years at Columbia Law School, graduating in 1984.  He previously founded and directed the legal action charities Louisiana Capital Assistance Center (1993 in New Orleans) and Reprieve (1999 in London). Since 1984 he has tried many capital cases, and helped to represent over 400 people facing execution in the US and elsewhere. He also brought the first challenge to Guantánamo Bay, where he has secured the release of 87 detainees, and continues to assist the remaining 15.  In all five of the cases he has helped bring to the U.S. Supreme Court the petitioner has prevailed.  He has recently taken on the case of Aafia Siddiqui, the woman who has most suffered from the US rendition-to-torture program – abducted with her three children. He continues to work on capital cases in the US, including a Post-Mortem Project where he is investigating the claims of innocence of 184 people executed since 1977. Clive has published a number of books including Bad Men (2008, describing work in Guantánamo) and Injustice (2012, on the capital case of Kris Maharaj), both of which were short-listed for the Orwell Prize; and most recently The Far Side of the Moon (2023), deconstructing the parallel lives of his father and a client Larry Lonchar, both of whom were labelled Bipolar. He has many other publications, including manuals for the defence of capital cases, and law review articles about aspects of capital defence. He has worked on many films and documentaries, starting with Fourteen Days In May (1987), recently ranked as one of the top BBC documentaries of all time.  While continuing his litigation practice, Clive teaches part time at Bristol Law School as well as running a summer programme for 35 students in Dorset, his home. He has received all kinds of awards in recognition of his work, including an OBE by Queen Elizabeth II for “services to humanity” in 2000. He has been a member of the Louisiana State Bar since 1984.  The transcript of the lecture is available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/myth-jury Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham College's mission, please consider making a donation: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today   Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk X: https://x.com/GreshamCollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/greshamcollege.bsky.social  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@greshamcollege Support Us: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Support the show

A stark advert picturing a gravestone chiselled with ‘AIDS: DON’T DIE OF IGNORANCE’ captured the horror of this disease in the 1980s. Now, for HIV-infected people able to access anti-retroviral therapies, life expectancy is normal. How were these amazing medicines developed and how have they transformed lives? Why is it so difficult to eradicate HIV or to develop a vaccine to prevent infection? What does the future hold in the quest to stop the global scourge of AIDS? This lecture was recorded by Matt Higgins  on the 16th of September 2026 Matt studied natural sciences at Christ’s College in the University of Cambridge and a Ph.D. in structural biology at the Laboratory of Molecular Biology. He started his research group with a Royal Society University Research Fellowship in 2005 and moved to the University of Oxford in 2010. He is currently the E. P. Abraham Professor of Structural Biology and a Professorial Fellow at Merton College, Oxford. He is a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences and a member of the European Molecular Biology Organisation. The transcript of the lecture is available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/hiv-pandemic Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham College's mission, please consider making a donation: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk X: https://x.com/GreshamCollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/greshamcollege.bsky.social TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@greshamcollege Support Us: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Support the show

This lecture was recorded by Alain Goriely on the 15th of September 2026 Alain Goriely is a mathematician with broad interests in mathematical methods, mechanics, sciences, and engineering. He is well known for his contributions to dynamical systems, mathematical biology, as well as fundamental and applied mechanics. He is particularly well known for the development of a mathematical theory of biological growth, culminating with his seminal monograph The Mathematics on Mechanics of Biological Growth (2017). He received his PhD from the University of Brussels in 1994 where he became a lecturer. In 1996, he joined the University of Arizona where he established a research group within the renowned Program of Applied Mathematics. In 2010, he joined the University of Oxford as the inaugural Statutory Professor of Mathematical Modelling and fellow of St. Catherine’s College. He is currently the Director of the Oxford Centre for Industrial and Applied Mathematics. In addition, Alain has enjoyed scientific outreach based on problems connected to his research, including tendril perversion in plants, twining plants, umbilical cord knotting, whip cracking, the shape of seashells, brain modelling, and he is the author of a Very Short Introduction to Applied Mathematics (2017). His work has been recognized by a Sloan Fellowship, a Royal Society Wolfson Research Award, the Cozzarelli Prize from the National Academy of Sciences and the Engineering Medal from the Society of Engineering Sciences. He was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2022. The transcript of the lecture is available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/cracking-whip Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham College's mission, please consider making a donation: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today   Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk X: https://x.com/GreshamCollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/greshamcollege.bsky.social  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@greshamcollege Support Us: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Support the show

On a remote mountain top in Chile, scanning the sky with the largest astronomical camera ever built, the Vera Rubin Observatory is conducting the deepest and most sensitive survey of the sky yet. This lecture covers whatever it’s found in the previous week, from supernovae to asteroids, giving us a glimpse of science in action. This lecture was recorded by Chris Lintott on the 14th of September 2026 Professor Chris Lintott is a Professor of Astrophysics at the University of Oxford, and a Research Fellow at New College. Having been educated at Magdalene College, Cambridge and University College London, his research now ranges from understanding how galaxies form and evolve, to using machine learning to find the most unusual things in the Universe, to predicting the properties of visiting interstellar asteroids. He was the founder of the Zooniverse citizen science platform, which provides opportunities for more than two million online volunteers to contribute to scientific research, and which was the topic of his first book, 'The Crowd and the Cosmos’. His latest book is ‘Our Accidental Universe’.  Professor Lintott is best known for presenting the BBC's long-running Sky at Night program, and as an accomplished lecturer. Away from work, he cooks, suffers through being a fan of Torquay United and Somerset cricket, and spends time with a rescued lurcher, Mr Max. He can often be found at the helm of Oxford’s science comedy night, ‘Huh, That’s Funny’. The transcript of the lecture is available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/sky-night Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham College's mission, please consider making a donation: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today   Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk X: https://x.com/GreshamCollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/greshamcollege.bsky.social  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@greshamcollege Support Us: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Support the show

How do we tell stories of past voices through a cello, the voice of its player? This lecture explores what it means to be separated from your voice, and to find it again. Dr Kate Kennedy traces a journey she took across Europe with her cello, to uncover the stories of instruments and their players. The result was a host of eccentric, sometimes tragic, always extraordinary accounts of silencing and survival, from the Auschwitz orchestra to a shipwreck, and even a cello full of bees. This lecture was recorded by Kate Kennedy on the 9th of September 2026 Dr Kate Kennedy is a biographer, cellist, and broadcaster. She is one of the foremost critics of twentieth-century music, and lectures in Music and English at Oxford University, and is a regular presence on BBC Radio 3.  Kate is the Director of the Oxford Centre for Life-Writing and a Supernumerary Fellow at Wolfson College, Oxford, having previously held Research Fellowships in English and Music at the University of Cambridge. She is also Director of the Centre for the Study of Women Composers, Director of the Museum of Music History, and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.  Her most recent book Cello: A Journey Through Silence to Sound was published in August  2024 with Head of Zeus / Bloomsbury. It is a group biography that weaves together four  narratives of cellists who suffered various forms of persecution, injury, and misfortune.  She is also the author of the Dweller in Shadows – A Life of Ivor Gurney (Princeton  University Press), and editor of Literary Britten, Lives of Houses (co-edited with Dame  Hermione Lee), and The Silent Morning – Culture and the Armistice 1918. Both Cello and Dweller in Shadows were shortlisted for the Royal Philharmonic Society prize.  The transcript of the lecture is available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/cello-voice Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham College's mission, please consider making a donation: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today   Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk X: https://x.com/GreshamCollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/greshamcollege.bsky.social  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@greshamcollege Support Us: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Support the show

This lecture was recorded by Jane Shaw on Monday, 07 Sep 2026. Professor Jane Shaw is Provost of Gresham College and Professor of the History of Religion at the University of Oxford. Professor Shaw was formerly Principal of Harris Manchester College and Pro-Vice-Chancellor at the University of Oxford. She has also served as Dean for Religious Life and Professor of Religious Studies at Stanford; as Dean of Grace Cathedral in San Francisco; and, prior to her time in California, she taught history and theology at the University of Oxford for 16 years. Her books include Miracles in Enlightenment England (Yale 2006); Octavia, Daughter of God: The Story of a Female Messiah and her Followers (Jonathan Cape and Yale 2011); and the co-authored Gen Z, Explained: The Art of Living in a Digital Age (Chicago 2021). She is currently writing Seeking Infinity: Mystics in the Modern World (forthcoming with Penguin Allen Lane) and has received Fellowships to support the completion of that book from the Leverhulme Trust and the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study.   Professor Shaw was educated at Oxford, Harvard, and U. C. Berkeley. She is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/why-empathy Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham's mission, please consider making a donation: https://gresham.ac.uk/support/ Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk Twitter:  https://twitter.com/greshamcollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Support the show

This is the Annual Sir Thomas Gresham Lecture. What does modern physics have to say about the meaning of time? Is it a fundamental feature of reality or merely an emergent property from something deeper? Does time flow, and is the present moment special when Einstein tells us that all times coexist. Where does the arrow of time come from if all the fundamental laws of physics are symmetric in time? This lecture will examine many of these issues and give our best guess answers as we understand the universe today. This lecture was recorded by Jim Al-Khalili on the 23rd of June 2026 Jim Al-Khalili is a quantum physicist, author and broadcaster. As an academic, he is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Surrey. He received his PhD in nuclear physics in 1989 and has published over 150 papers in the field. His current research interests are in the foundations of quantu mechanics and the exciting new field of quantum biology. As a science communicator Jim hosts BBC Radio 4’s long running show, The Life Scientific, which attracts two million weekly listeners. His many TV science documentaries over the past two decades include Atom, The Story of Electricity and the Bafta nominated Chemistry: a volatile history. His fifteen books on popular science and the history of science have been translated into twenty-six languages. He is currently working on an ambitious new book on the nature of time due out in Autumn 2026. Jim is a past president of both the British Science Association and Humanists UK and is a recipient of the Royal Society Michael Faraday medal and the Wilkins-Bernal-Medawar medal, the Institute of Physics Kelvin Medal and the Stephen Hawking medal and has ten honorary doctorates from UK universities. He received an OBE from the Queen in 2007 and later a CBE in 2021, both for ‘services to science and public engagement in STEM’. He is a trustee and commissioner on the board of the 1851 Royal Commission and a Fellow of the Science Museums Group. The transcript of the lecture is available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/thomas-gresham-26  Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham College's mission, please consider making a donation: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today   Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk X: https://x.com/GreshamCollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/greshamcollege.bsky.social  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@greshamcollege Support Us: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Support the show

This lecture was recorded by Professor Milton Mermikides on the 19th of June 2026 Milton Mermikides is a composer, guitarist, technologist, academic and educator in a wide range of musical styles and has collaborated with artists and scientists as diverse as Evelyn Glennie, Tim Minchin, Pat Martino, Peter Zinovieff, John Williams and Brian Eno. Son of a CERN nuclear physicist, he was raised with an enthusiasm for both the arts and sciences, an eclecticism which has been maintained throughout his teaching, research and creative career.  He is a graduate of the London School of Economics (BSc), Berklee College of Music (BMus) and the University of Surrey (PhD). He has lectured, exhibited and given keynote presentations at organisations like the Royal Academy of Music, TEDx, Royal Musical Association, British Library, Smithsonian Institute and The Science Museum and his work has been featured extensively in the press. His music, research and graphic art are published and featured by Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, Deutsche Grammophon, Sony and more, and he has won awards, scholarships and commendations for writing, teaching, research and his charity work.       Milton is Professor of Music at the University of Surrey, Professor of Guitar at the Royal College of Music, Deputy Director of the International Guitar Research Centre, an Ableton Certified Trainer, and lives in London with his wife, the guitarist Bridget Mermikides and their daughter Chloe. He is also a Vice-Chair of Governors at Addison Primary School, a state school which foregrounds music education, offering free instrumental lessons for all on Pupil Premium.  The transcript of the lecture is available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/music-sleep Gresham College has offered free public lectures for over 400 years, thanks to the generosity of our supporters. There are currently over 2,500 lectures free to access. We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to learn from some of the greatest minds. To support Gresham College's mission, please consider making a donation: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today   Website:  https://gresham.ac.uk X: https://x.com/GreshamCollege Facebook: https://facebook.com/greshamcollege Instagram: https://instagram.com/greshamcollege Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/greshamcollege.bsky.social  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@greshamcollege Support Us: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/get-involved/support-us/make-donation/donate-today Support the show