The Institute of Art and Ideas - HowTheLighGetsIn festival

[EmilyBaker]

Hi Guys!

My name is Emily and I work for the Institute of Art and Ideas (http://iai.tv/). We organise HowTheLightGetsIn, the biggest philosophy festival in the world.

I thought I'd let you know that we just released the three first events of the next edition of HowTheLightGetsIn happening in June 2012:

The World in Our Hands
Polly Higgins, Crispin Tickell, Nigel Lawson, Bjorn Lomborg.
Saturday 2nd June. 4pm.
The future of humanity is at stake. There is nothing to worry about. What is it about the debate between environmentalists and skeptics that makes it so intractable? Do we decide our position first and then only purport to argue rationally? Or is one side simply wrong?
Radical lawyer and advocate Polly Higgins and eminent diplomat and government advisor Crispin Tickell face off against journalist and former Chancellor of the Exchequer Nigel Lawson and environmental economist and one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People, Bjorn Lomborg.


The Fantasy of technology
Kevin Warwick, Tim Crane, Angela Saini, Luciano Floridi.
Saturday 2nd June. 10:30am.
From Archimedes’ screw to the sonic screwdriver, we measure and imagine the advance of civilisation in terms of our technology. But can perpetual innovation be mankind’s salvation, or has a technological arms race taken the place of meaningful human goals? In our quest for ever greater technological sophistication, do we risk rendering homo sapiens obsolete?
World-leading cybernetics expert and cyborg Kevin Warwick, Cambridge Professor of mind and metaphysics, Tim Crane, journalist, author and BBC broadcaster Angela Saini, and Oxford philosopher of information, Luciano Floridi, question the ultimate destination of our technological progress.

James Lovelock
The greatest scientific breakthroughs are often made by visionary men and women working alone or in small groups, dismissed and often derided by the mainstream. Has the corporate collectivism of modern laboratory work begun to stifle the creativity and insight on which scientific discovery relies? Nobel Laureate and independent scientist James Lovelock makes a powerful case for freedom of scientific speech.

I hope to see you there in June!
All our past events are available on our website to watch for free, so don't hesitate to have a look!

[Lynn]

Best wishes for a successful festival and I'm looking forward to dipping into the website to watch some of the debates .

[RickLewis]

We were at the festival last Saturday. Anja gave a lecture on Sentimentality and there was also a "Philosophy Now dinner" in the evening with a discussion on Philosophy and Literature. Stephen Law of Think joined us for that discussion too, bravely arguing that literature was over-rated and that philosophers shouldn't waste their time reading it! That really got the discussion moving, as you can probably imagine.

I was sorry we could only stay for the one day. The festival was great fun and there were a lot of talks to choose from. Congratulations to all the organisers of How The Light Gets In for running a really good, successful festival, and best wishes for next year's festival too!