UCC to host free science lectures

University College Cork is to host a series of accessible lectures on science’s role in society over the coming months.

Free for the public to attend, the lectures will see leading UCC scientists deliver addresses on diverse topics such as the nature of science, scientific discoveries, science and religion, science and the humanities, when science goes wrong, pseudo-science and anti-science, artificial intelligence, the microbiome and health, and the role of food and nutrition in our lives.

Professor Alan Kelly, School of Food and Nutritional Sciences, is co-ordinating this lecture series, now in its seventeenth year, and it will be offered from January through to April. Lectures will be delivered on Tuesdays and Thursdays in the Boole 2 theatre on UCC’s main campus from 6pm to 7pm.

“The Covid-19 pandemic illustrated vividly to us all how some of the greatest threats to our way of life are scientific in nature, as are the solutions to these threats in the form of scientific understanding and development of vaccines,” said Professor Kelly.

“Understanding of complex scientific topics became a key priority for many of us. Similarly, climate change is ever present in our consciousness, and understanding and combatting the threat is wholly dependent on science.

“Our modern world depends on science, and yet at the same time science can sometimes seem to be under attack, whether in the form of opposition to vaccines or general suspicion of the motivations and behaviour of scientists,” he said.

The next lecture, Food Processing: a Problem or a Solution? takes place this Tuesday, January 24, and will be delivered by Professor Kelly. For a full list of the lectures running from now until April, see www.ucc.ie/en/sefs/about/publiclectures/ There is no fee for these lectures, and all are welcome.