BRIGHTHINK: In Conversation

On the largest scales, gravity shapes galaxies and bends space-time. On the smallest, quantum mechanics governs a strange world of uncertainty and probability. Both frameworks are extraordinarily successful.There’s just one problem: they don’t work together.This tension sits at the heart of modern physics. When we try to describe extreme environments - black holes, the Big Bang - our best theories break down. So what’s missing? Is space-time truly fundamental, or something that emerges from deeper laws? Is our Universe the only one, or just one of many?In the search for a “Theory of Everything,” physicists are exploring bold ideas - from string theory to multiverses, even the possibility that reality itself may be more surprising than we imagine.Join Dr Katy Clough and Prof Toby Wiseman for a fascinating conversation at the frontier of physics, as they explore where our current theories succeed, where they fail, and what these cracks might reveal about the true nature of reality.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 23rd March, 2026.DR KATY CLOUGHKaty is a Senior Lecturer at the School of Mathematical Sciences, Queen Mary University of London, and an STFC Ernest Rutherford Research Fellow
Lead for Research Innovation.
 Her research focusses on testing the limits of general relativity and the Standard Model of particle physics, in particular using the numerical simulations of the early Universe and the interaction of fundamental fields and particles with black holes.PROF TOBY WISEMANToby is a Professor of Theoretical Physics at Imperial College London. His research focuses on fundamental aspects of gravity, black holes and quantum field theory. He is particularly interested in understanding space-time and gravitation at the smallest and largest scales, and also how string theory combines Einstein's theory of gravity with quantum mechanics. CHAIRAnish Ghoshal is a theoretical physicist at the University of Sussex, specialising in particle physics, cosmology and gravity. His research focuses on the origins of our universe related to questions about the dark matter, matter-antimatter asymmetry, and gravity.

Stunning advances in digital technology have given us a new wave of disarmingly human-like AI systems. Chatbots like ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini put the knowledge of all the world’s experts at our fingertips, and can generate meaningful sentences, equations and computer code. The march of this new technology is set to upturn our economies, challenge our democracies, and refashion society in unpredictable ways. We can expect these AI systems to soon be making autonomous decisions on the user’s behalf, with transformative impact on everything we do. It is vital we understand how they work. Can AI systems ‘think’, ‘know’ and ‘understand’? Whose interests do they ultimately represent? And when will they be able to move beyond words and take actions for themselves in the real world?Join neuroscientist and AI researcher Christopher Summerfield, as he discusses how these strange new minds work, with Prof. Ron Chrisley and grapples with the existential question of our age: can we look forward to a technological utopia, or are we in the process of writing ourselves out of history?Recorded Live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 2nd March 2026.CHRISTOPHER SUMMERFIELDChris is Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience in the Department of Experimental Psychology at the University of Oxford and an AI research scientist. His work focusses on the neural and computational mechanisms by which humans make decisions.RON CHRISLEYRon is Professor of Cognitive Science and Artificial Intelligence at the School of Engineering and Informatics, Sussex University. His areas of research include metacognition in neural networks, social and ethical issues of AI and machine consciousness.

What if the present moment – the ‘now’ we all inhabit – isn’t just a tick of the clock?We feel that the present is everything; all we can know. Yet physics finds no universal ’now’.Jo Marchant discusses her new book, In Search of Now, with Prof Robyn Waller and shows how we each carve out our lived experience – sensations and emotions, actions and decisions – through our interactions with the world. Far from being an illusion or a mere slice of time, she argues that this evolving, interconnected tapestry is the source of our lives and selves, and perhaps even reality itself.Jo explores the secrets of how our lives really unfold and draws on state-of-the-art discoveries in neuroscience, psychology, cosmology and quantum physics, to reveal a dynamic, creative process in which we all play a part.Recorded live at the Nightingale Room, Brighton, 17th February 2026.JO MARCHANTJo is an award-winning science journalist and author. She has a PhD in genetics and medical microbiology – and has previously worked as a senior editor at New Scientist and at Nature. Her articles have appeared in publications including The New York Times, The Guardian and Smithsonian magazine.ROBYN WALLERRobyn is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sussex, affiliated with the Sussex Centre for Consciousness Science and Sussex AI. She is also a member of the Council for the Royal Institute of Philosophy and works primarily in philosophy of cognitive science and metaphysics. 

AI systems now write code, generate images, produce news content, and increasingly make decisions that affect everyday life—from what we see online to how businesses operate and resources are allocated. What once felt experimental is now embedded in the tools, platforms, and institutions many of us rely on, often in ways that are invisible but deeply influential.This rapid integration has been matched by an intense media narrative: AI as breakthrough, AI as threat, AI as inevitable force reshaping work, creativity, and society itself. Headlines promise transformation or warn of disruption, yet the reality is more complex than either story suggests. Understanding where the technology truly is—and what its impacts actually look like—requires stepping beyond the hype.Recorded live at the Nightingale Room, Brighton, 10th February 2026.PROF RON CHRISLEYRon is Professor of Cognitive Science and Artificial Intelligence at the School of Engineering and Informatics, Sussex University. His areas of research include: metacognition in neural networks, social and ethical issues of AI, social robotics, machine consciousness, quantum machine learning and applied logic.DR MARK KENNEDYMark is Director of the Data Science Institute at Imperial College London, teaching across Ph.D., Masters, and Executive programmes. His research examines how AI and other technologies diffuse through organisations and society, shaping work, innovation, and social practices, and he develops methods like text and network analysis to study these processes.OLI SHARPEOli is the creator and host of Go Meta, a YouTube channel and blog focused on exploring the "metacrisis"—complex, interconnected global issues—through a lens of philosophy, rationality, and the societal impact of AI (Youtube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdmgV-gku1RPUUt9lEtkJmg)

John Keats once accused scientists of merely wanting to “unweave a rainbow,” but it was an irrepressible, romantic urge to wonder that defined Francis Crick, as much as a desire to find the basis of life in DNA and the workings of our minds. Crick was never shy about big questions. After helping reveal the structure of DNA, he turned his attention to some of the most challenging problems in biology and neuroscience, from the genetic code to the nature of consciousness. His curiosity, confidence, and occasional contrarian streak made him one of the most distinctive scientists of the 20th century.
Matthew Cobb discusses his new book, Crick: A Mind In Motion - which presents a full ‘warts and all’ portrait of the scientist and the man - with Anil Seth.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 26th January, 2026.AUTHOR BIOMatthew Cobb is a professor emeritus at the University of Manchester and earned his PhD in psychology & genetics from the University of Sheffield. He has presented many TV programmes on genetic engineering and CRISPR gene editing. Matthew is also the author of many books, including: As Gods: A Moral History of the Genetic Age, The Idea of the Brain, and Life’s Greatest Secret. CHAIR BIOAnil Seth is Professor of Cognitive and Computational Neuroscience at the University of Sussex and Director of the Sussex Centre for Consciousness Science. He is also Co-Director of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research (CIFAR) Program on Brain, Mind, & Consciousness. He is the author of 'Being You: A New Science of Consciousness' which was awarded Best Science Book of 2021 by The Guardian and the Financial Times.

Rarely has there seemed a more confusing time to be a man. This uncertainty has spawned an array of bizarre and harmful underground subcultures, collectively known as the ‘manosphere’, as men search for new forms of belonging.Acclaimed journalist James Bloodworth delves into these worlds and asks: what does their emergence say about Western society? Why are so many men susceptible to the sinister beliefs these groups promote? And what can we do about their pernicious encroachment upon our social and political spheres? Along the way, he enlists in a bootcamp for ‘alpha males’, dissects cultural figures including Jordan Peterson and Andrew Tate, and accompanies modern day Hugh Hefners as they broadcast their jet-set lifestyles to millions of followers.James Bloodworth was in Conversation with Prof. Richard de Visser.Recorded live at the Nightingale Room, Brighton, 9th Sept 2025.AUTHOR BIOJames Bloodworth is a journalist and the author of The Myth of Meritocracy, Hired, shortlisted for the Orwell Prize in 2019, and Lost Boys. His writing has appeared in the Times, the Guardian, and Prospect. He has produced and presented documentaries for Channel 4 and much of his work concerns the struggles of working class people.CHAIR BIORichard De Visser is Professor of Psychology at the Brighton & Sussex Medical School (BSMS) and has been working in health psychology and public health for 30 years. His research interests span a broad range of topics: sexuality & relationships; alcohol use; and cross-cultural analyses. He has also conducted many studies of gendered identity, and its intersections with sexuality.

The tortured poet. The rebellious scientist. The monstrous artist. The tech disruptor.You can tell what a society values by who it labels as a genius. You can also tell who it excludes, who it enables, and what it is prepared to tolerate.Helen Lewis discusses her new book, The Genius Myth, with Rafael Behr and unravels a word that we all use - without really questioning what it means. And she asks if the modern idea of genius - a class of special people - is distorting our view of the world.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 3rd September 2025.HELEN LEWISHelen Lewis is a staff writer at The Atlantic who writes about politics and culture. Her first book, Difficult Women: A History of Feminism in 11 Fights, was a Sunday Times bestseller and a Guardian, Telegraph and Financial Times book of the year. She is the writer and presenter of the BBC podcast series The New Gurus and Helen Lewis Has Left the Chat, and co-host of Strong Message Here, with Armando Iannucci.RAFAEL BEHRRafael Behr is a political columnist for the Guardian. He is a former Political Editor for the New Statesman, Chief Leader Writer and Online Editor for The Observer, a business news reporter for BBC online and a foreign correspondent for the Financial Times, based in the Baltic region and Russia.

A vital perspective is missing from the discussions we're having about Artificial Intelligence: What does it mean for our identity?Our fascination with AI stems from the perceived uniqueness of human intelligence. We believe it's what differentiates us. Fears of AI not only concern how it invades our digital lives, but also the implied threat of an intelligence that displaces us from our position at the centre of the world.Neil D. Lawrence discusses his latest book, The Atomic Human, with Professor Ron Chrisley, contrasting our own intelligence with the capabilities of machine intelligence and revealing the technical origins, capabilities and limitations of AI systems, and how they should be wielded. Not just by the experts, but ordinary people. Either AI is a tool for us, or we become a tool of AI. Understanding this will enable us to choose the future we want.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 23rd July 2025.NEIL D. LAWRENCENeil is the inaugural DeepMind Professor of Machine Learning at the University of Cambridge, senior AI fellow at the Alan Turing Institute and visiting professor at the University of Sheffield. His technical expertise is in uncertainty and machine learning methods, in particular its use as the principal technology underpinning modern artificial intelligence.RON CHRISLEYRon is Professor of Cognitive Science and Artificial Intelligence at the School of Engineering and Informatics, Sussex University. His areas of research include: metacognition in neural networks, social and ethical issues of AI, social robotics, machine consciousness, quantum machine learning and applied logic.

The UK has seen a 400% increase in far-right terror arrests over the last decade, with under-18s now making up a growing share of those radicalised.Far-right content is shared up to 10 times more on social media than mainstream political content - thanks to algorithms that reward outrage and conspiracy.Joe Mulhall, Director of Research at Hope not Hate, draws from his extensive experience investigating extremist groups across Europe and the U.S., and explores how the far right has evolved in the digital age, infiltrating mainstream discourse through social media and online platforms with Suraj Lakhani.Together they delve into the challenges faced by anti-fascist organisations, including threats and harassment, and the strategies employed to counteract these movements.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 30th June 2025.JOE MULHALLJoe is a historian, writer and Director of Research at the UK’s largest anti-fascism organisation, HOPE not hate. He has written several books including Drums in the Distance: Journeys in the Global Far Right and British Fascism After the Holocaust. He also writes for the Guardian about politics and extremism, and appears regularly on BBC News at Ten, Radio 4’s Today programme, The Moral Maze and Channel 4 News. His last documentary Undercover, has been nominated for a BAFTA.SURAJ LAKHANIDr Suraj Lakhani is a Lecturer within the School of Law, Politics and Sociology at the University of Sussex. He is also Director of the Sussex Terrorism and Extremism Research Network (STERN). Suraj’s research interests include extremism/terrorism and the internet, extremist subcultures, and counter-terrorism policy.

Cosmetic surgeries are at an all-time high, Ozempic is bringing back ‘heroin chic’ and TikTok, trad-wives are on the rise – after four waves of feminism, what went wrong?Despite decades of progress, the gains of the feminist movement feel more fragile than ever. But as Atlantic critic and Pulitzer Prize finalist Sophie Gilbert points out, this is not a unique moment. Feminism felt just as fragmented in the early 2000s, when the momentum of third-wave feminists and riot grrrls was squashed by lad culture and the commodification of Girl Power.In her new book, Girl on Girl, Sophie argues that we cannot move forward without fully reckoning with the ways pop culture has defined us and highlights a toxic pattern of progress and misogynistic backlash, claiming that every form of media, heavily influenced by the rise of porn, has shaped and warped women’s relationships with themselves and other women.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 18th June 2025.SOPHIE GILBERTSophie is a staff writer at The Atlantic where she covers TV, books, pop culture, and entertainment. In 2024 she won the National Magazine Award for Reviews and Criticism, and was the finalist for the 2022 Pulitzer Prize in Criticism. Girl on Girl is her first book.HANNAH MARTINHannah is the founder of What Follows, a communications agency amplifying brands and campaigns challenging taboos surrounding topics like health, sexuality and wealth. Her most recent work includes a campaign to end rape culture and promote sex education with MakeLoveNotPorn founder Cindy Gallop and activist Jameela Jamil.

In this timely and critical discussion on how the war in Ukraine is understood, interpreted, and justified within Russia, our panel of leading scholars - Jeremy Morris, Ilya Yablokov and Stefanie Ortmann - explore the narratives shaping Russian public opinion, the role of state propaganda, and the broader implications for Russian society and global geopolitics. Whether you're interested in international politics, post-Soviet studies, or the dynamics of information warfare, this conversation offers nuanced insights into one of the most consequential conflicts of our time, asking how ordinary Russians respond to the war, and how the boundaries between truth, belief, and coercion are navigated in a time of conflict. Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, 2nd June 2025.JEREMY MORRISJeremy is professor of Russian and Global Studies at the University of Aarhus in Denmark. He does ethnographic fieldwork in Russia and writes on many aspects of Russian politics and society. He is the author of books on the Russian working-class and rustbelt, Russian civil society, and Russian ‘everyday’ politics.ILYA YABLOKOVIlya is a lecturer in digital journalism and disinformation, and co-founder of the Disinformation Research Cluster, at the University of Sheffield. His research is on Russian disinformation, state-led conspiracy theories and the history of media post-1991. He’s written books on Russian conspiracy theories and Kremlin's propaganda and for the New York Times, BBC and Open Democracy.STEFANIE ORTMANN (CHAIR)Stefanie is Associate Professor in International Relations at the School of Global Studies, University of Sussex. She has previously taught at the American University of Central Asia, Bishkek, and at Royal Holloway, University of London. Her research is focused on relations between Russia and Central Asia.

How did wet nurses drive civilisation? Are women always the weaker sex? Is sexism useful for evolution? And are our bodies at war with our babies?Join Cat Bohannon as she discusses her first book Eve, with Sally Howard, and they delve into the past 200 million years to explain the specific science behind the development of the female sex. Bohannon's findings are not only a sweeping revision of human history, they're an urgent and necessary corrective for a world that has focused primarily on the male body for far too long.Recorded at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 26th May 2025.CAT BOHANNONCat is a researcher and author with a PhD from Columbia University in the evolution of narrative and cognition. Her essays and poems have appeared in Scientific American, Mind, Science Magazine, The Best American Nonrequired Reading, The Georgia Review, The Story Collider and Poets Against the War. Her latest book, Eve, was a New York Times bestseller and Guardian Best Book of The Year.SALLY HOWARDSally is a global health journalist and feminist academic. She is the author of ‘The Home Stretch: Why the Gender Revolution Stalled at the Kitchen Sink’ and the upcoming Vagina Inc. which explores reproductive technology, feminism and the resurgent Far Right.

The history of autism is male. It is time for women and girls to enter the spotlight.When autistic girls meet clinicians, they are often misdiagnosed with anxiety, depression, personality disorders – or receive no diagnosis at all. Autism’s ‘male spotlight’ means we are only now starting to redress this profound injustice.Renowned brain scientist Gina Rippon discusses her book, The Lost Girls of Autism, with Sophie Longley, which delves into the emerging science of female autism and asks why it has been systematically ignored for so long. Generations of researchers, convinced autism was a male problem, simply didn’t bother looking for it in women. But it is now becoming increasingly clear that many autistic women and girls do not fit the traditional, male, model of autism. Instead, they camouflage and mask, hiding their autistic traits to accommodate a society that shuns them.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, 13th May 2025.GINA RIPPONGina is Emeritus Professor of Cognitive Neuroimaging at the Aston Brain Centre, Birmingham. Her research involves state-of-the-art brain imaging techniques, investigating how the brain interacts with its world. She is an outspoken critic of outdated gender stereotypes in the field, and is the author of The Gendered Brain and The Lost Girls of Autism.SOPHIE LONGLEYSophie runs her own mentoring business for late-diagnosed (and identified) autistic women. She provides strengths-based mentoring in areas such as: reframing and processing a later in life autism diagnosis, employment & careers and self-advocacy skills. She is also an autism researcher and conducts research on the experiences of autistic women diagnosed in mid-late adulthood.

We tend to think of our memories as impressions of the past that remain fully intact, preserved somewhere inside our brains. In fact, we construct and reconstruct our memories every time we attempt to recall them. Join Ciara Greene, co-author of Memory Lane, as she discusses why our flawed memories are not a failure of evolution but rather a byproduct of the perfectly imperfect way our minds have evolved to solve problems.There are many benefits to our flexible yet fallible memory system, including helping us to maintain a coherent identity, sustain social bonds, and vividly imagine possible futures. But these flexible and easily distorted memories can also result in significant harm, leading us to provide erroneous eyewitness testimony or fall victim to fake news.Recoded live at The Nightingale Room, 16th April 2025.CIARA GREENECiara is associate professor in the School of Psychology at University College Dublin. She leads the Attention & Memory Laboratory, where she conducts research on memory and attention, with a particular focus on false memory.Dr SAM BERENSSam is a lecturer and researcher at the School of Psychology at Sussex University. His research focuses on the neuroscience of learning and memory and he also investigates what kinds of information are forgotten with time and why this happens.

Join two of the leading minds in the world of neuroscience, Kevin J. Mitchell and Anil Seth, as they explore one of the most profound questions in philosophy and science: Is there such a thing as free will? Delving into the realms of determinism and compatibilism, they'll examine whether our choices are truly free or governed by forces beyond our control.As neuroscientists probe ever deeper into the mechanics of decision making, many conclude that agency - or free will - is an illusion. In his book, Free Agents, Kevin Mitchell argues to the contrary, claiming that we are not mere machines responding to physical forces but agents acting with purpose. In his book, Being You, Anil Seth puts forward the theory that free will is not an 'uncaused cause' but a particular way of experiencing action generated within the brain and body. He argues that understanding free will involves recognising it as a perception of action, rather than an uncaused phenomenon.Don’t miss this thought-provoking conversation that will challenge your understanding of human agency, consciousness, and the nature of reality itself.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 1st April 2025.KEVIN MITCHELLKevin is an Associate Professor of Genetics and Neuroscience at Trinity College Dublin. His research is aimed at understanding the genetic program specifying the wiring of the brain and its relevance to variation in human faculties, especially to psychiatric and neurological disease and to perceptual conditions like synaesthesia. He also studies the biology of agency and free will.ANIL SETHAnil is Professor of Cognitive and Computational Neuroscience at the University of Sussex and Director of the Sussex Centre for Consciousness Science. He is also Co-Director of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research (CIFAR) Program on Brain, Mind, & Consciousness. He is the author of 'Being You: A New Science of Consciousness' which was awarded Best Science Book of 2021 by The Guardian and the Financial Times.

Why are a growing number of influencers like #tradwives dressing up like 1950s housewives and preaching total subservience to men? How did Johnny Depp and Amber Heard’s divorce become the centre of the anti-#MeToo backlash? Why have so many teen boys fallen under the thrall of Andrew Tate, a failed reality show contestant? In the years since #MeToo – the largest social media facilitated feminist campaign in history – Roe v. Wade has been overturned in the United States, there have been attacks on reproductive rights in multiple countries and female political leaders have withdrawn from the world stage citing the level of abuse they get as a reason.Join Cécile Simmons as she takes a deep dive, with Hannah Martin, into how a collection of misogynists and their allies have turned male supremacist ideology from a niche set of beliefs into a mainstream movement and outlines how to fight this rising tide and make online spaces more equal and inclusive.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 26th March 2025.CÉCILE SIMMONSCécile is a Research Manager at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD) where she leads projects focusing on online influence operations, election and public health mis/disinformation and gender-based violence. She has provided evidence to a range of government and tech industry stakeholders and written for media outlets including the Guardian, Politico, WIRED and GLAMOUR. She holds an MSc in International History from the London School of Economics.HANNAH MARTINHannah is the founder of What Follows, a communications agency amplifying brands and campaigns challenging taboos surrounding topics like health, sexuality and wealth. She has 12+ years’ experience leading communications for organisations, including counter-radicalisation and equity initiatives. Recent work includes a campaign to end rape culture and promote sex education with MakeLoveNotPorn founder Cindy Gallop and activist Jameela Jamil.

From periods and childbirth to menopause, female pain has been normalized, as society shrugs and says 'welcome to being a woman' instead of coming up with better solutions. But it doesn't have to be this way. Join award-winning journalist Marina Gerner as she takes an eye-opening look at the innovators challenging the status quo to deliver the healthcare solutions women need.In her new book, The Vagina Business, Marina interviewed entrepreneurs, researchers and investors across 15 countries, exploring the future of women's health, where female-focused companies are developing products to help women at every stage of life. From a life-saving bra to non-hormonal contraception and new takes on fertility and menopause, it shines a light on innovation that matters. Women should not be denied solutions to health issues just because people are embarrassed to talk about vaginas. We deserve much better.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 20th Janaury 2025.MARINA GERNER Marina is an award-winning financial journalist and columnist. Her work has been published in The Economist, Wall Street Journal, The Times, Financial Times, the Guardian, and Wired.She is an adjunct professor at the NYU Stern School of Business and has a PhD from the London School of Economics.SALLY HOWARDSally is a journalist and feminist academic. She holds a Master’s in Gender Studies and Law from SOAS, The University of London. She is also the author of ‘The Kama Sutra Diaries: Intimate Journeys Through Modern India’ and ‘The Home Stretch: Why the Gender Revolution Stalled at the Kitchen Sink’.

Rob Burley has been making political and current affairs TV since 1996, through seven General Elections and interviews with eight Prime Ministers. Offering a unique insight into the British political class during a time when no one appears to be telling the truth , Rob discusses his book ‘Why Is This Lying Bastard Lying to Me?’ - a deliciously irreverent insider’s account of a career spent trying to get straight answers from politicians - with Salma Shah.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 9th December, 2024.ROB BURLEYRob the former Editor of BBC Live Political Programmes running the department from 2018-2021 and the former Editor of The Andrew Marr Show on BBC1 and Deputy Editor of Newsnight. He currently works at Times Radio on Andrew Neil’s daily show. Other credits include senior roles at ITV and LBC/Global and two years as News Editor at Sky News working with Political Editor Beth Rigby. His memoir ‘Why Is This Lying Bastard Lying To Me’ has been dramatised for Channel 4, written by James Graham, directed by Steven Frears and starring Steve Coogan and Harriet Walter.SALMA SHAHSalma is the Director of Kraken Strategy Ltd. Previously, she was Special Adviser to the Home Secretary, Sajid Javid, from 2018-19. She served in the UK government from May 2014, in the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) and the Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government (MHCLG).Prior to this Salma was a journalist at the BBC, producing the Today programme on Radio 4.

Threats and abuse litter Marianna’s social media feeds. She is one of the most consistently trolled journalists working at the BBC. They infect her everyday life. Sometimes the people behind the messages try to find her in person. This seems to be the price of venturing into the world of conspiracy theories, hate and algorithms. And it turns out, she is far from alone.In 2020, Marianna became the BBC’s first disinformation and social media correspondent, and since then she has been trying to understand conspiracy-land. Where does the vitriol come from? What drives otherwise reasonable people to believe that almost everything – from the worst attacks and wars to global health crises and climate change – is a hoax designed to kill or control millions of us?Marianna Spring will be ‘In Conversation’ with Prof. Karen Douglas, discussing her new book ‘Among The Trolls’ , where she recounts the first-hand stories of the trolls and the trolled, those behind the information battle that threatens not just the way society works, but also some of the qualities we value most about being human: respect, fairness, tolerance, integrity and kindness.Recorded live at The Brighthelm Centre, Brighton, 25t h September 2024.MARIANNA SPRINGMarianna is the BBC's first disinformation and social media correspondent and an award-winning journalist. She has presented podcasts and documentaries investigating disinformation and social media for BBC Radio 4 podcasts - 'Death by Conspiracy', 'Disaster Trolls', 'Marianna in Conspiracyland' and'Why Do You Hate Me?' - as well as for BBC Panorama and BBC Three. She is also one of the presenters of the BBC's Americast podcast. In 2022, she was named the British Press Guild's Audio Presenter of the year and Royal Television Society Innovation winner.KAREN DOUGLASKaren is Professor of Social Psychology at the University of Kent and the director of the ERC funded project 'Conspiracy_FX - Consequences of conspiracy theories'. She studies the psychology of conspiracy theories, why they appeal to so many people, and the consequences of such beliefs on groups and societies.

Everything you know about capitalism is wrong - Free markets aren't really free. Record corporate pro­fits don't trickle down to everyone else. And we aren't empowered to make our own choices – they're made for us every day.Join acclaimed journalist Grace Blakeley 'In Conversation' with Siân Berry about her searingly explosive book, 'Vulture Capitalism', which takes on the world's most powerful corporations by arguing that the causes of our modern crisis are the intended result of our capitalist system. It's not broken, it's working exactly as planned. Grace attended the University of Oxford where she graduated with a first-class honours degree in philosophy, economics, and politics. She is a staff writer at Tribune Magazine and author of several books, including 'The Corona Crash: How the Pandemic will Change Capitalism' and 'Stolen: How to Save the World from Financialisation'.She is the former economics commentator for the New Statesman, and a former Research Fellow at the Institute of Public Policy Research. She appears frequently in UK and international media, including appearances on BBC Question Time, ITV's Good Morning Britain, Talk TV's Piers Morgan Uncensored and MTV News.SIÂN BERRYSiân served as a co-leader of the Green Party from 2018 and as its sole leader since 2021. Berry was a Green Party councillor on Camden Council for 10 years, representing Highgate until 2023 and was also a member of the London Assembly from 2016 until she resigned earlier this year. Siân was the Green mayoral candidate in 2008, 2016 and 2021, and the Green Party MP for Brighton Pavilion constituency.

Content Warning:This episode contains references to racist language and experiences of racism. Some listeners may find this content distressing or uncomfortable. Listener discretion is advised."This guy has better Punjabi than both of us and he’s only half Punjabi." Only. Half. When Jassa heard those words he felt diminished. The intent was not malicious, but he felt robbed of something essential to him.Born to a white English mum and a brown Punjabi dad, actor Jassa Ahluwalia described himself as ‘half Indian, half English’. His fluent Punjabi always prompted bewilderment and the world of casting taught him he wasn’t ‘the right kind of mixed-race’. Feeling caught between two worlds, it wasn’t long before Jassa embarked on a call to action: we need to change how we think and talk about mixed identity.Jassa discusses his upbringing and the journey of self-discover writing his book, Both Not Half - part-memoir, part-manifesto - with BBC correspondent Rajini Viadyanathan.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 4th September 2024.JASSA AHLUWALIAJassa is an actor and writer. He spoke English in the playground, Punjabi with his grandparents, and spent various summer holidays in India. He came to prominence as Rocky in the hit BBC Three series Some Girls, followed by starring roles in Unforgotten, Ripper Street, and Peaky Blinders.His TEDx talk on ‘How Language Shapes Identity’ clocked up over 250k views and his BBC One documentary Am I English? won an Asian Media Award in 2022.RAJINI VIADYANATHANRajini is an award winning broadcaster with 20 years experience, across TV, Radio and Online. As a foreign correspondent she reported from across the world and has also been a Westminster correspondent for the BBC.

There are many routes to mental wellbeing and award-winning neuroscientist Camilla Nord is at the forefront of finding them. In her ground-breaking book, The Balanced Brain, she offers a revelatory tour of the scientific and technological developments that are revolutionising the way we think about mental health, showing why and how events - and treatments - can affect people in such different ways.Camilla reframes mental health as an intricate, self-regulating process, one which is different for all of us, and shows that with so many factors at play, there are more possibilities for recovery and resilience than we might think.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 21st August 2024.CAMILLA NORD Camilla read physiology, psychology, and philosophy at Magdalen College, Oxford, before completing a PhD in Neuroscience at University College London. She is the Assistant Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of Cambridge and also leads the Mental Health Neuroscience programme of research at the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit at the University of Cambridge.HUGO CRITCHLEYHugo is Foundation Chair of Psychiatry at Brighton and Sussex Medical School and co-director of the Sackler/Sussex Centre of Consciousness Science. He was a principal investigator at the Wellcome Department of Imaging Neuroscience, UCL Institute of Neurology and group leader at the UCL Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience.

In his book ‘The Weight of Nature’ award-winning journalist and neuroscientist, Clayton Page Aldern, argues that the warming climate is not just affecting our planet – it is changing our minds, brains and bodies, too.An impassioned work of research and storytelling, Clayton’s book is the first on a burgeoning public health crisis that is largely going unreported – how the climate is changing our biology.The moment Clayton Aldern understood this was reading a 2015 Pentagon report for the Dept of Defense, who worried about the global climate’s ability to ‘aggravate existing problems’ like poverty and social tensions. But the conflict and crime spikes detailed by contemporary researchers couldn’t be pinned to income or food security; There was something else going on.The Weight of Nature is the product of seven years of ground-breaking research. Clayton travelled the world to meet the scientists and doctors working at the intersections of environmental science, psychology and neuroscience to synthesise a new, interdisciplinary approach to a novel field — the neuroscience of climate change.Recorded live at The Nightingale Room, Brighton, 22nd April 2024.CLAYTON PAGE ALDERNClayton is a data scientist and neuroscientist, turned environmental journalist working at the intersection of climate change, environmental degradation, neuroscience, and mental health. He holds a master’s in neuroscience and a master’s in public policy from the University of Oxford. He is also a research affiliate at the Center for Studies in Demography and Ecology at the University of Washington.CHARLOTTE RAECharlotte is a senior lecturer in psychology at Sussex University . She studied Experimental Psychology and Neuroscience at Oxford University , and for a PhD at Cambridge University using MRI brain scanning to understand the human mind.Charlotte is particularly interested in the environmental impacts of academic activities and is the Founding Chair of the Organisation for Human Brain Mapping's Sustainability and Environment Action Special Interest Group.