The Cabaret Of Dangerous Ideas

Join The Cabaret of Dangerous Ideas and challenge your preconceptions on hot button issues!

Are Children Wild Enough?

Are today’s children too disconnected from nature? Are we over-protective of young people? Do we need to re-wild childhood? Commentators suggest that contemporary lifestyles are detrimental not just to children’s health and happiness, but also, their understanding of, and relationship with, nature. Words are disappearing from their mental dictionaries and they’re more able to identify Pokémon species than animals. But what is ‘nature’ and where is ‘the wild’? How might we redress this supposed imbalance? Nina Morris (The University of Edinburgh) argues the case for a wilder childhood.

Call the Tooth Fairy!

Most academic research needs to be more relevant, produced more quickly and for less money. Is this possible? Jan Clarkson (University of Dundee & NHS Education for Scotland) shares her latest ground-breaking research - and you may be surprised by the results! How often should you go to the dentist? Can their patients take charge of research and predict dementia, locate defibrillators and diagnose disease from biopsies? Should research be conducted differently? Oh, and is the tooth fairy the answer?

Don’t Bank on the Bankers

A decade on from the financial crash, Rachel Findlay (Edinburgh Napier University) explores how bankers shafted us, crashing their banks and our economies; how they got it so badly wrong, and what they could have done differently. The mechanisms behind the worst crash since 1929 are laid bare, with blame suitably apportioned to those in charge – politicians, bankers and regulators. A combination of sophisticated information technology and greed led to banks offering loans to many who should never have been enticed into debt. Yet this didn’t happen in every country; some were spared the pain.