Debates
Debates are at the heart of HowTheLightGetsIn - where ideas collide and new thinking takes shape.
Explore the debates and panels that happened at HowTheLightGetsIn London 2025 by clicking the boxes below.
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Debates are at the heart of HowTheLightGetsIn - where ideas collide and new thinking takes shape.
Explore the debates and panels that happened at HowTheLightGetsIn London 2025 by clicking the boxes below.
The idea that the brain is computational has from the outset been central to neuroscience. The brain is a problem-solving machine operating according to the principles of mathematical logic, and stores memories, and processes information, as a computer. But despite the advance of AI, an increasing number challenge this assumption. Computers use transistors to build elementary logic gates, enabling them to store files exactly, in 0s and 1s. They are precise and perform identically on each occasion. Human brains are biological, the neurons do not operate as simple logic gates but have thousands of inputs and their output is dependent on past activity and its current internal state. Remove a computer’s processor, and it breaks. But humans can survive with only one brain hemisphere. Fundamentally, brains think and enable perception and consciousness while computers do not.
Is it a mistake to see the brain as computational and do we need to abandon the analogy? Are computers at root dumb machines with little in common with the sophistication of the brains of living things? Or have computers uncovered the essential character of all thought?
Many see populism with its focus on immigration and nationalism as not only politically dangerous but morally wrong. This reflects the universalist morality of all of the main Western moral frameworks, from utilitarianism to Kant's rule-based morality. But critics argue moral universalism has generated policies that favour strangers over the interest of those close to us and that it is profoundly mistaken. In contrast, Chinese Confucian morality accepts partiality towards our nearest. And recent studies have shown that in practice we favour those close to us and more so the closer they are. What's more a 2021 study concluded that we also think we are morally right to act in this partial way.
Do we need to abandon moral universalism, and see it as an overreach of an Enlightenment attachment to reason that flies in the face of our actions and what is beneficial for society? Have the excesses of moral universalism been responsible for the rise of populism? Or is moral universalism essential to the value system of the West and abandoned at great peril to ourselves and the world?
A central question in ancient Greek philosophy was the problem of the One and the Many. It is a question that has echoed across Western culture and is still with us today in contemporary physics. Should we see the world as a coherent whole or a multitude of separate parts? The puzzle is that we need both the whole and the parts, but an explanation of the relationship between them has proved problematic and perhaps unknowable. In contemporary physics, the parts are the teaming world of particle physics, and these should make up the cosmological world of the universe as a whole and the overall framework of Einsteinian space-time. But we haven't been able to combine the two coherently.
Should we recognise that looking at the universe from the small scale and the large, is always going to be incompatible? Does it mean a theory of everything is an illusion and the attempt to combine quantum mechanics and Einstein a forlorn project? Or is the parallel with the ancient Greek puzzle accidental and the current challenge one that might be overcome?
The nature of human experience, or consciousness, has divided thinkers for centuries. The Scottish philosopher Hume saw experience as nothing more than a bundle of perceptions, and denied the existence of a self holding them all together. Kant disagreed, arguing that sensation had to be organised by concepts for there to be experience. It is a debate that has echoed through the Western tradition. You might think science would have settled the matter, but the same dispute is still present amongst neuroscientists. Some argue that sensation is independent of how we think, a neutral bedrock of data which enables us to experience reality. While others claim what we take to be reality is an illusion created by our brain.
Do our thoughts and concepts shape and structure experience and what we take to be reality? Are current theories of neuroscience taking sides in this deeper underlying philosophical dispute? Does the existence of the self and the nature of reality depend on our philosophical outlook, or is there a fact of the matter that we might uncover?
We think of our scientific accounts of the universe as well-founded and value-free. The Big Bang theory is surely one of those. But critics argue this is not the case. The origin of the theory is not so neutral. It was first proposed by a Catholic priest, Georges Lemaître, who was also a theoretical physicist. He initially called it the ""hypothesis of the primeval atom"" – the primeval atom being created by God. Unsurprising, as the father of cosmic inflation Alan Guth put it, the Big Bang “says nothing about what banged, why it banged, or what happened before it banged."" Increasingly, critics claim, there are challenges to the theory as the religious origins and miraculous character of the Big Bang result in ever more convoluted cosmological theories to account for our observations.
Will the future be one where we see all ideas, even scientific, as motivated by the perspective of the author? Should the fact the Big Bang was proposed by a religious thinker lead us to question its validity? Or is it possible to see past personal bias, and reach objective truth?
We have for centuries in the West sought technological progress. But now some are making the radical claim that technology is the future of the human race. 'Effective accelerationists' have won high-profile Silicon Valley support and claim we should accelerate technology and ""usher in the next evolution of consciousness, creating unthinkable next-generation lifeforms."" Alongside, transhumanists such as Yuval Harari and Ray Kurzweil claim ""Homo sapiens is an obsolete algorithm"" and that soon ""there won't be a distinction between humans and technology.” Others go further arguing eternal life is an achievable, biological, scientific goal, and the creation of an artificial general intelligence, ""a digital God"", can solve human suffering. But critics fear this proposed future, calling transhumanism ""the world’s most dangerous idea”.
Is the future one where technology is not merely a source of innovation but the basis for a new account of what it is to be human and the ultimate goal of human endeavour? Does this new vision offer potential or disaster for the human race? Or are claims of eternal life and new forms of intelligence just fanciful nonsense?
From the Crusades to the fight against Hitler, from US intervention in Vietnam to the Iraq war, morality has often been used to validate military campaigns and foreign policy goals. But perhaps no longer. Trump's emphasis on ""America First"" makes little attempt to hold the moral high ground and declares self-interest alone. Securing US mineral rights in Ukraine is not proposed as a moral strategy. Meanwhile, Sweden's Foreign Minister recently renounced the aim of being a 'moral great power' and the UK has embraced 'realism' in foreign affairs. While many warn that discarding morality leads to a dangerous world where might is right, others point to the terrors and tragedies carried out in the name of morality, from the Inquisition to the Nazis who urged the moral necessity of 'cleansing Europe'.
In world affairs, is the new age one where moral claims are abandoned and instead self-interest is the goal? Given radically different national perspectives, are the universal claims of morality necessarily impossible? Or is a language of morality essential to constrain belligerent leaders and their wild and sometimes tyrannical fantasies?
From Democritus to Einstein, we have assumed the world is made of tiny building blocks of matter. But the more we’ve looked for them, the more they’ve disappeared. Our best theory now proposes the world is better described by ‘fields’ that don’t have the familiar properties of physical bits, things, or particles. Yet physicists still refer to particles though few seem to agree on their nature. Some say they ‘approximately exist’ and others that they don’t exist at all. Stranger still, there are ‘quasiparticles’ that we can treat as particles and enable us to solve equations but which we know aren't real.
Will we give up thinking that the world is made of particles at all, and instead embrace a world of fields and relationships alone? Furthermore, will we abandon the idea that anything exists at a fundamental level? Or are things and particles necessary for us to have a viable account of the world at all?
The leaders of liberal democracies have assumed that democracy is not only the best political system but that it delivers the strongest economies. Biden's Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, recently claimed democracy delivers a '20% higher GDP per capita'. But critics argue this is illusory. China’s state-led authoritarian capitalism has radically outpaced the West. Thirty years ago the UK's economy was five times that of China, today China's economy is five times the UK's. Meanwhile Singapore’s model of illiberal capitalism, despite being resource poor, has surpassed many European nations' GDP per capita by a substantial margin. While Russia's economy, far from being strangled by Western sanctions, has grown in the past few years.
Will the most successful economies of the future not be democratic but be autocratically run? Are democracies undermined by their need to avoid policies that deliver short-term pain even if they have the potential for lasting benefit? Or will authoritarian economic success in due course be overturned by political breakdown and dissent?
It was President Obama who said, “we hang on to our values… what else is there to guide us?” And typically those on the left have championed universal moral values like equality and compassion while making the case for growing the welfare state. But across the West, from Trump’s re-election to the rise of parties like Reform, many no longer seem convinced by this vision. In response, some on the left propose a shift from compassionate welfarism to a more hard-nosed politics focused on work, productivity and national industry. In the UK, Kier Starmer promises to put “Britain first,” investing in defence while cutting welfare spending.
Is the future of the left a replacement of welfare with work, and moralism with realism? Is it returning to the mantra of socialist playwright Bertold Brecht that “Grub comes first, then morality”? Or will the left mount a defence of the politics of kindness in the face of populist firebrands, or create a completely new rallying call for left-wing politics altogether?
Liberalism is no religion, no world view, no party of special interests,” claimed von Mises. Liberalism wasn't supposed to define 'the good', but rather ensure the individual freedom to define it ourselves. But opponents argue liberalism's supposed neutrality is an illusion, and that it is in fact universalist, prescriptive, and obstructive to alternatives. The Russian philosopher and critic of the West, Alexander Dugin, argues, “the individual subject is no longer the result of choice, but is a kind of mandatory given.” Indeed, for some, the label 'liberal' is no longer immediately associated with freedom or tolerance and equates with intolerance and censorship.
Was it a profound mistake to see liberalism as neutral? Is the new world one in which liberalism is seen as an ideology alongside other political beliefs, and no less partisan, and no more desirable? Or does liberalism allow for the only freedom which deserves the name, and must it therefore be fought for and defended?
After millennia of autocratic rule, we see democracy as the way to prevent tyranny and power accumulating in the hands of the few. But democracy has not prevented power from concentrating in corporations, in media giants, in government bureaucracies and amongst the educated elite. Some question whether democratic governments are really sovereign or whether a host of other unelected institutions and organisations are in control. The left point to the power of giant corporations and to the highly concentrated ownership of media and social media organisations. The right to the influence of bureaucrats or the so-called 'deep state', and left-leaning academic elites who control education and influence government policy.
Can democracy prevent the concentration of power without itself becoming tyrannical? Are attacks on federal employees or universities a victory over unelected elites or the abuse of government? Is democracy unable to control the accumulation of power and should we instead see value in the competing power of an oligarchy of organisations each of which need to be defended and constrained?
Bringing mental illness into the open was hailed as a breakthrough. Today, over half of Americans are comfortable discussing their emotional well-being, with openness and self-awareness now key pillars of mental health care. But recently both have come under fire. Despite greater openness, rates of anxiety, depression, and self-diagnosed disorders have soared across the West. The former chair of the American Psychological Association warns of ‘rampant’ diagnostic inflation as a result of medicalising normal behaviour, whilst studies from the National Institute of Health reveal that widespread mental health messaging may actually harm many individuals.
With this growing awareness, will the future be one where we shift from protecting people from discomfort to preparing them for it, normalising pain, and seeing it as a natural part of life? Or will we continue to see diagnostic inflation, and will this be a positive step towards our wellbeing? More radically, should we see mental health issues as primarily social rather than medical?
At the outset of the use of the term, to be on the right was to back the aristocracy, authority, and the status quo. In contrast, the liberals, known as Whigs in 18th-century Britain, backed change, freedom, and the rights of the individual. But in recent decades to be in favour of the free market and against the state itself came to be seen as right-wing. Now there's a further twist. The new populist right, often described as far right by its critics, has become critical of some aspects of the free market. Trump's tariffs are in support of current jobs and against the market. Le Pen is against big corporations. Reform in favour of state ownership of key services.
Is the populist right opposed to liberalism and the free market? Does this mark a change in what it is to be right-wing, or was it a mistake to see populism as far right in the first place? Or is there an unavoidable conflict on the right between maintaining the status quo and being conservative, and enabling change through the free market?
It is widely assumed that our language and theories are in principle capable of capturing the true state of reality. But many philosophers from Hume and Kant, to Nietzsche, Wittgenstein and Derrida, have challenged this account of language, sometimes referred to as 'naive realism'. And increasingly scientists and neuroscientists are also abandoning ultimate truth in favour of seeing theories as models of reality. But in the new post-truth world, how are we to choose between our models, if there is no neutral perspective from which to view them?
If our language and frameworks don’t mirror reality, is it enough to see them as useful tools? Is there a fundamental paradox that if language can't capture reality, we can't know that either? And how are we to avoid an outcome where those with the greatest influence impose their perspective on the rest of us?
Sparta focussed on physical prowess and bodily perfection. Athens on intellectual pursuit and artistic excellence. In large part Western culture sided with Athens. Descartes placed thought at the centre of identity and since then the West has tended to put intelligence and creativity above all else and sought through education and practice to refine them. But a new world may be upon us. Problem-solving skills appear to be in decline. The share of US adults unable to use mathematical reasoning to assess statements has risen to a high of 35%. In 2022, less than half reported reading a book. While research warns that outsourcing work to AI can result in forgetting how to think ourselves. Meanwhile, we are increasingly health and body-conscious and focus more on external appearance over our internal worlds.
Is the Athenian age of the intellect over, and are we seeing a return to a new form of Spartan values? Are we endangering our intellect and spending less time in thoughtful pursuits? Or was the focus on thought itself a mistake and an avoidance of reality and the simplicity and value of physical being?
Bill Clinton in 2000 describing the Human Genome Project and the mapping of human DNA, successfully completed three years later, said ""Today we are learning the language in which God created life. It will revolutionize the diagnosis, prevention and treatment of most, if not all, human diseases.” But while we have identified some diseases that have direct genetic markers, we have not found genes responsible for the great majority of common conditions. Nor have we found widespread genetic cures. Moreover, the initial research was focused not only on those of European descent but largely from a single American individual, making its predictions even less effective and in some instances dangerous and life-threatening.
Have we to abandon the idea that genes are a blueprint for life and disease? Is the reality that many other factors are responsible for our health and abilities? As we get an increasing understanding of the complexity of the elements involved, will we be able to deliver on the initial promise and claims to end disease or is the dream in fact a mirage?
In pursuit of the mantra of Making America Great Again, many see Trump as having upended the very idea of the West, breaking with the notion of allies working together in favour of the US pursuing its interest against all others. But some claim the outcome will be very different: the Making of Europe Great Again. Europe’s combined GDP and standard of living for most of the post-war era was far greater than either the US or China. Critics argue that by relying on American military defence, and ceding global leadership to the US, Europe lost its rightful place as a global leader and its motivation and incentive to focus on productivity and technological progress.
Is the new world one where Europe regains its global voice, and once again targets production and growth? Will the necessity to provide its own defence drive research and boost output? Can Europe find a leadership structure and cultural momentum to make it once again an economic powerhouse and a leader in global affairs, or is it destined to be a minor player to the global giants of the future?
Once the study of the physical universe was described as 'natural philosophy'. It is even today used as the name for physics in some Oxford University courses. But for more than a century, science has been seen as a neutral examination of facts and evidence and to have thrown off its philosophical roots. Yet critics argue this is an illusion as science carries the perspective and prejudices of those involved. Moreover many leading scientists see scientific theories as models of the world, in which case the choice of which model to adopt would seem a philosophical choice rather than a purely empirical one.
Should we conclude science and philosophy both require the other? Currently only 3% of academic philosophy papers cite scientific evidence, should philosophy abandon armchair reasoning and instead test its theories against the world? Might the future be one where science and philosophy are again seen as a single discipline, and if so will this lead to faster and more beneficial change, or will it undermine progress and lead to pointless debate?
Our primary mode of storytelling, whether in novels or films, has been to portray a realistic account of events. The modernism of Joyce and Woolf in the early 20th century challenged this approach by offering subjective perspectives and stream-of-consciousness writing. Now a new anti-realism is taking this attack further. Influenced by postmodern philosophers like Derrida and Baudrillard, a range of novelists including VanderMeer and Tamsyn Muir, and filmmakers, Yorgos Lanthimos and Oscar winner Guillermo del Toro, call into question the reality of the real, using fragmentation, metafiction and absurdity. This new anti-realism is not about escapism. As Frida Kahlo said, “I never painted dreams. I painted my own reality.”
Has realism limited us for centuries, forcing a focus on observations and rejecting the unseen, and the mystical? Will abandoning the norms of literary realism help us embrace realities outside of the Western, scientific, Enlightenment perspective? Or will realism always dominate due to its incomparable ability to frame narratives and offer insight into our lives?
At the height of the Victorian era, the poet Matthew Arnold captured the mood of the time using the metaphor of the waves on Dover Beach to refer to the long slow retreat of the sea of faith. Since then many have assumed reason and scientific advance would gradually overturn, and even eradicate, religion and mysticism. But although there has been a widespread European decline in church attendance, religious belief has not been eradicated and recent surveys show young Westerners are more drawn to mysticism and spirituality than their grandparents. Furthermore critics argue that belief in science and progress itself displays a mystical faith in the power of reason.
Should we conclude that we all have to worship somebody or something, whether it be gods, leaders or principles? Will the future be one where we see a return to an open acceptance of mysticism and spirituality? Or is there time yet for reason and science to put an end to religious belief?
Reason was supposedly the great liberator – an Enlightenment gift that freed us from blind adherence to tradition and the authority of church and state. But today, many now contend this is a comforting myth. For as Benjamin Franklin put it, reason merely helps us “make a reason for everything one already has a mind to do.” Furthermore, studies confirm people with more developed reasoning skills are more susceptible to groupthink and polarization, not less. For the more rational we are, the better we are at justifying what we already believe – especially when it aligns with our social circle.
Is the future one where we accept tribalism and conflict as inherent to the human condition, where moral and scientific beliefs based on reason are badges, shaped by class, nation, ethnicity and culture? Or is reason more important than ever, not as a route to truth, but as a means to test the effectiveness and consequences of a given outlook? And can we reclaim reason as a method for resisting the crowd rather than following it?
For more than a century there has been a divide in Western philosophy between two distinct approaches, often described as analytic and continental philosophy. Analytic philosophy is predominantly based in the English-speaking world taking its name from Bertrand Russell’s philosophy of logical analysis that overthrew the grand Hegelian metaphysics of the 19th century. It did so in favour of a focus on logic and linguistic precision, with the assumption that science would do the serious work of uncovering the nature of reality. Continental philosophy based primarily in France and Germany, has offered a broad range of outlooks on the nature of the human condition and the world. It has been defined by its critics simply in opposition to analytic philosophy.
Few thinkers have bridged the divide to be taken seriously by both camps. Yet both traditions now have deep challenges. The original focus of analytic philosophy has become increasingly blurred and its goal of uncovering the relationship between language and the world widely abandoned with some claiming it has failed. While following the dominance of postmodernism continental philosophy has struggled to find a response to its widely recognised flaws, and in France English speaking philosophy is in vogue.
What is the future of European thought? Are we seeing the end of the analytic and continental divide? Or is the Enlightenment tradition itself under threat and with it the influence and identity of European philosophy?
From Medusa, the Greek priestess punished for breaking her vow of celibacy, to Adam’s first wife Lilith, the Western tradition has taught us to fear erotic power and the unruly, dangerous women who embody it. In response, feminists have tried to break free from what they see as patriarchal control of sexuality. Sex work has been central to this, and is now undergoing a new revolution. With sites like OnlyFans allowing creators to keep 80% of their earnings and with some making upwards of $1 million a week, many claim women’s erotic power is being liberated. But for others, this new world contains new threats. Critics say OnlyFans is ""exploitation masked as liberation"", and point to studies into OnlyFans which suggest the platform is rife with underage content, deepfakes, impersonation, and blackmail.
Is the mobilisation of erotic power a vehicle or a threat to feminism? Do sites like OnlyFans and sex work empower women or undermine them? Or is the digitalisation of sex itself the problem, leading us to shun real-life intimacy and connection?
We turn to evidence to settle the matter. Although its origins go back to the ancient Greeks, it was the Enlightenment that embedded the idea that facts and evidence confirm a claim or a scientific theory. But in a world of competing perspectives, the notion of neutral evidence is no longer straightforward. From Ukraine to Greenland, one person's territorial ambition is another's defensive strategy. Some argue all so-called 'facts' are dependent on perspective. And whether we accept evidence becomes a judgment rather than a truth - an outcome embedded in the English courts with opposing narratives each employing their own 'evidence'. Equally, physicists sometimes operate with different models of reality, recognising the possibility of alternative frameworks.
Is the future one where we conclude evidence never settles the matter, and accept that our views are dependent on judgment rather than the impartial facts of the matter? Will this be a world that leaves us victim to the views and desires of the strong and powerful? Or is the coherence required to find evidence within a given perspective sufficient to arrive at good and effective accounts of the world?
We once assumed liberal democracy – with its freedoms, individualism, and belief in progress – would lead the way in solving global challenges such as climate change and environmental damage. However, the evidence suggests the tables are being turned and that authoritarian regimes are surpassing their liberal counterparts. In 2024, China invested over $625 billion in clean energy and installed more solar and wind capacity than the rest of the world combined. Any progress liberal countries have made has been made possible by China's green tech leadership, supply chains, and key minerals. 95 % of solar panels installed in the EU in 2024 were imported from China.
Is liberal democracy unsuited to getting action on global challenges? Is climate action better achieved by authoritarian governments? With liberalism faced with these challenges, what political system can best solve our 21st-century crises?
For centuries tariffs were an obvious way to raise revenue, and protect a nation's agriculture and industry from foreign competition. Then in the mid-19th century, backed by the economic theories of Ricardo and Adam Smith, Britain abolished the Corn Laws and became the first nation to advocate free trade. Despite the temporary reintroduction of tariffs during the 1930s depression, free trade gradually became widely accepted as creating a prosperous, peaceful world, with more innovation and lower costs. Yet now, it is not only Trump who favours tariffs. The left-wing Democrat Bernie Sanders argues: "Not only must we end disastrous unfettered free trade agreements with China, Mexico, and other countries, we must fight so that American products, not jobs, are our number one export."
Is the future one where free trade is dead and high tariffs are the norm? Will this rescue the declining industries of the US, protect jobs and reduce debt? Or will it undermine trade, reduce innovation, raise prices, lock workers into industries that in the long term will fail anyway, and lead to a global recession?
The liberal consensus is that we live in a patriarchy and we need to overcome the inherent discrimination against women and champion their rights. But this consensus is under threat. And not just from Trump and his followers. Educationalists are increasingly calling for action as boys underperform girls in every age group at school. Girls are a third more likely to go to university and, in the immediate years following, the gender pay gap is ten percent in their favour. Moreover, they claim this is the reason for the popularity of figures like Andrew Tate and for young men voting for the right, with three times as many committing suicide than women.
With 57% of Gen Z men in the UK believing that men are discriminated against, and 1 in 5 preferring unelected leaders to democracy, is there a risk to social order and even democracy itself? Will traditional masculine values of strength, courage and determination, return to dominate social and political life? Or are feminist gains sufficiently embedded in culture to stave off the threat of a newly confident and aggressive masculinity?
The Enlightenment was founded on the idea that facts and information would enable us to understand the world and help us make it a better place. So it is not surprising that at the outset of the internet era, we imagined that it would be a good thing for us all to have access to as much information as possible. But many now complain that we are overwhelmed by it. Moreover, critics argue information is never neutral and always presented from a point of view and a potentially hidden agenda. A so-called 'view from nowhere' is impossible and information and data inevitably contains bias. Late philosopher Bruno Latour argued that facts ""are not discovered but constructed.” While data scientist Cathy O'Neil states, ""Algorithms are opinions embedded in code.""
Is there no such thing as information since it cannot be neutral in the first place and more information not desirable? Do we need gatekeepers to sift and assess 'information' for us? Or is access to raw information not only liberating but vital to respond to a world of unsupported opinion?
From nuclear disasters like Chernobyl to the immense force of nuclear weapons, for much of the last 50 years, nuclear power has been seen by many as dangerous, environmentally problematic, and undesirable. But the tide has turned. Nuclear power is now endorsed as carbon-free, abundant, clean energy. The US is aiming to quadruple output in the next three decades. Britain is committed to building eight small nuclear reactors. Thirty countries have signed a pledge to triple nuclear power capacity. Yet critics claim we still lack a solution to nuclear waste, and the threat of a catastrophic nuclear accident has not gone away.
Is our criticism or endorsement of nuclear power driven by emotion rather than evidence? What is it about the technology that inspires such fear and such great hope, and are either justified? And crucially, is atomic power the future of energy or a dangerous mistake?
For a couple of centuries the rise in the urban population and its increasing importance in elections has looked inexorable. But no longer. Recent elections have shown the impact of a resurgent rural vote that rejects city ways of life. J D Vance's 2016 book Hillbilly Elegy identified the dissatisfaction of rural America, and Trump has gone on to describe American cities as 'killing fields', 'cesspools' and 'sh***holes'. Mass rural protests have been seen with the Gilets Jaunes in France and the Dutch farmer movement. Rural voices that have been ""left behind"" are driving politics and culture with a 32% greater Republican support in rural areas.
Will rural values become ever more influential in culture? Has the internet made it possible for rural voters to become more organised, and will it reverse the population shift to the town as more choose to live in the countryside and work remotely? Are we witnessing a long-term shift to the right, or is the political split between rural and urban one that might be reversed?
Central to Western thought has been the idea that through science and technology we are able to understand the world and improve our circumstances. Green tech is seemingly a contemporary example, with the aim of providing a clean solution to our energy needs. But critics argue the solution is flawed. The production of solar panels, wind turbines, and batteries is energy-intensive, fossil fuel-reliant, and generates toxic waste. Electric cars require six times the mineral inputs of conventional ones. Demand for the resources is generating international tension and encouraging land grabs for supplies across Africa, South America, and in the US 'deal' to own Ukrainian mines.
Is it a mistake to see science and technology as the primary means to solve our problems? Does technology necessarily bring its own risks and embed an exploitative relation to the natural world? Or is it the miraculous means by which human experience has been transformed from short lives devoted to finding food, shelter and safety to ones where everyday needs and comforts are provided for the great majority?
A UK First. Back To Big Thinking
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