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HowTheLightGetsIn London 2024 welcomes philosophical revolutionaries, scientific trailblazers, political rebels and creative icons to navigate our era of uncertainty this September. From party leaders and Putin adversaries to Nobel Laureates and Turing Award winners explore the leading minds set to join us so far!
Check out the full lineup of speakers or keep exploring the Big Ideas coming to Hampstead Heath with our full programme...
Sam Harris, joining us from the US via Zoom, is the author of five New York Times best sellers, including Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion. His writing and public lectures cover a wide range of topics—neuroscience, meditation, moral philosophy, religion, rationality—but generally focus on how a growing understanding of ourselves and the world is changing our sense of how we should live.
Sam received a degree in philosophy from Stanford University and a Ph.D. in neuroscience from UCLA. He has practiced meditation for over 30 years and has studied with many Tibetan, Indian, Burmese, and Western meditation teachers, both in the United States and abroad.
"In almost any circumstances I always ask ‘but how did it get like this? How did it start?"
Philippa Gregory CBE is a renowned writer and author of historical fiction. She is best known for The Other Boleyn Girl (2001), which was adapted into two films and in 2002 won the Romantic Novel of the Year Award from the Romantic Novelists' Association.
A member of the Society of Authors, Gregory was presented with the Outstanding Contribution to Historical Fiction Award in 2016 and an Honorary Platinum Award by Nielsen in 2018. Gregory was the founder of Gardens for the Gambia, a charity that funded almost 200 wells in Gambian primary schools.
"Gregory has made an impressive career out of breathing passionate, independent life into the historical noblewomen." — The Telegraph
“See you, either in Hell, or in Communism.”
Slavoj Žižek infamously said “Humanity is OK, but 99% of people are boring idiots” - Žižek himself is certainly neither boring nor an idiot. Žižek is arguably the most provocative philosopher of our times. Foreign Policy named Žižek a Top 100 Global Thinker "for giving voice to an era of absurdity”. With never a dull moment, Žižek breathes new life into Marxism, Hegel, psychoanalysis, philosophy, politics, film and culture.
Žižek, joining us from Slovenia via Zoom, is the author of more than 50 books, including most recently Christian Atheism: How to Be a Real Materialist. He is a senior researcher at the University of Ljubljana's Department of Philosophy.
“There is something inexplicably touching about all Žižek's mischievous bombast” - The Guardian
"Voters are distraught by the direction the Conservatives have been taking this country."
Carla is co-leader of the Green Party of England and Wales, elected along with Adrian Ramsay in October 2021. Carla is the Green Party’s candidate for Bristol Central in the upcoming General Election.
Before this, Carla was a Bristol City Councillor from 2015 to 2024, forming a critical part of the largest Green
councillor group in the UK which saw unprecedented success at the May local elections in 2021. Carla stepped back from her Councillor role in 2024 to focus on her General Election campaign. Carla is an engineer, previously working in the renewable energy industry with a specialism in offshore and onshore wind energy.
"Who should hold the next prime minister to account? Our best hope lies with the Green Party." — George Monbiot, The Guardian
"Quantum mechanics makes absolutely no sense."
Roger Penrose is a world-renowned mathematician, mathematical physicist, philosopher of science and Nobel Laureate in Physics. He is best known for his work on general relativity and sharing the Wolf Prize for Physics with Stephen Hawking for his work on black holes. Additionally, he is the author of The Road to Reality, Cycles of Time and Shadows of the Mind.
Penrose is a significant physics and philosophy populariser making appearances on the BBC, Closer to Truth, and even the Joe Rogan Experience - the largest podcast in the world.
"Sir Roger Penrose’s research has had a profound impact on human understanding of the universe and of the fundamental laws of physics that govern the universe." — Stephen Hawking Foundation
'You don't make the UK more level by making London Poorer'
Sadiq Khan is the current Mayor of London, former MP and human rights lawyer. He has had an extensive political career, most recently winning an unprecedented third term as Mayor. Prior to the mayoralty, Sadiq was an MP and member of the Shadow Cabinet under Ed Miliband where he held the posts of Shadow Secretary of State for Justice, Lord Chancellor, and Minister for London.
Throughout his time as Mayor, he has placed climate change, air quality, and social issues at the heart of his mayoralty. He has recently authored a book Breatheabout his approach to climate change and his campaign to win the climate argument.
"Khan is that rare thing: a politician with a mission and vision for the community he serves." — Guardian
"It’s very challenging psychologically to realize that what you’ve been working for...may actually be catastrophic."
Yoshua Bengio is recognized worldwide as one of the leading experts in artificial intelligence. He is most known for his pioneering work in deep learning, earning him the 2018 A.M. Turing Award, “the Nobel Prize of Computing,” with Geoffrey Hinton and Yann LeCun.
He is Full Professor at Université de Montréal, and the Founder and Scientific Director of Mila – Quebec AI Institute. In 2019, he was awarded the prestigious Killam Prize and in 2022, became the computer scientist with the highest impact in the world as measured by h-index.
""One of the most important AI researchers of the past three decades."" — Will Henshall, Time 100 2023
'"I'm an educational radical...The child who comes to us from a chaotic home is able to find order here at the school."
Katharine Birbalsingh is a British teacher and education reform advocate who is the founder and head teacher of Michaela Community School, a free school established in 2014 in Wembley Park, London.
Birbalsingh is the author of two books, Singleholic (2009) and To Miss with Love (2011), She was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2020 Birthday Honours. In October 2021, Birbalsingh was appointed chair of the Social Mobility Commission.
"Katharine Birbalsingh’s Michaela school has a formidable reputation" — The Guardian
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'"The attempt to isolate economics from other disciplines has fatally disabled its power to explain what is happening in the world"
Will Hutton is a leading political economist, author and journalist. His long and storied career has taken him from the City as an investment banker, the Economics editorship of the Guardian and BBC2 Newsnight , the editorship of the Observer, the chief executive of the Work Foundation and Principal of Hertford College Oxford.
He has chaired and directed, founded four think tanks – the Employment Policy Institute, the Work Foundation, the Big Innovation Centre and the Purposeful Company. His latest book This Time No Mistakes: How to Remake Britain, examines how right-wing ideology has dominated Britain for the last 50 years and how to bring in a new one.
'His optimism is unquenchable, his excitement exhilarating and his creativity awesome' ― Observer
"Creating a sense of co-existence and community is about forging a shared identity which...I think this will necessarily begin with quite a profound reform of education."
Dr Myriam François is a trailblazing journalist, filmmaker and writer. A former columnist at the New Statesman and a familiar face on the BBC, Channel 4 and Al Jazeera, Myriam has since founded mpwr productions, an independent documentary production company which seeks to platform minority voices.
François recently released her documentary directorial debut, ‘Finding Alaa’, to critical acclaim. The film was selected for the BAFTA longlist, and shortlisted for the 2021 Whickers Awards and the Cannes MIPDOC 2022. Myriam was nominated as one of only 14 “filmmakers to watch” in 2021 by One World Media.
“It takes enormous trust and courage to allow yourself to remember.”
Bessel van der Kolk is a Dutch psychiatrist and trauma expert. He is the founder and medical director of the Trauma Center in Brookline, Massachusetts. Van der Kolk is known for his pioneering work on the effects of trauma on the brain and body. His most famous books are The Body Keeps the Score and Traumatic Stress, which have become seminal texts in the field of trauma treatment.
Van der Kolk has spent decades studying how trauma impacts individuals. He has conducted extensive research on the neurological underpinnings of traumatic stress and has advocated for a more holistic, mind-body approach to trauma therapy. Van der Kolk has received numerous awards for his contributions to the field, including the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Trauma Psychology division of the American Psychological Association.
"change the way we heal a traumatized mind — by starting with the body." — New York Times
'"My number one priority has and always will be this great country"
Former Head of the U.K's leading political party, Nadhim Zahawi is a U.K. Conservative Politician who has held several ministerial positions under Theresa May, Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak. Born in Baghdad, Nadhim has risen to prominece in bussiness and in politics as co-founder of the leading market research firm YouGov.
He was first appointed as the Under-Secretary of State for Families and was later responsible for the UK's lauded vaccine rollout for covid 19. He was chancellor of the U.K. and was appointed head of Conservative party under Rishi Sunak before his resignantion last year.
"Nadhim Zahawi: from refugee to multimillionaire chancellor" Times
'"Orderrr!"
John Bercow is one of the most recognisable and iconoclastic figures in British politics. As Speaker of the House of Commons from 2009 to 2019, his distinctive bellow for order spanned the tenure of four Prime Ministers and a decade of political turmoil.
Having left his mark on the collective unconscious, he has since moved on from his parliamentary career of over two decades to become Chancellor of first Bedfordshire University and later the University of Essex.
"He will be remembered for championing parliament in the face of an arrogant and incompetent executive" - Prospect
"The most cognitively brilliant people usually have had to sacrifice their emotional selves."
Ruby Wax OBE is a seminal British-American talent, excelling as an actress, writer, TV personality, and mental health advocate. Her impressive career includes captivating performances with the Royal Shakespeare Company and a memorable role in the ITV sitcom Girls on Top.
Wax has been a longstanding advocate and campaigner for mental health, sharing her own experiences of bipolar disorder and depression. Recognized for her contributions, she received the Officer of the Order of the British Empire title. Recently, she released a poignant book and audiobook, I'm Not As Well As I Thought I Was, documenting her ongoing journey and relentless battle against depression.
"Nobody can make the serious funny and the funny serious quite like Ruby." — Alastair Campbell
“The belief system that governs conventional scientific thinking is an act of faith.”
Rupert Sheldrake is a scientist, author, and parapsychology researcher. Best known for his theory of morphic resonance, a radical hypothesis that nature itself has memory. Sheldrake is also known for his viral TED talk which was banned by the organisation. He has taken issue with the New Atheism of many and has also challenged the idea that the laws of nature are fixed and unchanging.
At Cambridge University, he worked in developmental biology as a Fellow of Clare College. He was Principal Plant Physiologist at the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics in Hyderabad, India.
"Sheldrake is an excellent scientist; the proper, imaginative kind." — New Scientist
"Freedom, human rights, tolerance, peace and prosperity are like the eternal flame that must be guarded, nurtured and never, ever taken for granted."
Konstantin Kisin is a Sunday Times best-selling author, comedian, satirist, social commentator and host of the wildly successful YouTube show, TRIGGERnometry. Born in the late Soviet Union and raised in Britain, Kisin has appeared on flagship TV shows like BBC Question Time, Real Time with Bill Maher and Tucker Carlson, as well as the Joe Rogan Experience and other popular podcasts.
Kisin is a powerful speaker, known for his engaging, entertaining and thought-provoking talks on a wide range of topics, including the importance of upholding Western values of liberalism, freedom of expression and viewpoint diversity. He has also spoken and written extensively about the war in Ukraine.
His speech at an Oxford Union debate generated over 100 million views around the world and has made him one of the most sought-after cultural commentators in the world.
"Science is a noble endeavour, but it’s also a low-yield endeavour."
John Ioannidis is a Greek-American physician, scientist and writer. He is a Professor of Medicine, Epidemiology and Population Health, and Biomedical Data Science at Stanford University. His research focuses on evidence-based medicine, clinical research and the study of scientific research itself.
Not only has Ioannidis served on the editorial board of over twenty scientific journals, but his 2005 essay "Why Most Published Research Findings Are False" was the most-viewed article in the history of the Public Library of Science, with over 3 million views.
"may be one of the most influential scientists alive." — The Atlantic
"Theoretical physicists used to explain what was observed. Now they try to explain why they can't explain what was not observed."
Fearlessly critical of the scientific mainstream, Sabine Hossenfelder is a groundbreaking theoretical physicist who specialises in the foundations of science. She is a leading science communicator, best-selling author and researcher. Her recent books include Lost in Math: How Beauty Leads Physics Astray, and the New York Times's Best Selling Existential Physics: A Scientist's Guide to Life's Biggest Questions.
Hossenfelder is the creator behind the popular YouTube channel, "Science without the gobbledygook" which has amassed over one million subscribers. Her writing has featured in some of the world's top publications including Scientific American, New Scientist, and Nautilus.
“A physicist who is utterly fearless, completely honest, and quite funny.” — Peter Woit, mathematical physicist
"Engineering really has the power to change our futures."
Dr Shini Somara is an award-winning media broadcaster and a highly accomplaished British mechanical engineer specialising in Computational Fluid Dyanmics.
In her mission to bring complex science, technology and engineering to everyone, Dr Somara has published 6 childrens STEM books and runs a podcast for Women in STEM. Her passion, knowledge and fascination for innovation has led to multiple TV appearances as an engineering expert on Sky, Discovery, The Science Channel, UKTV, Yesterday Channels. She is a TEDX Speaker and hosted Crash Course's hit YouTube series on Physics and Engineering, collectively garnering over 60 million views.
"Inspiring and inclusive." - BookTrust
“Russian stories never have happy endings.”
Bill Browder is the CEO and co-founder of Hermitage Capital Management, firebrand financier and anti-Putin activist. Following the death of his lawyer in Russian prison and his forced deportation to the UK, Browder successfully lobbied for the passing of the Magnitsky Act, which revolutionised sanctions worldwide.
Despite having many of his assets seized, Browder has tirelessly pressured Western governments into taking Putin's threat seriously. Bestselling author, outspoken Russian critic and recipient of eight Interpol arrest warrants for extradition to Moscow, Browder is a key thorn in Putin's side.
"[Bill] is such a thorn in Mr. Putin’s side that the Russian president singled him out by name during his first official summit with President Donald J. Trump." — New York Times
"The budget doesn't f*cking matter"
"We're on the Titanic, I'm the guy that's seen the iceberg. You know what I mean? I'm trying to let people know"
Gary Stevenson is a YouTuber, former financial trader, and firebrand activist against inequality. From humble origins in Ilford, Stevenson has made a name for himself by challenging the old boys' club of finance and beating them at their own game. In 2011 he was Citibank's most profitable trader by banking on increased inequality and growing poverty.
Since leaving the city, Gary has founded the GarysEconomics YouTube channel devoted to explaining economics in plain English. His recent memoir, 'The Trading Game' exposes the rotten core at the heart of the financial industry.
“Stevenson is a sharp observer, with a gift for colourful if merciless description.”—Financial Times
“We are smart enough to realize that we are stupid, and stupid enough to make the problem of becoming smarter hard.”
Anders Sandberg is radical futurist determined to surpass the limitations of the human form. He was previously a senior fellow at the Future of Humanity Institute at Oxford. He is a self-described 'academic jack of all trades', co-founder of and writer for the think tank Eudoxa, and chaired the Swedish Transhumanist Association for 4 years.
An ardent transhumanist, Anders comes to the festival brimming with innovative ideas about the ethical and social implications of future technologies.
"He might just be the most interesting academic at Oxford"" — Robert Wiblin and Keiran Harris."
"It's the definition of madness to do another interview again. I hope for his sake, and for the country's sake, that he doesn't do it."
Sam McAlister is an English former TV producer and author, best known for securing an interview with Prince Andrew for BBC Newsnight's programme, Prince Andrew and the Epstein Scandal. Sam is also a trained criminal barrister and has been a Visiting Senior Fellow in the law school of the London School of Economics.
Since this interview, McAlister has written an autobiographical book, Scoops. This was later adapted into a Netflix film, Scoop, where McAlister was played by Billie Piper.
"Even though we know what happened, McAlister’s eye-witness description of the royal car crash retains the power to shock… riveting." — Sunday Telegraph
“The infinite universe of ideas allows us to sidestep the constraints imposed by a finite planet”
Dr Daniel Susskind is an associate member of the Economics Department at Oxford University specialising in growth and the impact of AI on the economy. He has authored several bestselling books including A World Without Work and The Future of the Professions his Ted talk on the future of work received 1.6 million views.
Prior to Oxford Daniel worked in various roles in the British Government including the Prime Minister's Strategy Unit, Policy Unit at No 10 and The Cabinet Office.
"Daniel Susskind is a compelling, insightful thinker on the largest and most fundamental economic topics." Larry Summers Former United States Secretary of the Treasury
“It’s not just that women aren’t being listened to enough, it’s that their voices aren’t being heard in the first place.”
Mary Ann Sieghart is a distinguished journalist, radio presenter, former Chair of the Social Market Foundation and a visiting professor at King's College London.
Much of her journalism career was spent working for The Times, The Independent, The Economist and the Financial Times, writing on politics and social affairs. She spent a year as a Visiting Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, where she researched and wrote her best-selling book The Authority Gap: Why Women Are Still Taken Less Seriously Than Men, and What We Can Do About It.
“Her confidence is legendary” – The Independent"
'"We have a world to win."
Aaron Bastani is the co-founder of Novara Media, described as 'the slickest of the guerrilla news and opinion operations that have sprung up in Britain' by the Guardian. From humble origins in 2011 it is now a prominent power on the new left, with pundits regularly invited on to Newsnight and videos recieving hundreds of thousands of views.
His book, Fully Automated Luxury Communism: A manifesto sets out a future of technological optimism and abundance without work, and his arguments for Universal Basic Income and reduced working weeks have generated intense debate across the political spectrum.
"Bastani’s fully automated luxury communist manifesto is essential reading" - Theory, Culture and Society
'"Mathematics has beauty and romance"
Marcus du Sautoy is a leading British mathematician, and Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford. He is the author of many widely read popular mathematics and science books including The Music of the Primes, Thinking Better and his latest Around the World in 80 Games. He is a pioneering researcher in the mathematics of symmetry.
Named by The Independent on Sunday as one of the UK's leading scientists, Sautoy is known for popularising mathematics. He has been a regular contributor to the BBC Radio 4's In Our Time programme and written numerouss articles for The Times and The Guardian.
"Makes a lucid and beguiling companion as he guides us along the byways of contemporary science" - The Guardian
'“If all narratives are relative, then we are lost."
David Aaronovitch is an award-winning journalist, presenter of BBC Radio 4's Briefing Room, and former long-standing columnist for The Times. He was also previously president of the NUS and a communist but now identifies as a radical moderate.
David is the author of Paddling to Jerusalem: An Aquatic Tour of Our Small Country and most recently a memoir about his family and early life, Party Animals: My Family and Other Communists. His memoir details his parent’s love for the Communist Party of Great Britain, providing an intimate insight into his early life.
“An effervescent and essential writer.” — The Observer
“I was never totally what we would now call 'politically correct,' even in my most militant phase. I always liked good food, good wines. I suppose it was because I had total confidence in myself."
Tariq is a writer, political activist and filmmaker, and is considered to be a leading figure of the international left. He has written numerous books on world history and politics as well as novels and scripts for the stage and screen.
Tariq Ali’s screenplay The Leopard and The Fox which was about the last days of the Pakistani politician Zulfiqar Ali Butto, wasn’t previously produced because of controversy over censorship. However, in 2007 it premiered in New York, the day before former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Button returned home after eight years in exile. Tariq is currently an editor of New Left Review, which analyses politics, the global economy, protests, and the arts.
“A man of crystal-clear intellect, and no one, it seems, can escape his critical gaze.” - Vienna Review
"I’m too interested in wealth inequality, public ownership and Palestine to be welcomed in today’s Labour party."
Faiza Shaheen is a UK politician, former professor of economics, think-tank director, and expert in Inequality. In 2018 she was selected to be the prospective candidate for Chingford and Woodford Green, but was ultimately not endorsed by the Labour party in a highly controversial deselection.
She has an extensive career as an economist. She is currently a visiting professor of inequality at the LSE, but she has previously been a director at NYU and the Centre for Labour and Social Studies. Prior to this she was head of inequality at Save the Children and senior researcher at The New Economics Foundation.
"It’s unusual to find a person so accomplished, internationally respected, deeply networked and knowledgable in any political party" Zoe Williams for The Guardian
'“Every human being, in a way, is a philosopher. Because that's what it is to be human.”
Hilary Lawson is a philosopher, renowned critic of philosophical realism and editorial director of the Institute of Art and Ideas. His main work, Closure: A Story of Everything, has been described as ‘the first non-realist metaphysics’.
His early work made the case that twentieth-century philosophy was centrally concerned with the paradoxes of self-reference. Closure can be seen as an attempt to resolve these paradoxes and at the same time to provide an account of language that does require reference to an external reality. In doing so it outlines a metaphysics that abandons the traditional relationship between language and the world in favour of a vocabulary of closure and openness. The theory has dramatic consequences for how we understand ourselves and the world, and the role of both science and religion.
“Lawson shows himself to be a latter-day 'metaphysician' on the grand scale ... a quite astonishing achievement.” - Alan Montefiore, University of Oxford
'"This presumption of American decline has been a serious mistake of Putin’s."
Malcolm Rifkind is a renowned British politician who served in the cabinets of both Margaret Thatcher and John Major, most famously in the roles of Foreign and Defense Secretary. Most recently he chaired the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament, working closely with the CIA and MI6. A minister for eighteen years, he has seen longer uninterrupted service than anyone since the early nineteenth century.
He is currently banned from Russia by President Putin, for the robustness of his response against the Kremlin’s aggression in Ukraine. In recent years he has been appointed a visiting professor of war at King's College London and a Distinguished Fellow at the RSUI.
"Malcolm Rifkind was in the top rank of twentieth-century politicians. Few saw events at closer quarters" - John Major
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"I think that’s where the political discourse has got to in Scotland: aggression, violence and anger are coupled on to the debate about nationalism.”
Lisa Cameron is a Scottish Conservative politician who served as a Member of Parliament until 2024. Lisa is also a former clinical psychologist. After university, Lisa qualified in forensic and clinical psychology, and subsequently worked as a clinical pscologist at the NHS.
Previously a member of the SNP, Lisa has since changed her position on Scottish Independence, arguing that independence is an overly divisive position.
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"Human rights are not worthy of the name if they do not protect the people we don't like as well as those we do."
Trevor Phillips OBE is an award-winning broadcaster, writer, and former politician. He is best known for having served as the Chair of the London Assembly, as well as for heading the Commission for Racial Equality and as the chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission under Tony Blair.
More recently, he has presented Trevor Phillips on Sunday and Sunday Morning, two talk shows on Sky News. For his work in television and broadcasting, Phillips has won three Royal Television Society awards.
"We need Trevor Phillips’s fierce candour more than ever." — Allison Pearson, The Telegraph
"The job of the media is not to protect the powerful from embarrassment
Sir Simon Jenkins is a British Author, newspaper columnist and editor. He was an editor of the Evening Standard from 1976 to 1978 and of the Times from 1990 to 1992. He has also written extensively on British History, Politics and architecture.
In his columns, he has commented on all aspects of British politics and public life, particularly international relations. He has argued in favour of NATO funding, the ineffability of sanctions and that British Overseas Territories are expensive holdovers from our imperial past.
"Jenkins is one of the liveliest commentators at work in Britain, always worth reading and pleasingly contrarian" Jeremy Paxman
"I think, for me, one of the greatest moments of making peace with science was to realise that rather than taking away the mystery, it added to the mystery."
Sunetra Gupta is an acclaimed novelist, essayist and scientist. She is currently professor of Theoretical Epidemiology at the University of Oxford and was an outspoken critic of public health measures to curb Covid-19. Her academic interests lie in the infectious disease agents that are responsible for HIV, the flu, malaria and bacterial meningitis.
Sunetra has won many awards including the Scientific Medal by the Zoological Society of London, and the prestigious Royal Society Rosalind Franklin Award for her research. In 2012, she appeared on the popular BBC Radio 4 programme ‘The Life Scientific’ to discuss her epidemiological work, as well as the link between fiction and mathematics.
"Intoxicatingly brilliant." — The Times
Sandra Laugier is an award-winning Professor of Philosophy at Université Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne. She is the author of the celebrated book Why We Need Ordinary Language Philosophy. A key liaison between American and European philosophical thought her work spans moral philosophy, political philosophy, philosophy of language, gender studies, and popular culture.
Sandra's latest book TV-Philosophy explores the hold of TV series on our lives from a philosophical and ethical perspective. And reveals a vital and ubiquitous expression of popular culture throughout the world is transformative in its effects on the activity of philosophy in everyday life.
"[She] could change the perspective on philosophy of language as well as on the analytic-continental divide."—Stanley Cavell, Harvard University
"Within every form of oppression lies the seeds of liberation."
Dr Susie Orbach is a psychotherapist, psychoanalyst, and social critic. Her debut book, Fat is a Feminist Issue, took the world by storm. She was Princess Diana's therapist in the 1990s and was honoured in BBC's 100 Women twice, in 2013 and 2014.
Throughout her career, she has founded the Women's Therapy Centre Institute, and been a consultant for the World Bank, the NHS, and Unilever. Most recently, she has been a visiting scholar at the New School for Social Research, in New York whilst also working as a therapist at her well-known practice, in London.
"Virtually all feminist debate on body image and beauty imagery owes its existence to Susie Orbach." ― Naomi Wolf
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"This is a politics of time that goes way beyond regulations on labour hours, working conditions and campaigns for a four-day labour week."
Guy Standing is a Professorial Research Associate at SOAS University of London and co-founder of the Basic Income Earth Network. He is best known as a long-standing and prominent advocate of Universal Basic Income, but he is also responsible for redefining and revitalizing the term ‘precariat’ which describes a new emerging social class suffering from job insecurity as well as identity insecurity.
Standing's recent work has explored the politics of time and how to reclaim leisure in an age of uncertianty.
"Standing’s daring emancipatory agenda challenges our prevailing “jobs fetish” as anything but progressive" - Irish Times
'"Philosophers view the world to a certain extent in the same way as do alien beings or children."
Markus Gabriel works out of the University of Bonn, where he holds the chair for Epistemology, Modern and Contemporary Philosophy and is Director of the International Centre for Philosophy. Gabriel has also been a visiting professor at the University of California, Berkeley.
Markus is a prominent critic of physicalism and moral nihilism. He has also claimed that the coronavirus crisis called into question the idea that only scientific and technical progress could lead to human and moral progress.
"Markus Gabriel is that rare beast, a serious academic philosopher with the wit and talent to write for non-academic audiences." - Los Angeles Review of Books
"China has also been systematically hollowing out Uyghur culture in Xinjiang’s towns and cities, degrading Muslim landmarks, and inviting non-Uyghurs to move in — or visit for a vacation."
Megha Rajagopalan is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter with the New York Times, specialising in international human rights, labour and conflict. She is known for investigating how governments and companies abuse power and impact the lives of vulnerable people.
Megha started her career in China as a Fulbright scholar but has since reported from both the Middle East and South East Asia. Her Pulizer Prize-winning work used satellite imagery and investagative architecture to uncover the Chinese Government's mass incarceration and detention of minorities in Xingjiang.
"The cost of neutrality is a badly informed public. Journalistic practice reflects each one of us – the duty to seek the truth"
Lindsey Hilsum is the International Editor of Channel 4 News and a regular contributor to The Sunday Times, The Times Literary Supplement, and The Guardian among others. She is also a bestselling author.
Her career has taken her to every major conflict in the last thirty years. From Kosovo to Palestine, Lindsey has reported from the frontline of wars, coups, uprisings, and everything in between. Her most recent book I Brought TheWar With Meis part poetry anthology and autobiography detailing the lives of those in conflict.
"I can think of no better use of poetry in any anthology I have ever read: a profound, revelatory, distressing and timely account of humanity at war" — Carol Ann Duffy
“If we can make contact with cephalopods as sentient beings, it is not because of a shared history, not because of kinship, but because evolution built minds twice over.”
Peter Godfrey-Smith is a distinguished professor of philosophy at the Graduate Center, City University of New York, and a professor of the history and philosophy of science at the University of Sydney.
He is the author of several books, including the bestselling 'Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea and the Deep Origins of Consciousness'. His underwater videos of octopuses have been featured in National Geographic and New Scientist, and he has discussed them on National Public Radio and many cable TV channels.
‘In Other Minds, Peter Godfrey-Smith, a philosopher, skilfully combines science, philosophy and his experiences of swimming among these tentacled beasts to illuminate the origin and nature of consciousness.’ - The Economist
“It is my opinion that the isolated mind loses its purchase on reality all too easily and becomes prone to fantasy.”
Frank Tallis is a clinical psychologist who specialises in obsessive compulsive disorder. He is also a multi-award-winning author of several books including the Lieberamann papers which was adapted into the BBC show Vienna Blood.
Tallis's most recent book The Act of Living: What the Great Psychologists Can Teach Us About Surviving Discontent in an Age of Anxiety was described by the Times Literary Supplement as "an engaging and expansive tour of our modern-day therapeutic landscape".
"Few psychotherapists write with the clarity of Tallis." — The Tablet
“True, things have never looked this bad [...]. But this savage war also exposes the conflict’s darkest secret: its vicious cycle of humiliation, resentment and revenge is driven by power-famished fanatics treating people, including their own, as dispensable 'things’.”
Uriel Abulof is a senior lecturer at Tel-Aviv University's Department of Political Science and teaches at Cornell University. He is an expert on the politics of fear, happiness and hope, legitimation, social movements, nationalism and ethnic conflicts.
Abulof's 2015 book The Mortality and Morality of Nations received considerable praise. His recent journalism work has explored the nature and future of the Israel-Palestine conflict.
“What Uriel Abulof has succeeded in doing is to take issues of political morality out of the ethereal philosophical plane" — Matthew Evangelista, Cornell University.
"Oppressors, as a rule, deny oppressed people their own 'native' standards of beauty"
Clare Chambers is a Professor of Political Philosophy at Jesus College Cambridge. Her work spans feminist theory, liberal philosophy, and the intersection between body and politics. She has unveiled the political power at play when we choose to modify our bodies. From full-blown plastic surgery and bodybuilding to the innocuous application of make-up and styling hair, there is a world of politics within self-modification.
Clare's books include Intact: A Defence of the Unmodified Body and Against Marriage: An Egalitarian Defence of the Marriage-Free State. Her work has also been quoted in the Observer, Guardian, and The Times.
"Unlike most philosophers, Chambers ventures out of the arm chair and into the fray." — Boston Review
'“It’s often about striking the right balance that delivers the biggest impact”
Socrates is a leading economist operating at the intersection of macroeconomic policy and sustainability. He has close to 20 years of experience across academia, government, industry and professional services, having worked with Big Tech, various ministries of economy and finance and regulatory authorities. At Deloitte, he is making an impact by advising clients across the globe on how to transform their economies and achieve their pressing objectives of growth, fiscal rebalancing and efficient transition to net zero.
“He will be remembered for championing the use of economics as a toolbox to address complex problems.”
"If Gen Z girls really want change, then, it’s time we confront not only how social media is making us feel, but who it’s encouraging us to become."
Freya India is a freelance writer and the author of the popular weekly newsletter GIRLS, where she writes about the challenges girls face in the modern world. Her work has appeared in the New Statesman, the Spectator, The Independent, Quillette,and UnHerd.
Freya India has also recently joined Jonathan Haidt's new movement, called Free the Anxious Generation. It aims to promote free play in younger generations, away from screens.
"Freya India is one of the most sensitive and perceptive Gen Z writers." — Jonathan Haidt
"How would you ever truly know that you're out of Plato's cave and not just smack dab in another one?"
Curt Jaimungal is a renowned filmmaker and presenter. He is founder and host of the Theories of Everything YouTube podcast, which explores cutting-edge topics in physics, consciousness, free will, AI and transhumanism with some of the leading experts in the world.
On his YouTube channel, Jaimungal has recently conducted interviews with such esteemed guests as Sean Carroll, Edward Frenkel, and Eric Weinstein.
"I was genuinely grateful to have a conversation with
Curt Jaimungal, one of the most intellectually honest and sincere individuals." - Marwa ElDiwiny of the Soft Robotics Podcast
Jack Symes is a public philosopher, writer, and researcher at Durham University. He is best known as the producer of The Panpsycast Philosophy Podcast, one of the world’s most popular higher education podcasts. He is also the editor of the Talking about Philosophy book series, which features contributions from some of the world’s most influential thinkers.
Jack also hosts live shows, including An Evening With theatre events and panels at The Royal Institution. He is the author of four books, including two forthcoming in 2024: Philosophers on God: Talking about Existence and Defeating the Evil-God Challenge: In Defence of God’s Goodness.
‘Jack Symes guides us charmingly and authoritatively, with a wit and freshness that enlivens without trivializing.’ – Stephen Fry
"It would be arrogant to think we're alone in the universe"
Avi Loeb is a theoretical astrophysicist and the Frank B. Baird Jr. Professor of Science at Harvard University. A New York Times bestselling author, he consistently makes headlines for advocating that the search for intelligent extraterrestrial life should be mainstream science.
Loeb has been the longest-serving Chair of Harvard's Department of Astronomy (2011-2020), the Founding Director of Harvard's Black Hole Initiative (2016-2021) and the Director of the Institute for Theory and Computation (2007-present) within the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics .
"Avi Loeb is no stranger to controversy." — Scientific American
"The West has often been more multicultural than it realised."
Jessica Frazier is a trailblazing philosopher based at the University of Oxford who works on Indian Philosophy and the European tradition of phenomenology. She is the Founder and Managing Editor of the Journal of Hindu Studies. Dr. Frazier is also a frequent consultant for the BBC and speaker on In Our Time.
Her research explores key philosophical themes across cultures, from Indian classical theories of Being to twentieth-century phenomenology. Her work on Hindu ideas translates them into global terms, so that we can all think in new ways about issues that shape our society: the nature of a good life, justice and human rights, metaphysics, and the goals of community.
"Frazier has done a great job of offering us new ways of considering the relationship between ultimate reality and human desire." - David Haberman
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“I want to turn the standard view upside down.”
Nick Lane is a British biochemist and outstanding science communicator, asking the difficult question: what is the origin of life? He is a Professor of Evolutionary Biochemistry at University College London as well as a bes-tselling author of five critically-acclaimed books on evolutionary biochemistry. His books have sold over 150,000 copies worldwide and have been translated into 25 languages. His most recent book Transformer: The Deep Chemistry of Life and Death explores the elusive chemical logic of life, from genetic information to consciousness.
Amongst other prizes, he was awarded the 2015 Biochemical Society Award, the 2016 Royal Society Michael Faraday Prize, and Lecture, the UK’s premier award for excellence in communicating science.
"Nick Lane hasn't been afraid to challenge us with some tough science" — Maggie Philbin OBE
"I feel a real commitment to leave the world a better place – and science a more empowering environment."
Jessica Wade is an award-winning physicist, wikipedian and campaigner for gender inclusion in science. She is a lecturer in Functional Materials at Imperial College London and a Research Fellow of the Royal Society.
Jess is committed to improving diversity in science, both online and offline. Every day since the start of 2018, she has been on a mission to add biographies of women and people of colour in the sciences to Wikipedia. Her work on inclusivity has recieved many awards including Daphne Jackson Medal and Prize and as one of Nature's 10 people who matter in science in 2018.
"Mind-bogglingly impressive, Dr Jessica Wade is remarkably tricky to pin down." — Hush
"Big change requires big ambitions."
Richard is former Chief Strategy Officer of RBS (now NatWest Group) and was part of the executive team steering the bank after the financial crisis in the late 2000s. Over a 30+ year career, Richard has led major transformations at European banks; his expertise spans regulatory reforms and the implementation of new structures to support the UK economy in the aftermath of the global financial crisis, as well as complex initiatives focused on COVID recovery. Richard is now a Parter at Deloitte providing strategic advice to CEOs of systemically important banks.
"Richard will be remembered for his work in both advising and delivering change to create a more resilient banking sector."
"Globalization is what we in the Third World have for several centuries called colonization."
Matt Kennard is the co-founder and head of investigations at Declassified UK, a news outlet investigating British foreign policy. He was a fellow and then director at the Centre for Investigative Journalism (CIJ) in London, UK.
Kennard is famous, among other things, for breaking the story in the UCLA student paper, the Daily Bruin, of attempts by Harvard professor Alan Dershowitz to suppress the publication of Norman Finkelstein's Beyond Chutzpah by the University of California Press. He is the author of The Racket: A Rogue Reporter vs The American Empirre.
"perceptive direct reporting "- Noam Chomsky
"Individual behaviour has to be understood within its relational and systems context."
Dinesh Bhugra is a renowned Indian-born British psychiatrist and academic. He is the former President of the World Psychiatric Association and a leading expert in the field of cultural psychiatry. He is a professor of mental health and cultural diversity at the Institute of Psychiatry at King's College London.
Bhugra has made significant contributions to understanding the links between mental health and cultural factors, and has advocated for improving mental healthcare access and reducing stigma around mental illness in diverse communities.and has authored numerous books and publications on topics such as cultural psychiatry, mental health policy, and the impact of migration on mental wellbeing.
"wants a radical rethink of mental illness" - The Guardian
"We dream ourselves into existence every day, making ourselves the heroes of our own mythologies"
Rose Cartwright is a trainblaizing screenwriter, author and mental health advocate. She is the writer of the Netflix hit show 3 Body Problem, and is also widely known for her 2016 memoir Pure, which detailed her experiences living with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).
Beyond her writing, Cartwright is an outspoken voice raising awareness about OCD and challenging the stigma surrounding it. She is also the co-founder of the mental health non-profit Made of Millions.
"raw honesty and vulnerability" - The Guardian
"Knowing what is possible, helps make things possible"
Matt O'Dowd is a renowned astrophysicist and science communicator, he researches extragalactic astrophysics (black holes, quasars, gravitational lensing, and more) and is a Professor of Physics and Astronomy at City University of New York, Lehman College.
O'Dowd is also the host and writer of the weekly YouTube show PBS Space Time, currently the biggest physics and space show on YouTube with over 3 million subscribers. He is also a regular guest at StarTalk radio, the popular science show with Neil Degrasse Tyson.
"Whether he's guiding people through the night sky at burining man, chatting with Neil deGrasse Tyson or hosting a PBS radio show, O'Dowd has found myriad ways ro share his curiosity and awe for the cosmos" — Linda Tunesi at CUNY
"If you allow yourself to still love, even when you've had incredible grief, then all of you comes through it somehow."
Marie-Elsa Roche Bragg is an author, teacher, and priest.
Her first novel, ‘Towards Mellbreak‘ (Chatto & Windus 2017), is about four generations of a quiet hill farming family on the North Western fells of Cumbria. Her second book, ‘Sleeping Letters‘ (Chatto & Windus 2019), is the description of the the ritual of the Eucharist alongside a compilation of poetry, memoir, and fragments of un-sent letters.
Marie-Elsa has contributed articles and interviews for papers such as the Telegraph and the Church Times; Radio pieces for BBC Radio 4 and interviews for literary festivals and Story Vault Films.
"Brag displays a remarkable gift of observation – of human beings, animals, landscapes. " Max Davidson ― Mail on Sunday
"For a long time being female was treated by science and medicine as being akin to having a serious psychological disorder."
Dr Sarah Hill is a leading researcher of evolutionary psychology, and a professor at Texas Christian University. With more than fifty scientific publications, Hill has become an authority on evolutionary approaches to psychology and health.
Hill is the author of the acclaimed book This Is Your Brain on Birth Control: How the Pill Changes Everything. She has appeared on The Today Show as well as in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Scientific American, and The Economist.
Hill has provided sound evidence that is eye-opening, riveting, and a must read for all women and the people who care about them." — Dr. Jolene Brighten, NMD, author of Beyond the Pill
"If it is there, if it is a story, we put it out there."
Roger Hearing is a veteran journalist and broadcaster. Over a 35-year career with the BBC and Bloomberg, he has covered wars, elections, coups and revolutions across the globe - including the UN intervention in Somalia and the Rwandan genocide.
From 1999 to 2010, he presented The World Today and News Hour for the BBC World Service, along with the World Tonight on BBC Radio 4. He now co-hosts The Why? Curve podcast with Phil Dobbie.
"An excellent thoughtful broadcaster and a rock solid journalist." - Ian D. Richardson, Ex-editor BBC World Service
" I want us to feel engaged, productive, creative"
Julia Hobsbawm OBE is a British social entrepreneur, writer, and commentator. She is regarded as an influential voice on the intersection of business and technology. She is the founder of Editorial Intelligence, a media and communications consultancy firm, and the author of several books including The Simplicity Principle, The Nowhere Office and more recently Working Assumptions.
Hobsbawm is known for her work exploring the changing nature of work and communications in the digital age. She has written extensively on topics like networking, social media, and the future of the workplace. She has contributed frequently to The Guardian, The Times, and Harvard Business Review.
"Our foremost futurist of the workplace" - Barbara Kellerman, Harvard Kennedy School
"We are going to need white men to play their part in dethroning the white man’s god."
Chine McDonald is the director of Theos, an author, broadcaster and leading theological voice in the UK. Having studied Theology and Religious Studies at Cambridge, Chine regularly contributes to the BBC, presenting 'Thought for the Day' on BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme.
She is the author of God is Not a White Man, a work that seeks to interrogate the church's connection to racism, colonialism and oppression from within the faith. Through her work with Theos and a number of Christian charities, Chine seeks to bring faith to the forefront of everyday life.
"[Chine] is one of the most prominent Black evangelical voices in Britain." Christianity Today
"[It's possible to] have a phenomenological experience of nothing. All you have to do is think about it."
Graham Priest is the Distinguished Professor at the Graduate Center, City University of New York. He has published in nearly every leading logic and philosophy journal. At the last count, he had published about 240 papers. He has also published six monographs (mostly with Oxford University Press), as well as a number of edited collections.
Much of his work has been in logic, especially non-classical logic, and related areas. He is perhaps best know for his work on dialetheism, the view that some contradictions are true. However, he has also published widely in many other areas, such as metaphysics, Buddhist philosophy, and the history of philosophy, both East and West.
"Delightful and engaging" — Adrian Moore
"There are surprising connections between astrophysical objects ... and our future technology."
Marika Taylor is a Professor of Theoretical Physics, Pro-Vice Chancellor, and Head of the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences at the University of Birmingham. She studied Physics at Cambridge, where she was taught by Stephen Hawking and Roger Penrose. She continued her studies with her doctoral thesis on Problems in M-theory, supervised by Stephen Hawking.
Taylor's research is focused on string theory, quantum field theory, and gravitational physics. In 2008, she won the Minerva Prize, awarded by the Netherlands' Organisation for Scientific Research for a paper on black holes. She has also been a trailblazing advocate for women in physics.
"Insightful and informative"" — Gian Francesco Giudice, CERN
"Words aren’t a condiment you sprinkle on top of reality; they are the marinade that alters the taste of everything"
David Shariatmadari is the Guardian's non-fiction books editor and author of Don't Believe A Word: The Surprising Truth About Language.
His debut book Don't Believe a Word explored the fallacies and folklore that led us to misunderstand language.
'Wonderful. You finish the book more alive than ever to the enduring mystery and miracle of that thing that makes us most human' - Stephen Fry on Don't Believe a Word
"The future is made by the things we imagine today."
Güneş Taylor is an award-winning geneticist and pioneer of public engagement in her field. She is a training fellow at the Francis Crick Institute where her research predominantly focuses on the genetic formation of ovaries and testes. Both "an incredible science communicator" and a scientist herself, she has become a distinguished HowtheLightGetsIn host, sharing the stage with Slavoj Zizek, Richard Dawkins, Yuval Noah Harari, and more.
Güneş has debated the implications of genome editing on the Guardian's podcast Science Weekly, the UK's longest-running science podcast with the episode doing "exceptionally well" according to Guardian producer Max Sanderson. In 2018, Güneş was awarded the Crick Public Engagement Prize for her efforts in the public communication of science.
"Güneş has performed a significant service to disseminating the work within her field." - Anastasia de Waal
Ankhi Mukherjee is an academic specialising in Victorian and Modern English literature, critical theory and postcolonial and world literature. In 2015, she was appointed a Professor of English and World Literatures by the University of Oxford.
Mukherjee has five books including, Aesthetic Hysteria (2007), What is a Classic? (2014) which won the British Academy's Mary Crawshay Prize for English Literature in 2015, and Unseen City (2021) which has been shortlisted for the ESSE (European Society for the Study of English) Prize in Literatures in English, 2024.
'To ask 'what is a classic?', Mukherjee points out in conclusion, is to work with the finest fibres that make up the literary 'whose nature is to repeat'.' —Elleke Boehmer, University of Oxford
“I love philosophy but it shouldn’t be just for the elite. We should all be asking these questions.”
Joanna Kavenna is an award-winning writer. A seasoned traveller, she was born in the UK, but has lived in the US, France, Germany, Scandinavia and the Baltic states. Her travels led to her first book, The Ice Museum, which details her experience travelling in the remote North. In 2013, she was named as one of Granta’s Best Young British Novelists.
Her latest book, Zed, is a blistering, satirical novel about life under a global media and tech corporation that knows exactly what we think, what we want, and what we do - before we do.
"Wonderful, impossible, dynamic." — Observer
“Don’t argue about how much salt there is in food — this can save relationships — you live in different taste worlds; you’ve got different taste buds.”
Barry C. Smith is the director of the Institute of Philosophy at the University of London's School of Advanced Study and co-director of the Centre for the Study of the Senses. In 2010, he made waves with his insightful BBC World Service series 'The Mysteries of the Brain.'
Barry also harbours a deep passion for wine, often hosting engaging wine-tasting events at festivals. He ingeniously incorporates his studies on the multisensory nature of experience into these sessions, creating a unique, fascinating blend. Barry also lends his wine expertise to 'The World of Fine Wine' and 'Prospect Magazine' as a regular contributor and wine columnist. His unique blend of academia and viticulture creates an intriguing persona that's both enlightening and enjoyable.
“Well up to the task of situating wine-centered questions within a larger framework of questions about taste and perception, subjectivity and objectivity.” - The TLS
"It looks rather like cosmology... has become path-dependent: overdetermined by the implications of its past inventions."
Bjørn Ekeberg is a philosopher of science. With extensive education and outstanding international scholarship in the fields of journalism, media & communication theory, cybernetics, science and technology studies, political science, economics, philosophy, and history of thought, Bjørn Ekeberg is an unorthodox thinker who likes to challenge the unquestioned.
Bjørn's has focused on the limits of scientific knowledge and his published work is on cosmology and our understanding of the universe.
"...a lucid exploration of modern scientific history... a unique synthesis" - Graham Harman on Metaphysical Experiments: Physics and the Invention of the Universe
"We can never compromise on compromise."
Sophie is a modern intellectual historian and philosopher specialising in direct democracy, anarchism, activism, and education. She is a fellow at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland and a Remarque fellow at New York University.
Sophie is a regular speaker for the Institute of Art and Ideas and the BBC's Free Thinking programme. Sophie's current project illuminates transatlantic experiments in grassroots democracy among activist networks during the early Cold War. Her research lay the grounds for revitalising liberational politics for a post-industrial world.
Camila Vergara is a critical legal theorist, historian, and journalist writing on the relation between inequality and the law, and the possible institutional solutions to systemic corruption. Beyond her position as Senior Lecturer at the University of Essex, she is also the Editor of Theoria: A Journal of Social and Political Theory, Associate Editor of Critical Sociology, and organiser of the Venice Multidisciplinary World Conference on Republics and Republicanism.
Camila is the author of Systemic Corruption: Constitutional Ideas for an Anti-Oligarchic Republic She is also a leading public intellectual —with her articles and interviews featured in outlets such as New Left Review, Jacobin, Politico, Revista Plebeya, and Il Manifesto Inret— and an activist advising and collaborating with grassroots organisations on rights, deliberative democracy, and community-based forms of governance.
"Vergara beautifully draws from ancient and modern republican traditions to retrieve critical resources and institutional possibilities for the present."" — Aziz Rana, Boston College"
"In the digital age, other sectors are disrupting Defence… governments are no longer in control of change and are at best second adopters of commercial and societal developments."
Duncan Potts is a retired Vice Admiral of the Royal Navy, where he was the Director of the Joint Force Development. Before this, he was the commander of NATO's High Readiness Force and the EU's counter-piracy operations in the Indian Ocean at the height of Somali Piracy. He has commanded HMS Brilliant, Southampton and Marlborough and coalition forces in the Northern Gulf region of Iraq during the conflict.
Since leaving the Royal Navy, Duncan has become the director of Universal Defence and Security Solutions consultancy, chair of the Public Weather Service Customer Group and President of the Royal Naval Association.
"The question of technology is one of the most important questions in all of philosophy because we, as human beings, live with technology and live on its terms."
Babette Babich is a trailblazing philosopher of technology and science. Renowned for her exploration of the philosophy, history, and sociology of science as well as studies of ecology and animal philosophy. Babich is a Professor of Philosophy at Fordham University, New York City.
Her work crosses the analytic-continental divide but she draws heavily on Nietzsche, Heidegger, Adorno, and Illich. She is the director of The Nietzsche Society. Her latest book Günther Anders’ Philosophy of Technology explores the philosophy of isolation. Written amid Covid-19, the study of 'home-working' became more important than ever.
"[Babich] succeeds in penetrating the cloud of suspicion, incomprehension, and distrust that for contemporary readers surrounds Nietzsche's writing" — New Nietzsche Studies
'Now the thing about seeming is that seeming is never quite as it seems. Appearance is always strange'
Timothy Morton is a professor and Rita Shea Guffey Chair in English at Rice University. A member of the object-oriented philosophy movement, Morton's work explores the intersection of object-oriented thought and ecological studies.
Morton has published numerous books including 'Dark Ecology: For a Logic of Future Coexistence', 'The Ecological Thought' and 'Hyposubjects: On Becoming Humane'. They have collaborated with several artists and produced TIME TIME TIME, an opera commissioned by the Serpentine Gallery, which explored the multiplicity of temporalities at the heart of being human.
'[A] radical vision of what ecological thought can be.' — Los Angeles Review of Books
"When it comes to us [humans], it's not so easy to distinguish between facts and values."
Nick Spencer is a Senior Fellow at Theos, author, host of the podcast Reading Our Times and an expert on the interrelation between science and religion. His books include Magisteria: The Entangled Histories of Science and Religion, The Political Samaritan: How Power Hijacked a Parable, The Evolution of the West and Atheists: The Origin of the Species.
Nick's writing has appeared in the Financial Times, The Spectator, The Economist, TLS, and many other publications.
‘A deeply researched history of the interplay between the two ways of understanding the world.’ - The Economist on Nick Spencer's Magisteria
"We feminists never started this so-called battle of the sexes, but we are going to end it and we are certainly going to win."
Finn Mackay is a senior lecturer in sociology at University of the West of England, Bristol and has over twenty years of experience in feminist activism and policy.
Their work has appeared in Huffington Post, The Guardian, Open Democracy and more. Their television experience includes BBC 2 The Big Questions, BBC3 Sex on the Edge and Channel 4 documentary ‘Activists’. They are the author of ‘Female Masculinities and the Gender Wars’ from Bloomsbury and ‘Radical Feminism: Feminist Activism in Movement’ published by Palgrave.
Finn Mackay also founded the London Feminist Network, revived London Reclaim the Night and continues to do research for organisations such as Women's Aid.
“Thoughtful and often moving.” Gaby Hinsliff, ― The Guardian
" The Conservative government has just reached the period...like the Soviets in the 1960s, that mathematics will open an intellectual escape hatch out of the almighty systemic mess its doctrinaire predecessors have already induced."
Dr Abby Innes weaves political analysis with the scientific method to expose the ironic similarities between our current politics and the Soviet Union. She is an Associate Professor of Political Economy at the European Institute at the LSE. Her work focuses on party-state development, the transition from the Soviet system in Eastern Europe and the modern neoliberal state.
Her most recent book Late Soviet Britain exposes the cruel similarities between the Soviet Union and modern-day Britain that undermine our government and stagnate our society.
"Abby Innes is one of the most original and provocative analysts of politics in Britain. " — Rory Stewart
"Mathematics is a process of enquiry and coming to know, not a finished product, for its results remain open to revision."
Paul Ernest is emeritus professor of the philosophy of mathematics education at the University of Exeter. He is best known for his work on philosophical aspects of mathematics education and his contributions to developing a social constructivist philosophy of mathematics. Ernest has letured internationally from the University of the West Indies, Jamaica to the University of Cambridge.
His work challenges the prevalent notion that mathematical knowledge is certain, absolute, and neutral, and offers instead an account of mathematics as a social construction. This has profound educational implications for social issues, including gender, race and multiculturalism; for pedagogy, including investigations and problem solving; and challenges hierarchical views of mathematics, learning and ability.
"Stimulate reflection and reaction,” - Simon Goodchild
"When you look back at history, women would be mothering in communities with structural support around them… That is missing now."
Joanna Wolfarth is the author of Milk: An Intimate History of Breastfeeding. Previously visiting lecturer in Southeast Asian Art at SOAS, University of London, she now teaches History of Art at The Open University. Her research has explored the interactions between pre-modern and contemporary visual cultures via questions of archive, citation, materiality and power.
Wolfarth has written and spoken publicly about the nature of motherhood and how it has evolved over the centuries. Her book on the history of breastfeeding was highly lauded in The Sunday Times and many other publications.
"The beauty of Wolfarth's storytelling is difficult to convey" - BBC History Magazine
“Simpler theories may be more convenient to work with, but they are not intrinsically more probable than complex ones.”
Samir Okasha is a leading philosopher of science, specialising in biology and evolutionary theory based at the University of Bristol. His influential work has made major contributions to our understanding of fundamental questions in biology and beyond, including the levels of selection problem and the evolution of cooperation.
His research and writing have been recognized with numerous prestigious awards, including a Leverhulme Prize and election to the British Academy. He is also a frequent keynote speaker at major international conferences and workshops, as well as public platforms like Closer To Truth.
"Okasha...sought to convey his ideals in manner free from complicated jargon" — Journal of Young Investigators
'Modern medicine has certainly preferred dealing with my various conditions as individual diagnoses. But me? I think all the diagnoses boil down to anxiety.'
Sarah Wilson is a multi-New York Times and Amazon bestselling author, social philosopher, international keynote speaker, minimalist and philanthropist. She edited Cosmopolitan magazine Australia at 29, founded the global I Quit Sugar movement, hosted the most-watched TV series in the nation’s history – Masterchef Australia – and wrote the bestseller First, We Make the Beast Beautiful.
Her most recent book, This One Wild and Precious Life, won the US Gold Nautilus Prize, and she has ranked in the top 200 most influential authors in the world (two years in a row).
"Sarah Wilson is a force of nature. She has taken her pain and grief about our sick and troubled world and alchemised it into action." — Elizabeth Gilbert author of Eat Pray Love
"My idea of hell would be to live somewhere comfortable where no one ever talked about anything serious."
Isabel Hilton is a trailblazing journalist, broadcaster and expert on all things international relations. Hilton boasts a highly accomplished career in national and international media, having reported from China, South Asia, Latin America, Africa and the Middle East for the BBC, The Sunday Times, the Independent and the Guardian.
Hilton is a particularly formidable authority on China, with her extensive expertise beguiling enough to draw misfounded accusations of espionage. In 2006, she founded Chinadialogue, a fully bilingual not-for-profit newsroom dedicated to sparking intelligent discourse and fostering a global understanding of China's environmental challenges.
"Lively and vastly entertaining..." - Boston Sunday Globe
"Class is an identity itself, and also class inequality is predicated on the othering...of people..."
Marijam Didzagalvyte (or Marijam Did) is a Lithuanian-British writer, games industry expert and worker rights organiser. She has written for various publications, including The Guardian, The Independent, and VICE. Previously a lecturer at Royal Holloway, University of London, she has since pivoted to a senior marketing executive role at an award-winning videogames studio. In 2019, Did recieved a nomination from GamesIndustry.biz's 100 Women in Games as well as being nominated for Campaigner of The Year at the MCV UK Awards.
Did's latest book Everything to Play For: How Videogames Are Changing the World explores the political power of video games as a force for good, has been highly acclaimed by industry experts alike.
"Impassioned, fiercely intelligent, proudly left-wing." — EDGE Magazine
'"The risk of nihilism is that it alienates us from anything good or true. Yet believing in nothing has positive potential."
Nolen Gertz is an Assistant Professor of applied philosophy at the University of Twente and a senior researcher of the 4TU.Centre for Ethics and Technology in Eindhoven, both in the Netherlands. He is the author of a number of books including The Philosophy of War and Exile and Nihilism and Technology.
His work has appeared in The Washington Post, The Atlantic, and on the ABC Australia website, as well as in interviews for BBC World, Al Jazeera, Austrian Public Radio, Ireland's National Independent Radio, and France's Philosophie Magazine.
"He always satiates when I seek meaningful bites on the seemingly meaningless political, social, and economic existences so many parts of the world are experiencing today" — 032c Magazine
'"It's certain that we need creativity and invention in order to meet the confluence of crises facing Britain today."
Niki Seth-Smith is an editor, journalist, and fiction writer. Editor of the historic New Humanist, she helps lead one of the oldest running rationalist magazines in the world. Niki is also a novelist working on a speculative novel and auto-fiction set in Athens.
Her poetry and fiction have been published in Open Pen, The London Magazine, and Dove Release, while her writings on politics, culture, and gender have appeared in Vice, Al Jazeera, openDemocracy, and New Humanist.
"If there is a macroeconomic lesson the pandemic has taught us, it is that central banks can do a lot"
Daniela Gabor is a Professor of Economics and Macro-Finance at the University of the West of England. She has been published in The Guardian, Financial Times and Jacobin and has been heavily critical of the way central banks and finance operate in our economies. Her work gets to the fundamentals of central banks and exposes how activities we usually assume are apolitical are in fact choices we don't have to make.
She was invited as an expert witness to the European Parliament's hearing on the Capital Markets Union and is working on an upcoming book on the Wall Street Consensus.
"Science fiction and poetry might have a sort of underlying kinship, related perhaps to their ability to conjure alternative worlds."
Sarah Howe is a poet, editor and the Leverhulme Fellow in English at King's College London. Her first book, Loop of Jade won the T.S. Eliot Prize, the first debut poetry collection to do so.
Previously, Sarah Howe has judged the National Poetry Competition, and been a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University. Her work has been nominated for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection and she was also elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in its "40 under 40" initiative.
"Sarah Howe’s poems are alive to the complex stories and voices that cohere around objects, family and place." — Edumnd de Waal
"It’s true that we crave stories, but they shouldn’t always be treated as a kind of salvation.... Life may be shaped to look like a grand narrative, but there is plenty happening in the footnotes."
Johanna Thomas-Corr is the chief literary critic for Culture & Books at The Times. Her articles and reviews have also appeared in The Observer, the Financial Times, the New Statesman and the Evening Standard. Her work for the Times has been credited with reinvigorating arts coverage and increasing the influence of the Times and Sunday Times culture work.
She was recently the centre of attention over a warped quote from her review of Jordan Peterson's 12 More Rules for Life where she ended up being quoted favourably on the book despite leaving a scathing review. This sparked a scandal over misrepresentation in the publishing industry.
'It’s time to demand better for nature. We can start by replacing the lie of the land with a profound truth: that any of us can care for the countryside, regardless of whether you own it.'
Guy Shrubsole is a British researcher, writer and campaigner. He wrote Who Owns England?, The Lost Rainforests of Britain (The Sunday Times Science book of the Year 2023)and, most recently, The Lie of the Land.
In addition to this, he is an investigator at Friends of the Earth. He is currently leading their work to double UK forestry cover by 2050 as part of FOE’s ambitions to make space for nature and transition the UK to net zero emissions. Guy led FOE’s successful campaigns to protect Sherwood Forest from fracking, secure new government funding for natural flood measures, and stop a new opencast coal mine at Druridge Bay.
‘If anyone was born to save Britain’s rainforests, it was Guy Shrubsole.’ — The Sunday Times
Carol Cleland is Director of the Center for the Study of Origins and Professor of Philosophy at the University of Colorado Boulder. Her extensive work on the question of What is Life?
She is a SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Institute Affiliate, and member of CU Boulder’s Center for Astrobiology. She was involved as Co-I and Key Collaborator on several science teams of the now disbanded NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI).
"Cleland’s philosophical outlook means that she approaches the subject [of what is life?] from a fresh perspective, framing important questions rarely discussed by scientists"— Athel Cornish-Bowden
'Almost everything we think we know about Jane Austen is wrong.'
Helena Kelly is a former academic and author of The Life and Lies of Charles Dickens and Jane Austen, the Secret Radical. She is currently a visiting scholar at the Oxford Centre for Life Writing, where she is pursuing her work on the life of the Victorian writer Elizabeth Gaskell.
Her work uncovers the secret radicalism of the writers of the past and shows how they touched on subjects that, discussed overtly, would have been tantamount to treason.
‘A sublime piece of literary detective work’ - The Observer on Jane Austen: The Secret Radical
"The question ‘what is the meaning of life?’ within contemporary secular culture is a comic one.”
James Tartaglia is Professor of Metaphysical Philosophy at Keele University. James' latest book is Inner Space Philosophy: Why the Next Stage of Human Development Should Be Philosophical, Explained Radically (Suitable for Wolves). His main interest is in understanding and enhancing awareness of the nature of philosophical inquiry, which for him centres on the question of the meaning of life. He seeks to reconnect philosophy with issues of natural human interest; and to re-position philosophy within a contemporary culture dominated by scientific understanding.
He is also the author of books like Philosophy in a Meaningless Life and Philosophy in a Technological World: Gods and Titans. In addition, James also leads the band Continuum of Selves, which combines jazz music with philosophical ideas in a Jazz-Philosophy fusion.
“Tartaglia… challenges materialism in original and inventive ways." — Tim Crane
Claudia Canavan is Health and Wellness Director at Women’s Health UK and Men’s Health UK, where she specialises in mind, drugs, hormones and feels. Previously, she was Health Editor at Women’s Health and founded HuffPost UK’s sustainable living vertical, before that. She has also held staff roles at Red and Esquire magazines.
Her writing has explored the complexities of the ‘psychedelic renaissance’, how the ketamine wellness bubble burst, the potential for lucid dreaming to serve as a PTSD therapy and the what the rise of platonic life partnerships says about modern culture.
"Industrial-era faith in progress is turning against all but a tiny elite of women"
Mary Harrington is a columnist and editor for UnHerd and runs her own weekly Substack, Reactionary Feminist. Renowned for her searing cultural critiques, Mary’s work has been published in First Things, American Affairs, the New York Post, The Spectator, the New Statesman, the London Times, and the Mail on Sunday.
Her debut work Feminism Against Progress tackles women's rights in the biotech age, arguing that progress has now stopped benefiting the majority women.
"One of progressive feminism's most ingenious critics" — Kathleen Stock
"The complexities of our society – of class society – require closer scrutiny than ever, especially when it means challenging our working assumptions."
Craig Gent is a director at Novara Media, where he has worked for over ten years. He was previously a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Warwick, and his work has been published in Jacobin, Vice and the Independent. He is the author of Cyberboss: The Rise of Algorithmic Management and the New Struggle for Control at Work (2024, Verso Books).
Gent argues that if we want to understand British politics, we need to ensure our ideas are in conversation with things that are happening across the country and across the working class.
"Craig Gent has given working people a great gift." - Sarah Jaffe
"In the liberal industry of publishing, the tension that exists between profit and morality is nothing new. … But the debate over what should be published has reached a fever pitch."
Alison Flood is a British journalist and author who has built a career covering books and the publishing industry. As a senior reporter at The Guardian, she writes in-depth news articles and features that explore the evolving landscape of the literary world. She is judging the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction in 2024, chairs the British Book Awards’ Crime and Thriller Book of the Year award and has also judged the Costa first novel award and the Orwell prize for political fiction.
Flood takes a keen interest in examining how technological changes are transforming the ways in which books are written, published, and consumed by readers.
“Everything begins only to end. The moment you were born you began to die. That's how it is with everything.”
Janne Teller is a critically acclaimed writer of novels, essays, and short stories. Teller’s work explores existential themes and ethical questions of life and civilization.
Teller has received many literary awards including the Drassow’s Prize for literary works towards peace and human understanding and her work has been translated into over 25 languages. Before she began writing full-time, Janne studied macroeconomics and worked as a conflict advisor for the EU and UN, mostly in Africa.
“A beautifully poetic writer.” - The Telegraph
“Conventions need have no rationale apart from the rationale of having a convention.”
Jonathan Webber is a professor at Cardiff University specializing in moral philosophy and the philosophy of psychology. His work explores how contemporary social psychology can inform debates in moral philosophy and the intersection of philosophy and psychology with twentieth-century French existentialism.
He is President of the UK Sartre Society, a Trustee of The Mind Association, and served as President of the British Society for Ethical Theory from 2014-2019. His most recent book, Rethinking Existentialism, has been praised as "the only book one needs."
“Webber takes the reader on a journey of rethinking existentialism.” — Phenomenological Reviews
"The art of medicine consists of amusing the patient while nature cures the disease."
Jacob Stegenga, a professor at the University of Cambridge, is a leading expert in the History and Philosophy of Science. He has written extensively on reasoning, rationality, and philosophical issues in medicine and biology.
He is the author of Medical Nihilism and Care and Cure: An Introduction to Philosophy of Medicine. Medical Nihilsm sharply argues that our confidence in medical intervention, ought to be lower. Currently, Jacob is working on a new book tentatively titled Heart of Science.
"This is a well-written, fascinating book that will enlighten anyone interested in the Philosophy of Medicine or the Philosophy of Science" — Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews
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