Lord Rees of Ludlow giving the Romanes lecture. Photo: John Cairns
Lord Rees explored the limits of our current understanding of science, whether there are intrinsic limits to our scientific understanding, and the factors limiting how science is applied, at Oxford University's Romanes Lecture on Wednesday 2 November 2011. Video of the full lecture is now available to watch here. Lord Rees of Ludlow, who was the President of the Royal Society from 2005 to 2010, is the Astronomer Royal and Master of Trinity College and Professor of Cosmology and Astrophysics at the University of Cambridge. He used the hour-long lecture entitled 'The Limits of Science' to tackle a range of topics showing the importance of science to society and the way we think. Speaking to a full house at the Sheldonian, Lord Rees said he would 'scan some horizons in my own field of astronomy,' and then 'ask if there are intrinsic limits to our scientific grasp - phenomena within the remit of science that nonetheless transcend human understanding,' before tackling 'more practical concerns: the threats and opportunities science presents, and the limitations on how it's applied that are set by politics, prudence or ethics.' Discussing the possibility of alien life Lord Rees said: 'We may learn this century whether biological evolution is unique to the 'pale blue dot' in the cosmos that is our home, or whether Darwin's writ runs through a wider universe that teems with life - even with intelligence. But even in the latter case, such intelligence could be qualitatively different from our own - assemblages of superintelligent 'social insects', or computers.
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