Our April 2023 Meeting

The Life & Legacy of George Peabody 

Christine Wagg

Thursday, April 20th at 7:30PM

The North End Club, 70 Roff Avenue, Bedford, MK41 7LW

Born into a poor family in Massachusetts, George Peabody moved to London established himself as a successful banker. In his old age, Peabody won worldwide acclaim for his philanthropy. He founded the Peabody Trust in Britain, providing housing for the poor. The Peabody Trust continues his work to this day.

Christine will outline the life and achievements of George Peabody, the history of the trust and some of the notable properties it owns.

Christine Wagg is the Peabody Trust’s historian and has a background in property law. 

 

Our March 2023 Meeting

Drop The Dead Donkey: Are the benefits of Chinese medicine e'jiao too good to be true? 

Dr Heather Maggs

Thursday, March 16th at 7:30PM

The North End Club, 70 Roff Avenue, Bedford, MK41 7LW

Wrinkles! Bleeding/Childbirth! Erectile dysfunction! Cancer! The reduction of nitrous oxide in the blood! “When you’re just feeling a bit shit!”

Sceptical already?

E’jiao, made from boiling donkey skins to form a collagen-based TCM, has been used in China for over three millennia by emperors and their elites. Clever marketing over the past 30+ years is generating increasing demand for this multi-therapeutic TCM, which is threatening global donkey populations as well as aiding and abetting illegal trafficking in pangolin scales, ivory and tiger bones – to name just a

few.

If you find this difficult to believe, Heather will share some of the results from both her recent doctorate and her sponsor, the Donkey Sanctuary. Please note, her presentation will contain images that some people may find distressing.

Dr. Heather Maggs is a local lass and registered veterinary nurse (RVN), Heather has a passionate and lifelong interest in animal welfare.

She has just completed a PhD by papers at the University of Reading, researching the value of donkeys in underpinning the livelihoods of poor rural farming communities in northern Ghana. Her three peer-reviewed papers focus on the study’s over-arching results, livelihoods and incomes and how children view and work with their donkeys.

 

Our February 2023 Meeting

Rebel Cell: A New View of an Old Disease 

Dr Kat Arney

Thursday, February 16th at 7:30PM

The North End Club, 70 Roff Avenue, Bedford, MK41 7LW

Many of us think of cancer as a contemporary killer caused by our modern lifestyles. But that’s not true. Cancer has always been with us. It killed our ancient ancestors, the mammals they evolved from and the dinosaurs that trampled the ground before

that. Why? Because cancer is a bug in the system of life. 

Kat Arney takes us to the dawn of life on planet earth right up to the present day to get to the heart of what cancer really is and how by better understanding its evolutionary journey we might one day overcome it.

Dr Kat Arney is an award-winning science writer, broadcaster and public speaker, and is the founder and creative director of First Create The Media.

Her latest book is Rebel Cell: Cancer, evolution and the science of life. Kat was a key part of the science communications team at Cancer Research UK for more than a decade, co-founding the charity’s award-winning Science Blog and acting as a principal media spokesperson.

Kat also presents the popular Genetics Unzipped podcast for The Genetics Society and has fronted several BBC Radio 4 science documentaries including the recent series Ingenious, looking at the stories behind our genes.

 

Our January 2023 Meeting

A Human History of Emotion: How The Way We Feel Built The World We Know 

Dr Richard Firth-Godbehere

Thursday, January 19th at 7:30PM

The North End Club, 70 Roff Avenue, Bedford, MK41 7LW

We like to think of humans as rational creatures, who have relied on calculation and intellect to survive. But many of the most important moments in our history had little to do with cold, hard facts and a lot to do with feelings.

Richard Firth-Godbehere’s award-winning interdisciplinary research walks the line between history, psychology, linguistics, philosophy and futurism, vividly illustrating how our understanding and experience of emotions has changed over time, and how our beliefs about feelings profoundly shaped us and the world we inhabit.

Richard Firth-Godbehere, PhD, is one of the world’s leading experts on disgust and emotions and is an Honorary Research Fellow at the Centre for the History of the Emotions, Queen Mary University of London.

 

Our November Meeting -  The Reluctant Teacher - with
Kevin Precious - Thursday, November 17th at 7:30PM

The North End Club, 70 Roff Avenue, Bedford, MK41 7LW

Kevin returns for his 3rd Bedford Skeptics appearance. This time with a work-in-progress show, the former-teacher turned stand-up-comedian takes a backward glance towards his former profession, as he looks ahead to Edinburgh 2023.

Expect anecdotes and observations aplenty, as well as the odd polemical interjection regarding the parlous state of the profession.

‘Kevin’s stage charisma and poise set him head and shoulders above the previous acts’ - The Times

Our September 2022 Meeting -  Tackling Climate Change & The 6th Mass Extinction - with Prof. Jim Harris - Thursday, September 15th at 7:30PM

The North End Club, 70 Roff Avenue, Bedford, MK41 7LW

ACOP26 necessarily had a major focus on reducing, eliminating,
and sequestering carbon. Less prominent in the headlines is the crisis in biodiversity – the Sixth Mass Extinction, with the current rate of species loss to be as much as 1 000 times higher than the natural background – caused by us. We have been losing species by habitat loss, unchecked invasive species, overexploitation (extreme hunting and fishing pressure), pollution, and climate change.

The UK itself is in the bottom 10% of biodiversity as a country – with about half of its biodiversity left – compared to the global average of 75%, which itself is nothing to celebrate. The good news is that by increasing biodiversity through ecosystem restoration we can sequester more atmospheric carbon than simply planting rows of non-native tree monocultures.

Prof. Jim Harris, an environmental scientist at Cranfield University, will take us through the science of this complex, but hopeful, prospect.

Our October Meeting -  ORIGINS - How the Earth Shaped Human History - with Prof. Lewis Dartnell - Thursday, October 20th at 7:30PM

The North End Club, 70 Roff Avenue, Bedford, MK41 7LW

When we talk about human history, we focus on great leaders, revolutions, and technological advances. But how has the Earth itself determined our destiny? How has our planet made us?

As a species we are shaped by our environment. Geological forces drove our evolution in East Africa; mountainous terrain led to the development of democracy in Greece; and today voting behaviour in the United States follows the bed of an ancient sea. The human story is the story of these forces, from plate tectonics and climate change, to atmospheric circulation and ocean currents.

By taking us through millennia of human history, and billions of years into our planet's past, Professor Lewis Dartnell tells us the ultimate origin story. When we reach the point where history becomes science we see a vast web of connections that underwrites our modern world and helps us face the challenges of the future.

From the cultivation of the first crops to the founding of modern states, Origins reveals the Earth's awesome impact on the shape of human civilizations.

ORIGINS is the Sunday Times top history book of the year, a Waterstones 'Best of 2019' book, on iNews' 11 best popular science books for 2019, and a Mail on Sunday recommended science and nature book.

Origins by Lewis Dartnell stands comparison with Yuval Noah Harari's Sapiens... A thrilling piece of Big History' -- THE SUNDAY TIMES

Dartnell's story is beautifully written and organized. His infectious curiosity and enthusiasm tug the reader from page to page, synthesizing geology, oceanography, meteorology, geography, palaeontology, archaeology and political history in a manner that recalls Jared Diamond's classic 1997 book Guns, Germs, and Steel.'  -- NATURE

Dartnell's approach is encyclopedic, marked by both a broad sweep and a passion for details. -- WASHINGTON POST

 Dartnell has found the perfect blend of science and history. This is a book that will not only challenge our preconceptions about the past, but should make us think very carefully about humanity's future' -- MAIL ON SUNDAY