In her final lecture, the forensic psychiatrist Dr Gwen Adshead, assesses how we deal with violent offenders and asks is it time for a re-think? The UK has more than 70 people on whole life tariffs, at incredible expense – all to appease a sense of revenge, she says. Dr Adshead assesses the effectiveness and impact of therapeutic interventions with offenders in prisons. And she asks if the public needs to change their minds about violent perpetrators. The programme is recorded in Bergen, Norway ...
Dec 17, 2024•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast How best do we understand how to manage powerful emotions such as rage, fear and shame? With very rare access, Forensic Psychiatrist Dr Gwen Adshead gives her third Reith Lecture inside HMP Grendon, where she talks to prisoners and staff, and asks the question: “Does trauma cause violence?” Does being a victim of violence in some circumstances make you more likely to become a perpetrator of violence? Was WH Auden right when he wrote in 1939 ‘Those to whom evil is done do evil in return’? The Rei...
Dec 10, 2024•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast In her second Reith Lecture, Dr Gwen Adshead asks if there’s such a thing as “evil.”? In a career spanning nearly 40 years the forensic psychiatrist has heard many of her patients ask: “ I have done evil things but does that make me evil.”? Dr Adshead says that we have often confused “evil” with mental illness. She argues that we all have capacity for “evil” and says we need to find ways to cultivate societal and individual “goodness.” The programme is recorded at the V&A in Dundee in front ...
Dec 03, 2024•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast In her 2024 Reith Lectures, Dr Gwen Adshead, addresses four questions that she has most commonly faced in her work as a therapist with violent perpetrators in secure psychiatric units and prisons: Is Violence normal? What is the relationship between trauma and violence? Is there such a thing as Evil? Can we change violent minds? In this first lecture, using data and real-life stories from nearly 40 years’ experience as a forensic Psychiatrist working inside institutions such as Broadmoor, she as...
Nov 26, 2024•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast This year's BBC Reith Lecturer is Ben Ansell, Professor of Comparative Democratic Institutions at Nuffield College, Oxford University and author of “Why Politics Fails.” In four lectures called “Our Democratic Future,” he asks how we can build a politics that works for all of us with political systems which are robust to the challenges of the twenty first century, from climate change to artificial intelligence. In this fourth and final lecture, recorded in Atlanta, Georgia in the United States, ...
Dec 20, 2023•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast This year's BBC Reith Lecturer is Ben Ansell, Professor of Comparative Democratic Institutions at Nuffield College, Oxford University and the author of "Why Politics Fails." He will deliver four lectures in a series called “Our Democratic Future.” The series asks how we can build a politics that works for all of us with systems which are robust to the challenges of the twenty first century, from climate change to artificial intelligence. In this third lecture, recorded in Sunderland, Professor A...
Dec 13, 2023•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast This year's BBC Reith Lecturer is Ben Ansell, Professor of Comparative Democratic Institutions at Nuffield College, Oxford University. He will deliver four lectures called “Our Democratic Future.” In his series Professor Ansell asks how we can build a politics that works for all of us with systems which are robust to the challenges of the twenty first century, from climate change to artificial intelligence. The lectures build on his recent book Why Politics Fails, which identifies a series of tr...
Dec 06, 2023•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast This year's BBC Reith Lecturer is Ben Ansell, Professor of Comparative Democratic Institutions at Nuffield College, Oxford University. He will deliver four lectures called “Our Democratic Future,” asking how we can build a politics that works for all of us with systems which are robust to the challenges of the twenty first century, from climate change to artificial intelligence. In this first lecture, recorded at New Broadcasting House in London in front of an audience, Professor Ansell asks whe...
Dec 01, 2023•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast In the last in a series of four lectures examining what freedom means, the foreign affairs and intelligence expert Dr Fiona Hill gives her BBC Reith Lecture on Freedom from Fear. Dr Hill is one of the world’s leading experts on Russia, and served as director for European and Russian affairs on President Trump’s National Security Council, and in senior intelligence roles for both Presidents Bush and Obama. She will talk about the fear she felt growing up as teenager in the Cold War and living wit...
Dec 21, 2022•1 hr 2 min•Transcript available on Metacast Author and musician Darren McGarvey gives the third of four BBC Reith Lectures on the theme of liberty, addressing "Freedom from Want." McGarvey argues that the present system isn't working for many but that it is incumbent on citizens to confront that and rise to the challenge of what inequality means. Individuals, he says, need to take personal responsibility and reject the apathy which many working-class communities experience. The lecture and question-and-answer session is recorded in Glasgo...
Dec 14, 2022•1 hr 14 min•Transcript available on Metacast Rowan Williams cyn Archesgob Cymru a Chaergaint yn traddodi ei ddarlith Reith i'r BBC yn y Gymraeg gan drafod ffydd a rhyddid. Yn ôl yr Arglwydd Acton, yr awdur ar ryddid o'r 19 ganrif a ddyfynnir yn y ddarlith, rhyddid crefyddol yw sail pob rhyddid gwleidyddol. Mae Rowan Williams yn cymhwyso hyn yng nghyd destun De Affrica, y gwrthdaro yn y ddadl gyfoes am erthylu ac amryw bynciau eraill. Dadleuir fod rhyddid i addoli yn gorfod cynnwys y rhyddid i fynegi argyhoeddiadau yn ogystal a'r rhyddid i ...
Dec 07, 2022•29 min•Transcript available on Metacast Rowan Williams, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, gives the second of the 2022 Reith Lectures, discussing faith and liberty. In his lecture, he cites Lord Acton, the 19th Century thinker on freedom, who said that religious freedom is the basis of all political freedom. Williams addresses this with reference to South Africa and today's controversies around the abortion debate. He argues that for religious believers, freedom of worship must mean the freedom to express conviction, not just the f...
Dec 07, 2022•1 hr 11 min•Transcript available on Metacast Best-selling Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie gives the first of four 2022 Reith Lectures, discussing freedom of speech. She argues that it feels like freedom of speech is under attack. Cancel culture, arguments about “wokeness" and the assault on Salman Rushdie have produced a febrile atmosphere. Meanwhile autocrats and populists have undermined the very notion of an accepted fact-based truth which lives above politics. So how do we calibrate freedom in this context? If we have the free...
Nov 30, 2022•1 hr 10 min•Transcript available on Metacast Stuart Russell suggests a way forward for human control over super-powerful artificial intelligence. He argues for the abandonment of the current “standard model” of AI, proposing instead a new model based on three principles - chief among them the idea that machines should know that they don’t know what humans’ true objectives are. Echoes of the new model are already found in phenomena as diverse as menus, market research, and democracy. Machines designed according to the new model would be, Ru...
Dec 22, 2021•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast Professor Stuart Russell explores the future of work and one of the most concerning issues raised by Artificial Intelligence: the threat to jobs. How will the economy adapt as work is increasingly done by machines? Economists’ forecasts range from rosy scenarios of human-AI teamwork, to dystopian visions in which most people are excluded from the economy altogether. Was the economist Keynes correct when he said that we were born to “strive”? If much of the work in future will be carried out by m...
Dec 15, 2021•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast Stuart Russell warns of the dangers of developing autonomous weapon systems - arguing for a system of global control. Weapons that locate, select, and engage human targets without human supervision are already available for use in warfare,. Some argue that AI will reduce collateral damage and civilian casualties. Others believe it could kill on a scale not seen since Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Will future wars be fought entirely by machines, or will one side surrender only when its real losses, mil...
Dec 08, 2021•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast Stuart Russell explores the future of Artificial Intelligence and asks; how can we get our relationship with it right? Professor Russell is founder of the Centre for Human-Compatible Artificial Intelligence at the University of California, Berkeley. In this lecture he reflects on the birth of AI, tracing our thinking about it back to Aristotle. He outlines the definition of AI, its successes and failures, and the risks it poses for the future. Referencing the representation of AI systems in film...
Dec 01, 2021•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast Mark Carney, the former Governor of the Bank of England, argues that the roots of the climate change threat lie in a deeper crisis of values. He suggests that we can create an ecosystem in which society’s values broaden the market’s conceptions of value. In this way, individual creativity and market dynamism can be channelled to achieve broader social goals including, inclusive growth and environmental sustainability. Presenter: Anita Anand Producer: Jim Frank Editor: Hugh Levinson Production Co...
Dec 23, 2020•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast Mark Carney, the former Governor of the Bank of England, observes that the pandemic has forced states to confront how we value health, wealth and opportunity. During the first few months of the crisis, most states chose to value human life more than the economic well-being of the nation-state. But if that seems to be changing how do we assess value in this sense? Dr Carney elucidates surprising differences in the financial value put on a human life in different nations – and goes on to argue tha...
Dec 16, 2020•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast Mark Carney, the former Governor of the Bank of England, takes us back to the high drama of the financial crisis of 2008, which ended a period when bankers saw themselves as unassailable Masters of the Universe. More than a decade on, how much have the bankers changed their ways? How far has the financial sector changed? Dr Carney says that we must remain vigilant and resist the “three lies of finance.” If we don’t, he warns, we will live with a system which is ill-prepared for the next crisis. ...
Dec 09, 2020•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast Mark Carney’s Reith 2020 Lectures chart how we have come to esteem financial value over human value and how we have gone from market economies to market societies. He argues that this has contributed to a trio of crises: of credit, Covid and climate. And the former Bank of England Governor will outline how we can turn this around. In this lecture, recorded with a virtual audience, he reflects that whenever he could step back from what felt like daily crisis management, the same deeper issues loo...
Dec 02, 2020•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast Jonathan Sumption argues against Britain adopting a written constitution as a response to political alienation. The former UK Supreme Court Justice has argued that politics is in decline partly, at least, because the courts and the law is increasingly doing what politicians used to do. This has indirectly contributed to the electorate’s increasing rejection of the political process. There is growing resentment against the political elite. So what can we do? Lord Sumption makes some suggestions t...
Jun 18, 2019•42 min•Transcript available on Metacast Jonathan Sumption assesses the US and UK’s constitutional models. He describes Britain's unwritten constitution as a political institution. The US Constitution is by contrast essentially a legal document. This has led Americans to address what should be political questions – such as the right to abortion – via the courts, rather than through politics. Britain, Lord Sumption argues, should learn from the United States be careful about which rights should be put beyond democratic choice. The progr...
Jun 11, 2019•42 min•Transcript available on Metacast Jonathan Sumption argues that judges - especially those of the European Court of Human Rights - have usurped power by expanding the interpretation of human rights law. Lord Sumption argues that concepts of human rights have a long history in the common law. But by contrast, the European Convention on Human Rights has become a dynamic treaty, taking on new interpretations and powers. Article 8 – the right to private and family life – is the most striking example. Should these decisions be made by...
Jun 04, 2019•43 min•Transcript available on Metacast Jonathan Sumption explains how democratic processes have the power to accommodate opposition opinions and interests. But he argues that in recent years that politics has shied away from legislating and now the courts have taken on more and more of the role of making law. Lord Sumption was until recently a justice of the UK’s Supreme Court and is a distinguished historian. This lecture is recorded in front of an audience at Birmingham University. The Reith Lectures are presented and chaired by An...
May 28, 2019•43 min•Transcript available on Metacast Jonathan Sumption argues that the law is taking over the space once occupied by politics. Lord Sumption was until recently a justice of the UK’s Supreme Court, as well as being a distinguished historian. In this lecture, recorded before an audience at Middle Temple in London, Lord Sumption says that until the 19th century, law only dealt with a narrow range of human problems. That has now changed radically. And he argues that the growth of the law, driven by demand for greater personal security ...
May 21, 2019•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast Historian Margaret MacMillan looks at representations of war: can we really create beauty from horror and death? Speaking at the Canadian War Museum, she discusses the paradox of commemoration. She questions attempts to capture the essence and meaning of war through art. The programme is presented by Anita Anand in front of an audience and includes a question and answer session. Producer: Jim Frank Editor: Hugh Levinson
Jul 24, 2018•42 min•Transcript available on Metacast Historian Margaret MacMillan assesses how the law and international agreements have attempted to address conflict. Speaking to an audience at the Northern Irish Parliament Buildings at Stormont in Belfast, Professor MacMillan outlines how both states and the people have sought to justify warfare - from self-defence to civil war - focusing on examples from Irish and British history. The programme, including a question and answer session, is presented by Anita Anand. Producer: Jim Frank Editor: Hu...
Jul 17, 2018•57 min•Transcript available on Metacast Historian Margaret MacMillan dissects the relationship between war and the civilian. Speaking to an audience in Beirut, she looks back at the city's violent past and discusses the impact of conflict on noncombatants throughout the centuries. She explores how civilians have been deliberately targeted, used as slaves and why women are still often singled out in mass rapes. And she addresses the proposition that human beings are becoming less, not more violent. The programme is chaired by Anita Ana...
Jul 10, 2018•58 min•Transcript available on Metacast 
