Biology and the Humanities – Workshop at the University of Reading

Calling all biologists... from the British Society for Science and Literature:

 ‘Cultivating Common Ground: Biology & the Humanities’

 What do biologists know and think of the humanities? And what do they make of those humanities scholars – literary critics and historians – who have made biology their area of study? University of Reading staff in the biological sciences and the humanities are currently seeking practising biologists to participate in an AHRC-funded workshop which will address these and other questions. The workshop will consist of short presentations by humanities scholars whose research focuses on biology, followed by discussion and analysis of these and other topics. The workshop will be lead by Nick Battey, a plant biologist with a long-standing interest in the value of humanities research to biology, and there will be presentations by John Holmes (Darwinian evolution in poetry), Karin Lesnik-Oberstein (pre-conceptions in biomedical research), David Stack (understanding Victorian science) and Françoise Le Saux (medieval ideas about magic and the natural world). The workshop will take place on Wednesday 18 July 2012 at the University of Reading’s Whiteknights campus between 0930 and 1700. Refreshments, including lunch, will be provided, as will reasonable travel expenses.

Please see http://www.reading.ac.uk/cultivating-common-ground/ for further information. To register for a place, please contact Rachel Crossland: r.c.crossland@reading.ac.uk.

Julio: Big Conference for Young Mathematicians

Here's an event that will take place at the University of Bristol on 2nd April 2012:

Young Researchers in Mathematics Conference 2012.

The Young Researchers in Mathematics Conference is an annual event that aims to involve post-graduate and post-doctoral students at every level. It is a chance to meet and discuss research and ideas with other students from across the country. The conference spans a wide variety of disciplines arranged into tracks, each of which includes a keynote speaker and contributed talks by young researchers. There will also be plenary lectures of interest to the entire audience. For a full list of tracks and keynote speakers, please visit the conference website.

Starts: 11:00am on 2nd April 2012
Finishes: 4th April 2012
Venue: Queen's Building on University Walk, University of Bristol.

James: Conference time

Conferences, I am somewhat of the mind that they are little jolly half holidays given to those who spend their life in the pursuit of knowledge, filled with free food and free wine.

This is the new world in to which I enter, meeting many from different places even different countries all drawn by a uniting overarching research area. Yet the thing that struck me immediately on talking to others, of which I am not immune, is a queer sense that they are only interested in their own work and if your does not agree or compliment theirs then you may as well be talking about a cute kitten you saw the previous week for the amount they take in. Still there is a great air of respect around for all those presenting and again I see the transcendence from undergraduate, where you are either right or wrong as decided by your lecturer, to a level playing field where your views are seen with equal weight to someone 40 years your senior.

From a personal point of view yes it was an all expensive paid trip with glorious food laid on and plenty of free drink, for how else could you entice all the best minds for a particular field to one place at the same time. The up shot is what this then achieves, you have all gone for the free stuff but you leave with new friends and new ideas which in turn fuels more research to be presented at the next conference and the cycle continues. It is rather a way to keep everyone on the same page, sharing findings in order to save others from dead-ends and inspire new avenues of research.

So to be some what more concise: yes, I and others attend conferences with a mind for good free food and to show off our latest research yet harbouring the knowledge that you will walk away with new ideas and contacts to help you make the next step in your work.