The Human Being

Our friends at St Thomas' Burwood are hosting a panel discussion on the complex subject of legalised assisted dying.

Chaired by Michael Dowling, the panel will feature:

Prof David Clarke, psychiatrist
Rev Barbara Colliver, hospital chaplain
Dr Rachel Carling, Board member of the Australian Care Alliance, Right to Life and previously a member of the Legislative Council
Dr Denise Cooper-Clarke, medical ethicist
Dr Adrian Dabscheck, palliative care physician

Download a pdf of the review here

For other reviews, visit the Journal reviews page here

"Life extension – using science to slow or halt human aging so that people live far longer than they do naturally – may one day be possible.

"Big business is taking this possibility seriously. In 2013 Google founded a company called Calico to develop life extension methods, and Silicon Valley billionaires Jeff Bezos and Peter Thiel have invested in Unity Biotechnology, which has a market cap of US$700 million. Unity Biotechnology focuses mainly on preventing age-related diseases, but its research could lead to methods for slowing or preventing aging itself.

Sociologist Tom Aechtner on why complexity is better than conflict and how we change our minds.

Tom Aechtner was a speaker at this year's COSAC and Dr Natasha Moore (from the Centre for Public Christianity) recorded this interview with him there.  In the interview, Tom tackles the vital and very current problem of, "...mass persuasion, why we believe and disbelieve things and how we can get past pointing fingers and yelling at each other." 

In this article, sparked by the publication last year of Improbable Destinies by Jonathan B. Losos, Frank Nicholas argues that both Richard Dawkins and Simon Conway Morris are in danger of misinterpreting Darwin by placing too much emphasis on natural selection and adaptation, and too little emphasis on non-adaptive evolutionary forces.