science wire

Peter Sowerby Foundation endows Chair of Philosophy and Medicine
King's College London has received a major endowment from the Peter Sowerby Foundation to establish the first Chair in Philosophy and Medicine with the purpose of building on the University's groundbreaking work on the relationship between philosophy and medicine.

Smart drugs - smart decisions?
What are the ethical implications for society of allowing healthy people to take 'smart drugs' to enhance their performance? Barbara Sahakian will discuss the issue at Hay this weekend.

Open science and ethics debate

£7 million gift establishes Yeoh Tiong Lay Centre for Politics, Philosophy & Law
King's College London has received a donation of £7 million to set up a new research-based Centre for Politics, Philosophy & Law.

Creativity that counts
In a digital world, literature, art and music are often the result of collaborative efforts. But who owns what, and can copyright law cope? New research aims to find out. Authorship remains an important concept in the digital age, though there is real diversity in its meaning.

Conversations with Cornel West
Don't miss the chance to hear the controversial commentator Cornel West in dialogue with other great minds on politics, philosophy and literature, touching in particular on issues of race and identity.   Our future is greater than our past.

New conceptions: single mothers by sperm donation
Sophie Zadeh, a PhD candidate in the Centre for Family Research, is contributing to a new study of the well-being of single mothers by sperm donation and their children.

Does increased exposure to a piece of art make us like it more?
When it comes to judging art, beauty may not just be in the eye of the beholder, according to a study from the University of Leeds. The research challenges the idea that what people value in art is largely what they are used to, or that people will come to like any image if they see it enough times.

Birmingham and Yale to establish global justice programme in India
The University of Birmingham is joining forces with Yale to support the development of a pioneering global justice programme at the University of Delhi.

Cracking the semantic code
Half of a word's meaning is simply a three dimensional summary of the rewards associated with it, according to an analysis of millions of blog entries undertaken by researchers from the University of Bristol and published today in PLoS ONE. We make choices about pretty much everything, all the time  - "Should I go for a walk or grab a coffee?";  "Shall I look at who just came in or continue to watch TV?" - and to do so we need something common as a basis to make the choice.

Britain’s first Professor of Morality appointed by the University of Birmingham
The University of Birmingham is proud to announce the appointment of Randall Curren as Professor of Moral and Virtue Education to the Jubilee Centre for Character and Values, in the School of Education.

University Sermon on ‘Epiphanies of the Human: Faith and Migration’
Rowlands, who is currently Lecturer in Theology and Ministry at King's College, London and also a Research Associate of St Edmund's College, works at the interface of Political, Moral and Practical Theologies.

Valuing nature is not enough
Is it possible to put a price tag on the natural world? A researcher at The University of Nottingham has been examining the rise of a new concept — ecosystem services — to describe the multitude of resources supplied to us by Mother Nature.