How can people and nature coexist?
I have been monitoring environmental issues for over 25 years and have
seen a huge change in how society views the environment. Conservation concerns that
some once regarded as green scare-mongering are now mainstream issues.
There is a growing awareness of the difficulties in ensuring the environment
can co-exist sustainably with modern lifestyles. To what extent should jobs come
before the environment e.g. threatened species? Does a concern for the
environment damage a national economy or enhance it? Are long term environmental
considerations more important than the short term ones dictated by election cycles?
Should we protect key areas for conservation and exploit the rest of
the earth mercilessly? If so, who decides what is worth conserving? Is a
rare and little seen snow leopard more important than the common birds
which cheer us daily? A fast paced, engagingly crafted talk full of surprises and ethical dilemmas
designed to get an audience thinking and questioning.
I was responsible for designing and running several courses for the
University of Glasgow's environmental sustainability degree program, and
have also taught on environmental issues for the University of Edinburgh
and the Open University.
Other environmental talks
Our Energy Future
Antarctic science
Climate change
The End of Nature
"On behalf of our President and the members of Sheffield Women’s Lecture Club, thank you for your most informative and interesting talk yesterday.
It was a superb thought-provoking way to get us all thinking about what environmental cost our lifestyles are making.It was so interesting
to hear of your travels, studies and work you are doing. It was a delight to spend time with you.
Members were very complimentary on the way out and I know enjoyed listening to you as much as we at the top table did.
Many, many thanks for being with us and giving us such an enjoyable talk."
Daphne Cawthorn, Sheffield Women's Lecture Club
"For the second time, I must congratulate you on giving us a talk which was not only most professional in execution,
but also put over controversial and key issues in a supremely measured way.
All too often, those who climb on controversial platforms have their own axes to grind,
but you avoid this and instead present the information in such a way that your audience
can make their own minds up without any blast of heavily-loaded rhetoric from the
speaker
which may deliberately set out to distort or proselytise.
I think the audience appreciated this today - they were very attentive and it was clear afterwards
that many had gone away thinking in a very positive way about all the issues you raised - which was exactly what you'd intended!
Your images were superb, beautifully chosen and with the added textual elements so slick,
unlike so many speakers who overdo the text side of things on screen and bore the pants off one by so doing.
Presentations so often fail because of this but yours are so finely tuned and balanced and always timed to perfection.
We look forward to having you back amongst us - and many thanks again."
Margaret Wilkes, Royal Scottish Geographical Society (Co-Chair Edinburgh Centre)
guest speaker / guide / geologist / university tutor
