This event is open to sixth form students at LAET and Y10-11 students from its feeder schools (Mulberry Academy Woodside, Park View School, Dukes Aldridge Academy, Gladesmore Community School) and other schools by invitation only.

Part 1: We begin in ancient Greece when the mysteriously behaving objects were believed to have a soul and everything was made of combinations of earth, air, fire and water. The lectures take us through the rise and fall of ancient Empires and the ebb and flow of knowledge that would see the Western world enter the dark ages, while Baghdad became the centre of enlightenment. The contributions of Arab philosophers were vital to developing the scientific method and challenging long accepted beliefs about the nature of light and the solar system.

Part 2: We return to Europe, finally emerging from the dark ages with Galileo coming into conflict with the Church when he challenges the heliocentric model of the universe and uses the scientific method to overturn Aristotle's 2000 year misconception about falling objects. Meanwhile, the observation of a new star in the night sky that outshines every other cannot be explained by our models of a permanent and ever-lasting universe. Later Newton will take up the mantle, falling out with almost everyone he encounters, but will leave a large legacy on Physics along the way.

Part 3: We dive deeper into the nature of light - what exactly is it? Does it have a speed or travel instantaneously? How can we explain reflection and refraction? Newton thought he’d cracked it with his corpuscular theory, but experiments were showing odd behaviour that were better explained if it were a wave. Huygens, Young and Fresnel all made telling contributions, but it wouldn’t be until the speed of light could be accurately measured that we would be able to prove if Newton’s theory was incorrect.

Part 4: We start in 1801 with the invention of the voltaic pile, which allows scientists to investigate the new phenomenon of electricity. The strange link with magnetism is demonstrated by Faraday and will revolutionise the shape of our lives to come. However, it will take the genius of Maxwell to explain this link and uncover the nature of light. By 1888 Tesla and Edison are ready to battle over the contract to electrify America, a dispute that would electrocute an elephant and see the invention of the electric chair, would eventually be won by the right man - although the loser would end up rich and famous.

Part 5: This brings us to the start of the 20th Century - a time when physicists thought they had essentially discovered everything there was to know. Then Rutherford noticed that atoms can change from one element to another, was alchemy back on the table? Hertz noticed something strange when ultra-violet light shone on his radio-wave experiment and Planck did some mathematical fudging to make his theory on blackbody radiation match experimental results. Enter Einstein, unable to obtain a university position, working as a patent clerk in 1904 he will publish 4 papers that each rocks the foundations of accepted science.

Celebration event: Pizza and prizes! Certificates of course completion will be awarded as well as a quiz covering all 5 lectures. Students will then participate in a conference-style poster presentation where they can present their own research inspired by the lecture series with prizes from the lecture series on offer for the top 3 posters and the winning quiz team.

Students can work individually or in a group of maximum 3 people.

Pick a topic:

A philosopher or scientist
A theory and/or experiment
A time period and/or place
An interesting rivalry etc…

Success criteria:

A3 in size (hand written or powerpoint etc.)
Factual & interesting
Visually appealing (colourful & pictures)
Read in 3 minutes or less (limited words)
Contains at least 3 references.

Part 6: The final chapter last year took place at The European Space Center in Belgium and focused on Cosmology and the Space Race. Depending on whether or not another trip to Belgium is arranged this or next year, this lecture may or may not be added to this series in the new year.

With more powerful telescopes we'll look for planets that shouldn't be there, and discover them! Measuring distances in space is tough, but we'll try it and find 'nebulae' much beyond the MilkyWay - there are more galaxies! What's stranger is they're moving away and accelerating, but what could be causing this behaviour? The race for dark energy and dark matter are still progressing, but who will win the race to conquer space, the Moon, Mars... ?

History of Science Lectures 2024/5