Plotting the Future

This public lecture series is a joint initiative of four research institutes at University College Dublin – the Earth Institute, the Geary Institute for Public Policy, the Humanities Institute, and the Institute for Discovery. The series will consist of public lectures, thematic workshops, interviews and other outreach activities.

Building on the success of the initial series Plotting the Future: Scenes and Scenarios of Speculation which addressed the social, cultural and economic impact of Artificial Intelligence and robotics, Plotting the Future: Towards Sustainability explores the question of whether and how life in the Anthropocene can be made sustainable. The question of sustainability cannot be solved by any one discipline on its own – besides scientific, economic and political interventions, it also requires ethical, cultural and historically informed perspectives. We are therefore keen to invite leading international experts spanning the sciences, social sciences and humanities to explore how we are driving environmental change and discuss how we can or should respond, in terms of society, economy, policy, technology, culture and lifestyle.