Reith Lectures Transcripts

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Many of the lectures are also available as mp3 downloads.

Reith 1948 - Bertrand Russell: Authority and the Individual

• 1. Social Cohesion and Human Nature
• 2. Social Cohesion and Government
• 3. The Role of Individuality
• 4. The Conflict of Technique and Human Nature
• 5. Control and Initiative: Their Respective Spheres
• 6. Individual and Social Ethics

Full details of Reith 1948 - Bertrand Russell: Authority and the Individual

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Reith 1949 - Robert Birley: Britain in Europe: Reflections on the Development of a European Society

• 1. The Problem of Patriotism
• 2. The Meeting of Britain and Europe
• 3. Problem of a Common Language
• 4. Britain's Contribution to a European Society

Full details of Reith 1949 - Robert Birley: Britain in Europe: Reflections on the Development of a European Society

Reith 1950 - John Zachary Young: Doubt and Certainty in Science

• 1. The Biologist's Approach to Man
• 2. Brains as Machines
• 3. The Human Calculating Machine
• 4. The Establishment of Certainty
• 5. How We Learn to Communicate
• 6. The Changing Symbols of Science
• 7. The Mechanistics Interpretation of Nature
• 8. Made in What Image?

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Reith 1951 - Cyril Radcliffe: Power and the State

• 1. Power and the State 1
• 2. Power and the State 2
• 3. The Fairy Story of Natural Rights
• 4. Makers of the American Constitution
• 5. British Rule In India
• 6. The Individual and the State
• 7. Power, and the Problem of its Control

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Reith 1952 - Arnold Toynbee: The World and the West

• 1. The World and the West: Russia
• 2. The World and the West: Islam
• 3. The World and the West: India
• 4. The World and the West: The Far East
• 5. The Psychology of Encounters
• 6. The World and the Greeks and Romans

Full details of Reith 1962 - Arnold Toynbee: The World and the West

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Reith 1953 - Robert Oppenheimer: Science and the Common Understanding

• 1. Newton: the Path of Light
• 2. Science as Action: Rutherford's World
• 3. A Science In Change
• 4. Atom and Void in the Third Millennium
• 5. Uncommon Sense
• 6. The Sciences and Man's Community

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Reith 1954 - Oliver Franks: Britain and the Tide of World Affairs

• 1. Britain and the Tide of World Affairs 1
• 2. A Fellowship of Free Nations
• 3. The Atlantic Bridge
• 4. The End of the Old World
• 5. The Balancing Act
• 6. The Will to Greatness

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Reith 1955 - Nikolaus Pevsner: The Englishness of English Art

• 1. The Geography of Art
• 2. Hogarth and Observed Life
• 3. Reynolds and Detachment
• 4. Perpendicular England
• 5. Blake and the Planing Line
• 6. Constable and the Pursuit of Nature
• 7. Architecture and Planning: The Functional Approach

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Reith 1956 - Edward Appleton: Science and the Nation

• 1. Our National Need of Science
• 2. The Lessons of the War
• 3. Science for its Own Sake
• 4. Government and Science
• 5. Industrial Science
• 6. Science and Education

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Reith 1957 - George Kennan: Russia, the Atom and the West

• 1. The Internal Soviet Scene
• 2. The Soviet Mind and World Realities
• 3. The Problem of Eastern and Central Europe
• 4. The Military Problem
• 5. The Non-European World
• 6. Strengthening Nato: To What End?

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Reith 1958 - Bernard Lovell: The Individual and the Universe

• 1. Astronomy Breaks Free
• 2. The Origin of the Solar System
• 3. The New Astronomy
• 4. Astronomy and the State
• 5. The Origin of the Universe 1
• 6. The Origin of the Universe 2

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Reith 1959 - Peter Medawar: The Future of Man

• 1. The Fallibility of Prediction
• 2. The Meaning of Fitness
• 3. The Limits of Improvement
• 4. The Genetic System of Man
• 5. Intelligence and Fertility
• 6. Future of Man

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*Relatively few recordings are available from the years 1949-1975