RSVP to 03 9662 2062 or drop in to book. Friday 6.30pm 4th May.

Aubrey de Grey is a theoretician in the field of gerontology, and the Chief Science Officer of the SENS Foundation as well as the editor-in-chief of the academic journal Rejuvenation Research. His research focuses on whether regenerative medicine can stop or dramatically slow down the aging process. He works on the development of tissue-repair strategies intended to rejuvenate the human body and allow an indefinite lifespan. In recent years Aubrey has been interviewed by 60 Minutes, the BBC, The New York Times, Fortune Magazine, The Washington Post, TED, Popular Science, The Colbert Report, and Time.

In this special science night before the Humanity Plus conference, he will be being interviewed by Dr Krystal of Triple R, science show, Einstein A-Go-Go. Dr Krystal is a medical research scientist whose work focusses on finding a vaccine for Malaria. She has been a recipient of a grant from the Melinda and Bill Gates Foundation for work whole organism vaccine against the parasite that causes Malaria. RSVP Essential, call 9662 2062 or drop in. As with all our events, the venue is Embiggen Books at 197-203 Little Lonsdale unless otherwise indicated. Friday 6.30pm 4th May.

From now on we’ll be opening till 7.00pm on Friday instead of 8.00pm. This is the only change. Which is great for us because we get to see our little girl before she goes to bed every night now! How cool is that?!

One caveat, our opening times do alter when we have events, which means if you are having a book emergency or are planning to come in from far away just call to make sure that you don’t arrive in the middle of an event when we can’t open the doors.

Monday - Wednesday 10.30am - 6.30pm

Thursday - Friday 10.30am - 7.00pm

Saturday 10:30am to 5.00pm

Sunday: Closed.

Public Holidays: mostly closed, phone us to check.

Science, Scepticism and Society: Wednesday 11th April 6.30pm RSVP essential to Embiggen Books 03 9662 2062. All Embiggen Books events at shop unless otherwise stated

Address 197-203 Little Lonsdale St, Behind the State Library

Laureate Professor Peter Doherty and Peter Ellerton

Nobel Prize winner Peter Doherty in conversation with Peter Ellerton (winner of the Australian Skeptics critical thinking award 2008).

The following quote by Carl Sagan is well known among scientists, as well as lay people with a general appreciation for science and technology: “We have arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces”. It expresses their concern over the discrepancy between the widespread use of science-based technologies on the one side and the the anti-science message of the new age, post-modernists and some religions on the other. How has this come about?

Even as they become one with their smart phones, has the public truly lost its trust in science?

Thursday 12th April 6.30pm
SECULAR AUSTRALIA: A 10 POINT PLAN
RSVP essential to Embiggen Books 03 9662 2062
All Embiggen Books events at shop unless otherwise stated
Address 197-203 Little Lonsdale St, Behind the State Library

Never mind The Four Horsemen, come and listen to the Trinity.

Russell Blackford, Meredith Doig and Graham Oppy are three of Australia’s foremost intellectuals and they’ll be in-store to discuss possible ways to strengthen the secular nature of Australia’s democracy.

Russell Blackford, Graham Oppy & Meredith Doig

Three of Australia’s finest and most rigourous public intellectuals come together to discuss how the ideas of secularism have evolved over the last few decades and how and why the time has come to strengthen the policies and strategies which hold our multicultural societies together. In the last few years we have all heard arguments from religious figures telling us how secularism is devoid of a moral compass — and that the ills of the world are as a result of this and other inadequacies which they see as part of the secular project. This has resulted in politicians showing increased public piety and the growing influence of religious lobby groups and organisations.

In the USA, Sean Faircloth, the new Richard Dawkins Foundation Director of Strategy and Policy, has put forward a 10 Point Plan for a secular America.  In this vein, our top-shelf panel of thinkers asks:  What could/should be Australia’s 10 Point Plan be for a truly secular nation?

The Good Book: 10:00am Saturday 14th April
$5.00 incl. Coffee and muffins.
RSVP 03 9662 2062 or in store essential. All events at shop unless otherwise stated.

AC Grayling

A.C.  Grayling is to philosophy what Carl Sagan was to science. His ability to illuminate philosophy and ethics for the lay person is unparalleled. He has written extensively on a staggering array of subjects: the ethics of war crimes, secularism, human rights, religion, euthanasia, drug use and perhaps most importantly: How to live. This ability to comment and write knowledgeably across such wide ranging areas of popular concern has made him one of the most important public intellectuals of our time.

The Good Book, Grayling’s latest work has, perhaps strangely, been his most controversial. Written as an alternative to the Bible and read as a narrative, it draws upon an impressive line-up of secular writings throughout history. Reading it, one is left wondering what the world would have looked like had this been one of its central foundational texts.  As with the religious alternatives, some of our customers have said that it is best read in small portions, and even prefer to pick pages at random to dip in and out of — though I enjoyed reading it right through. I found that as with reading writers like Shakespeare or James Joyce or Cormac McCarthy the language used takes a little while to adjust to but once you’re there, the works really bear fruit. The reader can start to delight in the poetic language and highly quotable phrases that express what is clearly an immense labor of love.

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“We learn, if we are brave, the power of mind, which is the greatest thing in man; of how, though man is small before nature, his mind can encompass all nature, in thinking of it, and singing about it, searching it in science, and celebrating it in poetry.

So I think all the sages found both courage and modesty through the mind’s contact with nature, and these two things are the begetters of hope.

Is there proof that they were right to hope? Well, only consider: it is many centuries since the first sages paced their groves, and their words and thoughts are with us today, and we speak of them;

Though nature conquered their bodies and their bodies are dispersed into the elements once more, the fruit of their minds is with us still.

Parables 13:9-13” — A.C. Grayling

PZ Myers, Leslie Cannold and Chris Stedman in conversation

Road Less Travelled

You either believe or you don’t (unless you’re agnostic of course). Where’s the middle ground? Can those with opposing views join forces on issues other than those on which they disagree?

On both sides of this divide many say ‘no’: the compromise is either too great or the area of disagreement is the only real issue of importance. This discussion online is, without a doubt, polarised in the way only the internet can be. Views tend to be represented with a bit more vitriol, and a little more dogmatically, than they would be if a face-to-face discussion was taking place. On the 16th of April that face-to-face discussion takes place with 3 very different speakers with 3 very different points of view. Book your place NOW on Eventbrite.

Elisabeth Murdoch
University of Melbourne
Melbourne, Victoria 3004
Australia
Monday, April 16, 2012 at 6:15 PM

The Road Less Travelled features PZ Myers, Leslie Cannold and Christ Stedman in a conversation moderated by the President of The Rationalist Society, Meredith Doig. The evening is an official fringe event for the Global Atheist Convention. Following the talk come to Embiggen Books to chat with the speakers during the after party.

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Leslie Cannold: bioethicist, novelist, columnist and researcher. Regarded as one of Australia’s top public intellectuals and winner of the 2011 Humanist of the Year Award.

PZ Myers: American biology professor at the University of Minnesota Morris and the author of the most popular science blog on the net, Pharyngula.

Chris Stedman: Interfaith and Community Service Fellow for the Humanist Chaplaincy at Harvard University, and columnist for the Huffington Post.

Book Launch and comedy night:
Saturday 21st April 2012 4pm launch at The Wheeler Centre (after party at our shop)
Bookings available via women@vwt.org.au

Nelly Thomas

‘What Women Want’ by Nelly Thomas launches at The Wheeler Centre followed by drinks, signings and book sales over the road with us at Embiggen Books. (Both venues on Little Lonsdale Street, between Swanston and Russell Streets, Melbourne)

Hosted by comedian Cal Wilson. Launched by Liberty Sanger. With performances and presentations by Mary Crooks (Victorian Women’s Trust), Tina del Twiste (aka cabaret diva Wes Snelling). With a reading by, author, Nelly Thomas.

Bookings available via women@vwt.org.au

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With all the moxie of an RSL barmaid and the library card of a research fellow, Nelly Thomas has emerged to talk about nothing slighter than the trials of her generation… She’s erudite, earthy and entirely unemployable.
Helen Razer - The Age (review Melb Comedy Festival)

Growing up in post-feminist Australia, Nelly Thomas, one of Australia’s most gifted and natural comedians, was told she could ‘have it all’. She’s giving it a crack – but she still isn’t quite sure what ‘it’ is.

What do women want?

In pursuit of answers, Thomas has tried being a telemarketer, a professional student, a fast-food worker, a broadcaster, a smoker, a prostitute’s confidant,
a health advocate, a reality television obsessive, a mother, a partner (or is it girlfriend? lover?), an award-winning comedian, a sex-educator, a Loony Lefty
Feminista and a self-confessed fatty boombah. Like many of her generation, she’s had a lot of options, yet she’s wondering – which do you choose?

In this hilarious part-memoir, part-manifesto, Thomas navigates the murky waters of her life and womanhood in the twenty-first century. She tackles the big contemporary issues – career, equality, family, porn, sex, entertainment, obesity, parenting, culture, class, Beyonce’s derriere – with customary insight and a wickedly dry wit.

A must-read for the modern Aussie woman.

Readings with Michael Pryor and George Ivanoff

That’s right we had Michael Pryor and George Ivanoff in our store. Together. On the same day. Were you there or did you miss it? They’re fabulous writer and highly entertaining readers. Here’s a couple of pics from the day.

Michael Pryor at Embiggen Books

George Ivanoff at Embiggen Books

Lawrence Krauss physicist. Dr Krystal Malarial researcher and radio presenter.

Lawrence Krauss: A Universe From Nothing

Lawrence Krauss and Dr Krystal

Lawrence Krauss at Embiggen Books

An extraordinary evening by one of the best science communicators of all time: Lawrence Krauss — speaking about his extraordinary book A Universe From Nothing at Embiggen Books. Thank you to Meredith Doig and the Rationalist Society of Australia for helping to make this possible and also to Dr Krystal from Triple R radio’s science show Einstein A-Go-Go.

Thank you to John Carney for taking these photographs on the night. All photos copyright John Carney ©.

A Universe from Nothing: Why There is Something Rather Than Nothing by Lawrence Krauss

A Universe From Nothing

One of the finest science communicators today, Professor Lawrence Krauss will be in the store and talking about his new book A Universe from Nothing March 17th at 5.00pm. Professor Krauss is a theoretical physicist and cosmologist. He is the  Foundation Professor of the School of Earth and Space Exploration, and director of the Origins Project at Arizona State University. He also serves on the advisory board of Scientists and Engineers for America, an organization focused on promoting sound science in American government. After his talk he will chat with local science show Einstein a Go-Go host Dr Krystal from Triple R radio station.

A Universe From Nothing is an accessible examination of the most basic underpinnings of existence, it has received high praise from top names in the scientific and literary community including Sam Harris, Frank Wilczek, and Ian McEwan.  Krauss’ book provides a bold scientific answer to the foundational question of why there is something rather than nothing, but as you might suspect, it’s far more nuanced than that.

What was once regarded as nothing — empty space — we now know is full of energy, neutrinos and a multitude of strange particles. Today we might regard nothingness as the absence even of these and where the laws of physics, as we know them, have no meaning either. So if you have ever asked the question: what happened before the big bang? or what is nothing? or better yet, how do you get something from nothing? call Embiggen Books during business hours to book your place on 03 9662 2062 or drop in to the store at 197 Little Lonsdale St, Melbourne.