Is there a great divide between the arts and science?

Arts & Ideas

BBC

Society & Culture

4.2 • 598 Ratings

🗓️ 5 December 2018

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Geneticist Sir Paul Nurse, current director of the Francis Crick Institute, and Tristram Hunt, historian and now director of the V&A, debate the impact of robots, the winners and losers in funding, whether our education system has the balance right between STEM and Arts subjects and they reveal their own arts and science hits and misses. Recorded before an audience at Queen Mary University London, the presenter is Shahidha Bari.

Nearly 60 years on from C.P. Snow's 'Two Cultures' lecture in which the chemist and novelist argued that a great divide existed between art and science, this conversation considers the relationship between the two in 2018.

Producer: Craig Templeton Smith

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome back to the home of the oxymoron. Evil genius. He asked the newspaper to print his obituary early so he'd enjoy it. That's like hiding at your own funeral. Yeah, a big, great gig. I'm Russell Kane. Join me to weigh in on whether the biggest players in history are more evil or genius. Becoming that rich, I'd say that is some level of genius. It also helps that it's a long time ago, right?
0:23.3	It's like the podcast version of telling your kids the ice cream van plays music when it's
0:27.5	out of ice cream.
0:28.8	Listen to evil genius on BBC Sounds.
0:33.3	BBC Sounds, music, radio podcasts.
0:37.5	Hello, you. Yes, you with the inquiring mind and the artistic hair.
0:43.2	Thank you for downloading this podcast. We promise to keep you company as you trek the lonely path to work, laugh with you as you loll in the bath and whisper sweet somethings into your ear as you drift into sleep.
0:56.4	I'm Shahad Abari and I think you and the Arts and Ideas podcast from BBC Radio 3 are just meant to be together.
1:04.5	Think of it as a love letter heading straight to your brain, delivered to you in just a moment after this.
1:11.5	Hello, I'm composer Michael Barclay, and I just want to let you know about my podcast,
1:16.4	which I think you might enjoy.
1:18.0	It's called Private Passions.
1:19.9	Every week, a different guest chooses the classical music they're passionate about.
1:24.4	People like Alan Bennett, Jan Ravens, Grace and Perry.
1:28.8	And what I love about it is how much people reveal of themselves when they're talking about and listening to the music
1:34.3	which moves them. Just search for private passions in BBC Sounds. Download the free app now.
1:42.5	Hello. There's no denying that here in 2018, we live in polarised times, whether it's
1:49.8	Democrats versus Republicans, Remainers versus Brexiteers, or X Factor versus strictly on a Saturday night.
1:57.4	Why share the friendly middle ground when you can glare at each other from across the room?
2:03.1	Intellectuals aren't above divisions either. Almost 60 years ago, the novelist and chemist
2:08.5	C.P. Snow delivered a landmark lecture lamenting the gulf between scientists and literary
2:14.2	intellectuals. The two cultures debate has raged on since, and we return to it tonight.
	...

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