12:00
Cambridge University
June 18
Churchill College
Join us to hear from Churchill College alumna and Honorary Fellow Prof. Helen Czerski, a physicist, writer and broadcaster, in conversation with the Master of Churchill College, Prof. Sharon Peacock, as they discuss Helen’s award?winning book Blue Machine: How the Ocean Shapes Our World. Earth has a story that is rarely told. Not the fish or the dolphins, but the ocean itself: a single vast engine, powered by sunlight, that shapes our climate, our weather, and the whole of human history. In Blue Machine: How the Ocean Shapes Our World, Helen Czerski dives deep into this hidden system, tracing the powerful currents, invisible ocean walls and underwater waterfalls that drive life on our planet. From the ancient Polynesians who navigated the Pacific by reading the waves, to the Greenland shark living silently in the deep for hundreds of years, she reveals the thrilling extent to which all life, including our own, exists at the mercy of this great engine. Timely, elegant and passionately argued, Blue Machine offers a fresh perspective on what it means to live on an ocean planet. It won the 2024 Wainwright Prize for Conservation Writing and was named a top non-fiction book of 2023 by both The Times and the Financial Times. All attendees are invited to join a free drinks reception following the talk.