Annual Review May 2011 – May 2012 To celebrate, recognise, preserve, protect and encourage excellence in all of the scholarly disciplines, and in the professions, industry and commerce, the arts and public service; o promote the advancement of “ T learning and scholarship and the dissemination and application of the results of academic enquiry and research; To act as a source of independent “ Mission and expert scholarly advice and comment on matters affecting the wellbeing of Wales and its people and to advance public discussion and interaction on matters of national and international importance. For more information about the Society, contact: Company Number Dr Lynn Williams 7256948 Chief Executive and Secretary The Learned Society of Wales Registered Charity Number PO Box 586 1141526 Cardiff CF11 1NU (29) 2037 6951 email: [email protected] or visit the Society’s website: www.learnedsocietywales.ac.uk The period of time between one Annual General Meeting of the Society and the next is defined as a Society Year. The present Review reports on the Society Year for the period between the Annual General Meetings held on 25 May 2011 and 23 May 2012. President’s Introduction The Learned Society of Wales is The Learned Society of Wales will and have continued to: Wales’s first national scholarly reach full maturity only over many develop an exciting programme of academy and its establishment in years and the range of its activities lectures and other events; May 2010 marked a very important will necessarily be built up gradually build relationships with key development in the intellectual and over time. We have some way to go stakeholders in Welsh academia, cultural life of our nation. We now before we can emulate the great the Welsh Government and Civil have the beginnings of an academy academies of London and Edinburgh, Service and beyond; and of learning of the kind that has long and those that flourish across engage in public policy debate, for existed elsewhere in the United Europe, in North America, and example, in the areas of the Kingdom. beyond but, as the pages that follow Welsh Assembly Government’s show, with continuing and generous support for our universities, The Society’s guiding ethos is pump-priming support of the science policy and research Celebrating Scholarship and Serving University of Wales and valuable help the Nation. Our aim is to celebrate, funding policy. from other sources, notably the recognise, safeguard and encourage universities in Wales that have I look forward to reporting further excellence in every one of the hosted our events, we have enjoyed on progress in future Annual scholarly disciplines and in the an encouraging second year. Reviews. professions, industry and commerce, the arts and public service, so that For example, we have: Wales should come to be seen widely elected a very strong cohort of and justifiably, as a small but clever seventy three new Fellows, to add country. Over time and to the excellent lists of Founding appropriately-supported, the Society Fellows and Fellows elected in the will ensure that Wales’s intellectual Inaugural Election last year; and capability is properly represented taken the first steps towards and promoted on the international securing a Royal Charter for the stage. It will harness and channel the Society (which is currently nation’s talent for the good of our constituted as a company limited country, giving our people, politicians by guarantee under a and policy-makers, and business Memorandum and Articles of people access to well-researched, Association); scholarly and objective advice on issues of key importance. It will act Sir John Cadogan CBE DSc FRSE FRSC PLSW FRS as a defender of and protagonist for President the very activities and functions which must surely underpin the notion of Welsh cleverness, particularly in these difficult times. Celebrating Scholarship and Serving the Nation Learned Society of Wales Annual Review 2011-12 | Page 31 The Society’s Programme of Events: Series and Themes During the year we continued to Our Themes are: develop a number of lecture series and some special themes that support the Invention, Innovation and Change Energy world of learning and organised and At the heart of our understanding of The production and consumption of participated in a successful programme change is the interplay between the energy are fundamental to our social, of more than twenty events. technical, commercial and social economic and political lives. The aspects of inventions, innovations and problems of energy are sources of The current Lecture Series are: improvements. Events organised under inspired and grand technologies, this theme explore these fundamentals massive commercial enterprises, bitter Frontiers- a lecture series in which of the “knowledge economy”. international quarrels, magisterial distinguished academics are invited to rhetorics, passionate beliefs, and speak about the frontiers of research The History of Science and Technology wishful thinking. Under this theme the and to place their own contributions in Wales and its people have played a Society is examining the complex and context. Frontiers Lecturers are drawn substantial role in the growth of important subject of energy from a from the first rank of their disciplines, scientific knowledge and its application, variety of standpoints, confronting and are often visitors to Wales. yet the history and heritage of Wales in speculation and belief with academic science and technology are little known rigour and evidence. Anniversaries - a series of lectures, each and neglected. This theme is associated with an anniversary, often developing the history of science and During the year, it was decided that marking people or achievements that technology and its appreciation in two further themes should also be have connections to Wales, in which general, and the Welsh scientific and developed: distinguished academics are invited to technological heritage in particular. reflect on discoveries, or to celebrate a The multi-disciplinary theme of person or event. The Universities Patronage will examine the various types of patronage in the arts and the Universities are central to the sciences and in public life, as development of the modern world. manifested in Wales, the UK and Expectations of higher education from beyond, and will address the individuals, businesses and motivations and mechanisms for governments increase and sometimes patronage and its consequences; and conflict. The global question arises: What are Universities for? Events Welsh Civil Society will explore the organised under The Universities theme peculiar development of civil society in explore both their societal and Wales in the context of the recent economic functions and their devolution of significant powers of self- intellectual and cultural roles. determination to a semi-independent Welsh Assembly, through a series of lectures that range across sociology and politics, history, cultural and media studies, and literature. Page 4 | Learned Society of Wales Annual Review 2011-12 Programme of Events 4 June 2011 at the National Museum 13 July 2011 at Cardiff University 27 October 2011 at Cardiff University Cardiff Gravitational Waves: Listening to the Stability and Complexity in Model Ancient Britons, Europe and Wales: True Music of the Spheres!, a lecture Banking Systems, a lecture by New Research in Genetics, by Professor Bernard Schutz FInstP Professor Lord May of Oxford OM AC Archaeology, and Linguistics, FLSW, Director of the Max Planck Kt FRS, Oxford University, President of a one-day Conference jointly Institute for Gravitational Physics (The the Royal Society 2000-2005. In the sponsored by the University of Wales Albert Einstein Institute), Potsdam, context of the recent banking crises, Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic and Professor at the School of Physics which have made it clear that Studies and The Learned Society of and Astronomy, Cardiff University; increasingly complex strategies for Wales, and organised by Professor Sir organised by the School in association managing risk in individual banks and Barry Cunliffe CBE FSA FLSW FBA and with the Society, on the occasion of investment funds have not been Professor John Koch FLSW. the Amaldi-9 and NRDA-2011 matched by corresponding attention Conferences. to overall systemic risks, the lecture explored the implications of simple 20 – 22 July 2011 at Bangor University mathematical caricatures of “banking Writing Welsh History, 18501950: ecosystems” and showed that Contexts and Comparisons, a strategies that tend to minimise risk Conference to mark the Centenary of J. for individual banks can maximise the E. Lloyd’s History of Wales (1911); probability of systemic failure. marking the groundbreaking work carried out by Sir John Edward Lloyd in establishing Welsh history as an academic discipline, the conference was organised by the School of History, Welsh History and Archaeology at the University of Bangor in association with the Society; speakers included a number of the 7 June 2011 at Cardiff University Society’s Fellows (Professor Thomas The Coldest March of Robert Falcon Charles-Edwards FRHistS FLSW FBA, Professor Lord May Scott, an Anniversaries lecture by Professor Robert Evans FLSW FBA, Professor Susan Solomon ForMemRS, Professor Ralph Griffiths OBE DLitt University of Colorado at Boulder, FRHistS FLSW, Professor Prys Morgan sponsored by the Society as one of the FRHistS FSA FLSW and Professor Huw Scott Lecture Series