Just got this in my inbox, in case anybody wants to go to something free.

This year the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland will host our annual public outreach lecture during Ireland’s national Science Week (11th November until the 18th November). The speaker is Dr Michael Stebbins and he has an interesting spin on American science policy and how the Bush administration is interfering with science, often very misguidedly and from a religious perspective (never a good thing when it comes to answering awkward scientific questions). His talk will be entitled “Mopping up the mess: Bringing US science policy back from the brink of insanity” and will be held on 13th November at 7pm in the O’Flanagan Theatre, RCSI.

Michael has a good sense of humour and not very much time for politicians interfering with science and basing decisions on their religious beliefs rather than scientific evidence. He is currently the Director of the Biology Policy for the Federation of American Scientists. Prior to joining FAS, Dr. Stebbins was a congressional fellow in the US Senate and before moving to Washington, Dr. Stebbins was a senior editor at Nature Genetics (“a rather snooty science journal” his words). He has written for Reuters and numerous scientific journals and is a science advisor for ScienCentral a television production company that produces stories for the ABC and NBC affiliates. He has a B.S. in Biology from SUNY at Stony Brook and received his Ph.D. in genetics while working at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. Sex, Drugs & DNA is his first book, if you are interested in finding out more about Dr Stebbins please check out his website http://www.sexdrugsanddna.com/ .

Michael also does work for the FBI, as well as a weekly appearance on a radio show where he tends to “kick the President in the teeth for his administrations and actions regarding science policy” (his words quoted). He had his intern build a website mirroring the Department of Homeland Security website, only in his version any false information is corrected www.reallyready.org

This is a lecture open to members of the public. Admission is free but ticketed – for tickets please contact Dr Kate Johnston in the Research Office katejohnston@rcsi.ie. The limit on the number of tickets has been set to 2 per request, please include your name and postal address in the e-mail.

Please feel free to forward this e-mail on to your department or externally as this is a lecture open to the public.

Kind regards,
Kate

Dr. Kate Johnston,
REC convenor / Outreach Officer / Research Project Officer,
Research Office,
Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland.
Ph +353 (0)1 402 8651
Fax +353 (0)1 402 2449
Email: katejohnston@rcsi.ie
Website: http://www.rcsi.ie/