Today we bring you another video from our Beautiful Science events season.

For this event we joined forces with our colleagues in the BL’s Social Sciences team to explore the age-old nature vs nurture debate in the era of epigenetics. Epigenetics is the study of how genes can be switched on or off by environmental factors such as nutrients, toxins and hormones. This relatively new field has revolutionized the nature vs nurture dichotomy as we now know that both our genes (‘nature’) and our environment (‘nurture’) can affect who we are. This panel debate and lively Q&A session explored the social, ethical and political implications of this new and exciting area of study.

The event was chaired by Professor Jane Elliot (Institute of Education and ESRC). Expert speakers were Professor George Davey Smith (University of Bristol) and Professor Nikolas Rose (King’s College London).

 

Note: For more about epigenetics check out this handy guide from Wikipedia.

Katie Howe