On the Town: Prof David McConnell, of Trinity College Dublin, drew a large crowd to RTÉ's Radio Centre this week to hear his lecture, The Greatest Success Story of Our Time: Making Sense of Science in the 21st Century.
"This modern Garden of Eden could not exist without science and technology," said McConnell, delivering the annual Michael Littleton Memorial Lecture, in honour of the late broadcaster. "We must do all we can to ensure that it is put to good use. We must begin to focus our science on those huge humanitarian problems of hunger, illness and environmental degradation in the developing countries.
"The public can be confident of the rigour and authority of the scientific method," added McConnell, professor of genetics at TCD's Smurfit Institute of Genetics. "Truth will come out in science for the simple reason that every scientific observation must be reproducible or else it is false. Every hypothesis must be supported by a great range of tests, and not disproven, if it is to achieve the status of a theory. It is important to find ways of increasing public and political confidence in science."
Zan O'Doherty, from Dún Laoghaire, attended the lecture with her husband, Dr Kevin O'Doherty. Science student William Cross, from Rathangan, Co Kildare, and his nephew, James Cross, a biology student at NUI Maynooth, said they were both interested in McConnell's subject. Beatrice Conway, whose late father was EJ Conway (first professor of biochemistry at UCD and winner of the Boyle Medal), was also in the audience.
Members of Michael Littleton's family attended the lecture, which will be broadcast on RTÉ Radio 1 on Monday, December 26th, at 2.30pm.