Main content

Existential Risk

Sheila Heti, SJ Beard and Omar Elerian discuss different artistic and philosophical approaches to dealing with threats to humanity's existence. Shahidha Bari presents.

The doomsday clock stands at less than two minutes to midnight, but how alarmed should we be and how can art respond to humanity's apparent vulnerability? Shahidha Bari is joined by author Sheila Heti, theatre director Omar Elerian and New Generation Thinker SJ Beard.

Sheila Heti's new novel Pure Colour, a kind of fable about end times, is published on 15th February. You can find her discussing a previous novel exploring motherhood in the Free Thinking archives /programmes/b0b3fjvg

The Chairs (Les Chaises) by Eugene Ionesco, translated and directed by Omar Elerian, runs at the Almeida Theatre, London until 5th March. First staged in post-war Paris in 1952, it features two characters, Old Man and Old Woman, who spend the play preparing chairs for a series of invisible guests coming to hear a revelation that could be the meaning of life, or could be about the end of the world.

SJ Beard is Academic Programme Manager at the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk and a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by 91热爆 Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to share academic research on the radio. You can find their Essay about AI and what we learn from Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide on 91热爆 Sounds /programmes/b09vz70d

Producer: Torquil MacLeod

Image: The 2022 Doomsday Clock revealed in January
Image credit: Thomas Gaulkin/Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

Available now

44 minutes

Last on

Thu 10 Feb 2022 22:00

Broadcast

  • Thu 10 Feb 2022 22:00

Featured in...

The Arts & Ideas Podcast

The Arts & Ideas Podcast

You can download all the past episodes of Radio 3's Free Thinking

Discussions and talks from the Free Thinking Festival 2019

Discussions and talks from the Free Thinking Festival 2019

Angry politics, what we can鈥檛 say, being diplomatic, weeping, emotion in music, film & TV

Click to listen to discussions, talks and music as the Free Thinking Festival 2019 Gets Emotional

Click to listen to discussions, talks and music as the Free Thinking Festival 2019 Gets Emotional

Angry politics, what we can鈥檛 say, being diplomatic, weeping, emotion in music, film & TV

CLICK to LISTEN & SEE programmes from the Free Thinking Festival 2018: The One & the Many

CLICK to LISTEN & SEE programmes from the Free Thinking Festival 2018: The One & the Many

We examine the fast-changing relationship between the individual & the crowd

CLICK to LISTEN & SEE all programmes, images, clips & features from 2017's festival

Free Thinking Festival 2017: The Speed of Life