Leading Edge - 03/09/2009

Geoff Watts meets Lord May, President of the British Science Association, who has held many of the most senior scientific offices in the land, having been government chief science advisor and President of the Royal Society. Never afraid of speaking his mind - perhaps a product of his Australian upbringing - Bob May famously accused President George W Bush of being a modern-day Nero over climate change. His address at this year's Science Festival in Guildford will focus on his own subject of population biology and the apparent problem of natural selection; why do we do things for the common good when 'survival of the fittest' is a key principle of evolutionary theory? Also, insect art comes to London's South Bank in a 'Pestival' of the amazing, inventive and sometimes artistic world of six-legged creatures.