Has human prosperity peaked already?

Will the future bring only greater poverty and more turmoil? Is it too late for us to take preventive action? Do we have any real leadership in the world, or are we merely drifting? These questions sound hyperbolic and we must hope they will prove just that. But the signs are frightening. We are not reversing climate change and the population of the world, particularly in the tropics, continues to grow rapidly. Unicef predicts that there will be over one billion under-18s in Africa alone by the middle of the century, only 36 years away. If that extra population were to achieve a decent standard of living, the consequences for the climate would be dire. The prediction is that it will not achieve even a modest standard of living, one of the results being severe migration pressures towards the industrialised world.

Hazhir Teimourian believes that the underlying main cause of the present turmoil in Arab countries is large numbers of young people unable to find worthwhile jobs.  He hopes to be proved mistaken, so please come along and show him!

Hazhir Teimourian was born in the Kurdish country of western Iran in 1940 and has lived and worked in the UK as a commentator on the Middle East for decades, mainly with the BBC and The Times. He is the author of a detailed biography of Omar Khayyam, the eleventh century freethinker and poet who nearly succumbed to the lynch mob. He is writing a book with a professor of demographics at the University of Oxford to investigate these trends and has begun to consult some of the world’s top thinkers and scientists to aid him.

Entry £3, £2 concs./Free to Ethical Society members

Doors 10.30. Tea, Coffee & biscuits will be available.