Pembroke Papers is an interdisciplinary forum for talks and sharing research. The society is run by graduate students, but talks are open to everyone, so it represents a chance for the graduate community to shape the academic life of our college
All individuals that discuss topics within Pembroke Papers do so to inform others of the value of their work in a manner that any person can understand, and in a forum in which anyone would feel comfortable.
20 October 2016
The talk will give an overview of how the Cambridge colleges developed in the often-overlooked 19th century, with a focus on Pembroke's own history in this period. It will trace how the image of Oxbridge that we know today emerged as a romanticised reinvention of collegiate ideals transformed the architecture and landscaping of the colleges.
27 October 2016
Telescope observations show that every large galaxy in our Universe hosts a super massive black hole at its centre. Many of these black holes have masses of over one billion times the mass of our sun and these objects are so bright, they can be seen all the way across the Universe. How these black holes become so massive so quickly is currently unknown and we will discuss many of the ideas, from the most mundane, to the most exotic, for how these objects become so large.
3 November 2016
In England and Wales, almost one in six of imprisoned sentenced adult men have been convicted of a sex offence. Alice talks about her recent ethnographic study of HMP Stafford, a medium security prison which only holds men convicted of sex offences. She'll talk about how sex offenders deal with stigma and manage shame, how their feelings about their court cases still structure their feelings about their imprisonment, about the moral and social community which forms among prisoners, and about the relationships they form with staff.
10 November 2016
This talk will discuss the triumphs and failures of the Standard Model, humanity’s best attempt to describe Nature. We will look at the many mysteries that surround our current knowledge and the theoretical and experimental progress towards a better understanding of the Universe.
17 November 2016
Trust is an important but underexplored concept in international relations. We know that trust is crucial for achieving success in negotiations, but trust building measures are costly and time-consuming. How can we use what we know? Which questions remain to be answered? In this talk, we will look at what preconditions are important when building trust, and what some of the main obstacles are.
24 November 2016
AI is a hot topic right now, and has the potential to fundamentally change our way of life. However, it remains a generally poorly understood area outside of media sensationalism. This talk will tell the story of how intelligent machines evolved, where they stand, and where they might be heading. This is a technical talk aimed at a general audience, and is intended to inform attendees of the facts regarding this interesting, and highly relevant field.