With more nations developing space programs and more billionaires rushing to join Elon Musk in the industrialization of Earth’s orbit, we suddenly face the prospect of a ‘tragedy of the commons’ in outer space.

 What role can a science-informed, carefully regulated approach to the development of Earth’s orbit have in protecting and nourishing the planet?

 Moriba Jah describes himself as a celestial steward with a mission to preserve a safe, prosperous and sustainable Earth-space environment.

 As an astrophysicist, TED Fellow and National Geographic Explorer, Jah publicly promotes the safe, peaceful and sustainable use of outer space and the need for a global, accessible and transparent space traffic management system.

 Moriba Jah is a powerful, inspirational, interdisciplinary speaker who reaches a global audience.

 Join us for an evening of enlightenment on the health of the Earth-space environment – of Gaia – and what we can do to save it.

Tickets available HERE

We all know and love Carol Off as an award-winning journalist, author and host of CBC Radio’s As it Happens, for which she conducted 25,000 interviews over 16 years. She is an icon of Canadian journalism and a beacon of humour, compassion and insight.

 Carol Off’s latest book: At A Loss for Words: Conversation in an Age of Rage (Random House 2024) has been called “…an elegy and a call to arms”.

 In the book, Carol Off studies six words whose meaning and use, she feels, have been hijacked and twisted to mean something completely different. As a result, we are losing our political vocabulary—and with it, the ability to speak with and hear each other in meaningful ways.

 We are left unable to reckon with the complexities of the crises we face, and become easy prey to conspiracy theories, tech billionaires, and autocrats.

It is true that dictionaries add and remove words each year. Are language and society simply evolving?

 Or is the “dumbing down” of language and society, along with a democracy now dictated by capitalism, leading to less nuanced, balanced and important discussions, and, by extension, to people’s inability to accurately articulate their own thoughts and needs?

 Carol Off wonders if we can reclaim the value of words like: Democracy, Freedom and Truth.

 Please join us for this special discussion with a very special guest.

Tickets availabe HERE 

Captain James Cook is famous for exploring and mapping Oceania, Australia, New Zealand and the West Coast of North America up to Nootka Sound.

 Cook is also famous for his desire to “civilize” the people he encountered on his three voyages and the often-brutal means he employed in pursuit of that goal.

 Two-and-a-half centuries later, colonialism has stolen the lands and cultures of Indigenous peoples, and “civilization” is still being forced onto them.

 Alice Te Punga Somerville is a Māori poet, author, scholar and irredentist. She is also the Head of the Department of English Language and Literatures at UBC.

 Professor Te Punga Somerville’s research goes deep into stories told by Māori and First Nations as opposed to the stories told about them.

 She will be joined on stage by local author, historian, anthropologist and fellow Māori Chris Arnett.

 What do the stories told by Māori and First Nations reveal? How can they find wider audiences?

 How do the experiences of Māori in Aotearoa (New Zealand) compare with the First Nations of BC?

 Are Māori any closer to acceptable reconciliation than our First Nations?

 How can non-Indigenous people develop respect and understanding for the histories, perspectives and continuing importance of Indigenous peoples?

 Tickets available HERE from February 3rd.