There are reasons to be optimistic that we can start to know something about whether life exists elsewhere. But, says Charles Cockell, a more remarkable finding might be that we are exceptional
Academic Jack Davis tells John Morgan of his surprise at learning that his history of the Gulf of Mexico had won a Pulitzer prize and his hope that it will help to deliver a pro-environmental message
Precarity is a significant feature of the academy worldwide, creating a feeling of ‘academic apartheid’ as it grows. Ellie Bothwell explores its impact
Lincoln Allison was inspired to teach by academics who loved what they did and communicated this to students. But has all passion for teaching been eliminated by creeping assessment and instrumentalism?
Seekers of dispassionate truth may be irritated by the moral passion of the likes of Dostoevsky, Zola and Chekhov, but it is a much stronger influence on public opinion, says David Aberbach
Educators accusing students of not working hard enough is simply a shirking of their responsibility to actually meet learners’ needs, says Katherine Gould
The accounting magic the UK government performs to handle outstanding student loans has once again been questioned, but the timing couldn’t be worse for universities, says Andy Westwood
Don’t believe the hype; Finnish universities face just as many problems with professional mismanagement and staff morale as those in other countries, says Gareth Rice
The entanglement of the university and tech worlds faces increased scrutiny following the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Could joint positions in industry and academia offer a workable and ethically defensible way forward? David Matthews reports
What is it like to be a bat?; writing about yourself; when safety compromises freedom; a pioneer of the history of medicine; and rethinking the Garden of Eden
While Vieno Vehko empathises with millennials’ burden of tuition debt, she also finds it hard to respect a group that neither reads critically nor takes responsibility for its learning
