David Nutt – Time to put Science at the Heart of Drug and Alcohol Policy

David Nutt is a psychiatrist at Imperial College London. Here he uses a range of brain imaging techniques to explore the causes of addiction and other psychiatric disorders and to search for new treatments. He has published over 400 original research papers, a similar number of reviews and books chapters, eight government reports on drugs and 28 books, including one for the general public, Drugs: without the hot air, that won the Transmission Prize in 2014. He is currently the President of the European Brain Council and Founding Chair of DrugScience (formerly the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs (ISCD). Previously he has been president of the British Association of Psychopharmacology the British Neuroscience Association and the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology.

He broadcasts widely to the general public both on radio and television. In 2010 The Times Eureka science magazine voted him one of the 100 most important figures in British Science, and the only psychiatrist in the list. In 2013 he was awarded the John Maddox Prize from Nature/Sense about Science for standing up for science.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Nutt

Find out more here or by following him on twitter @ProfDavidNutt

His talk tonight will explore the inconsistencies and injustices that emerge from the un-scientific methods we use to control alcohol and other drugs. He will explain how there are more rational and functional approaches and encourage Scotland to rise to the challenge of breaking out of the current flawed position.

Skeptics on the Fringe is proud to be part of PBH’s Free Fringe. Our talks are free and unticketed, so come early to the Free Fringe’s spoken word hub at the Banshee Labyrinth to be sure of a seat.

We have a different topic every day, bringing science, reason and critical thinking to the largest arts festival in the world.

Our website for the entire run is:

http://www.edinburghskeptics.co.uk/fringe

Due to very very high demand we will be issuing queuing tokens for this talk.

Tokens will be issued at the Leslie Mabon talk on Wed 17th to anyone who wishes to come to both talks.

Remaining tokens will be issued starting at 6pm Thursday afternoon outside the Banshee Labyrinth Front Door.

Interest for this talk is high and we expect all tokens to be issued by 7.15pm if not earlier.

60 tokens will be issued and this should guarantee everyone who gets one a seat in the Chamber room.

Anyone not getting a token will have the opportunity to either take any unfilled seats; stand at the back of the Chamber room; or we hope to have a live feed to the small bar at the back, as we have done on previous occasions with large crowds (this is not 100% guaranteed yet but will be confirmed tonight).

We will be looking to prioritize the podcast recording of this so that if anyone cannot get in they will get a chance to listen to the talk as soon as possible.

If there are any changes to our published speakers, we will try to send an email to anyone whose said they're be attending, but please check online for changes. All events start at 7.50 pm prompt and last for 1 hour (with discussions in the bar afterwards). We will try to include a couple of questions in the hour long talk but this may not be possible. Please note that these restrictions, the timeslot, and the venue are out-with our realistic control, and we apologise for any inconvenience.

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