They are among the greatest thinkers of the day, driving forward an understanding in a range of disciplines from the origins of the cosmos to the nature of consciousness. But from today, 12 of the world‘s leading academics will be available to expound on their latest theories at the touch of a button.
Richard Dawkins, evolutionary biologist, Niall Ferguson, controversial history professor and the media‘s current academic favourite, and Sir Martin Rees, the astronomer royal, are three of the eminent dons who will deliver interactive, online lectures on a ground breaking internet site to be launched today.
In a development which may herald the web‘s coming of age as a powerful educational tool, the series of "e-lectures" will cover topics as diverse as the human genome project, Shakespeare‘s Othello and the relationship between power and money.
Alongside the eminent British contingent, will be three leading American academics, including Steven Pinker, the world-renowned professor of brain and cognitive sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
His lecture, the Ingredients of Language, poses some fundamental questions. "How does language work?" he asks. "What is the trick behind our ability to share so many different kinds of ideas, merely by making noise as we exhale? ... the prediction that regular forms are generated by rule whenever memory fails helps to make sense of the many puzzles of language, such as how children learn their mother tongue, where language resides in the brain and why no one really seems to know the plural of Walkman."
Richard Halkett, who set up Boxmind - the company producing the e-lectures - with two fellow Oxford graduates three years ago, said: "Everybody has heard of Richard Dawkins, Niall Ferguson and the others. They might have heard them on the radio or seen them on television but very few will ever have had the chance to hear them deliver a lecture. Now they can log on and see them put forward their greatest theories."
Boxmind claims the site will blow apart traditional approaches to study. Because the lectures are not delivered by a live webcast but by a broadcast of filmed material, users can stop the action at any point and follow the extensive links on each page for in-depth background information on specific points. The lectures can also be rewound and examined line by line for weaknesses in the argument.
The technology used for the site - www. - is as inventive as the concept. Each lecture screen is split into four. In the top left, a talking head delivers the lecture, while synchronised slides run in the top right. In the bottom right there is a synchronised transcript of the entire lecture - complete with embedded footnotes - next to the relevant web links.
The 12 lectures will form the foundations of a growing archive. But there is one drawback: the resource is open to members of the public only until the end of the month. After that, the lectures will be licensed for use by individual universities, which will also be able to have their own academic staff delivering lectures in the same way.
"It is a pity that the public won‘t be able to access them," said Mr Halkett. "But the reality of internet businesses since the dot.com collapse is that we have to make real money."
The technology driving the site has potential far beyond academia. One option already under discussion is a deal with publishers for similar sites to tie in with new book releases, especially in the booming popular science market. That opens the possibility of readers being able to log on and have ready access to leading authors - Stephen Hawking, for example - to take them through their latest work.
The launch of the e-lectures is also likely to intensify demands for high quality online learning. So far the internet‘s potential as an educational resource has been limited by the sheer volume of information it carries.
In February last year, David Blunkett, the education secretary, announced plans for the world‘s first national e-university, offering a "British university education" worldwide.
But since then the grand plan has foundered, with many sceptics dubbing it an irrelevant white elephant on a par with the Millennium Dome. The government itself admits that the project is at least four years from fruition.
But Mr Halkett said the new e-lectures were proof that the internet could be made to deliver. "We started off building an online library but we quickly realised how scarce decent material is out there. We decided to produce our own and now we have a lecture series which offers dynamic, unrivalled access to the most persuasive thinkers of the day."
Heavy hitters in the groves of academe
The site‘s first 12 lecturers are:
Richard Dawkins
Fellow of New College, Oxford, and Charles Simonyi, professor of the public understanding of science. Lecture title: Survival of the Fittest - the Fittest What?
Niall Ferguson
Professor of political and financial history, at Oxford. Lecture title: The Cash Nexus - Money and Power in the Modern World.
Sir Martin Rees
Astronomer Royal and Royal Society professor at Kings College, Cambridge. Lecture title: Cosmic Evolution.
Daniel Dennett
Professor of philosophy, and director of the Center for Cognitive Studies at Tufts University, Massachusetts. Lecture title: Consciousness: More Like Fame Than Television.
Peter Atkins
SmithKline Beecham fellow and tutor in physical chemistry at Lincoln College, Oxford. Lecture title: The Second Law.
John Kay
Fellow of St John‘s College, Oxford, and visiting professor of economics at the London School of Economics. Lecture title: The Foundations of Corporate Success.
David Womersley
Fellow and tutor in English literature and senior tutor of Jesus College, Oxford. Lecture title: Tragedy and Individuality in Othello.
John Searle
Mills professor of the philosophy of mind and language, University of California at Berkeley. Lecture title: Consciousness, Free Will and the Brain.
Sir David Weatherall
Regius professor of medicine at Oxford. Lecture title: The Human Genome Project and the Future of Medical Practice.
Ian Stewart
Professor of mathematics at Warwick University. Lecture title: Order and Chaos in Mathematics and Nature.
Nicola Lacey
Professor of criminal law at LSE. Lecture title: Criminal Law and Modern Society.
Steven Pinker
Peter de Florez professor in the department of brain and cognitive sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Lecture title: The Ingredients of Language.
