£1m AHRC Funding Announced for The Ordered Universe Project

Prof Hannah Smithson, Fellow in Psychology, is Co-Investigator with The Ordered Universe Project, an inter-disciplinary exploration of the scientific writings of the medieval bishop Robert Grosseteste.

The Project is a collaboration between a large and international group of historians, linguists, philosophers, theologians, physicists, cosmologists, engineers and neuroscientists. Together this team is investigating Grosseteste’s theories of natural phenomena – such as light, colour and sound – and presenting his 13th century theories and observations to diverse modern audiences.

The Project has been funded and supported by a variety of organisations since its inception in 2010, including the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)’s Science in Culture theme, Durham University’s Institute of Medieval and Early Modern Studies, and the Mahfouz Fund here at Pembroke College.

In recent years the team have held a large number of public workshops around the country, as well as taking part in the Festival of the Humanities and the Cheltenham Science Festival.

The AHRC funding announcement in August 2015 sees a grant of £1m awarded to The Ordered Universe Project to continue its work. This will be used over four years and allows the team to employ two post-doctoral researchers, and to coordinate a further series of symposia to bring together the Project’s collaborators from across the UK, Italy, North America, and the Lebanon. New ventures for 2016 will include working with the Pembroke Access scheme, introducing activities to engage university applicants with the challenges and benefits of inter-disciplinary working.

Prof Smithson commented: “This funding presents a great opportunity to continue the collaborative work of interpreting Grosseteste’s  remarkable scientific writings.  There is much to learn from reflecting on the history of a field of study.  My own research focuses on human colour perception about which Grosseteste has much to say – indeed his descriptions are as insightful and thought provoking as many modern writings on colour, albeit that his investigations start from a different place.”

Find out more about The Ordered Universe Project at www.ordered-universe.com