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The Simonyi Professorship for the Public Understanding of Science is a chair at the University of Oxford. The chair was established in 1995 for the ethologist Richard Dawkins by an endowment from Charles Simonyi.[1][2] The aim of the Professorship is 'to communicate science to the public without, in doing so, losing those elements of scholarship which constitute the essence of true understanding'. It is a position that had been endowed by Charles Simonyi with the express intention that the holder "be expected to make important contributions to the public understanding of some scientific field",[3] and that its first holder should be Richard Dawkins.[4]
[...] if I am asked for a single phrase to characterize my role as Professor of the Public Understanding of Science, I think I would claim Advocate for Disinterested Truth.
Richard Dawkins explained the history of the creation of the chair in a chapter of his memoirs, Brief Candle in the Dark: My Life in Science.[2] In 2008, Dawkins retired and the Oxford mathematician Marcus du Sautoy was elected to the chair.[6][7]
Richard Dawkins established an annual "Charles Simonyi Lecture" at the University of Oxford. He invited the following speakers:[8][9]
Marcus du Sautoy, second Simonyi Professor, invited:[9]
